Xavier Becerra Jumps Into Governor's Race

[00:00:06] If you're a California conservative, a libertarian, a moderate Democrat, believe in common sense, or just the sane person, this is the political podcast for you. It's the California Underground Podcast.

[00:00:27] What's going on, everybody? Thanks for tuning into another episode of the California Underground Podcast, the most trusted podcast for all things California politics. I am your host, Phil. And as always with me, my trusty cohost, the best, the fastest researcher in the West, Camille. How are you doing tonight, Camille? I'm good. My ring light is spazzing. It's a beautiful day. And the foster cat is gone. The demon cat's gone.

[00:00:54] Yeah, people don't know it was a demon cat, but it was a demon cat. I default to demon cats and apologies to anyone who is a cat person, but in Italian culture, and I believe in also Mexican culture, cats are believed to be agents of Satan. Well, that one was. I guess my great-grandmother who came over. Well, that one was. For sure.

[00:01:16] From what you told me, I think that cat was an agent of Satan, but I think it was my great-grandmother who came over from Italy, used to say, you can't let cats near babies because they'll steal their breath. So, hey, look, who am I to argue with? An old lady who came over from Italy. I mean, yeah, I didn't have any cats when I had babies. So, and then I had- No baby's breath was stolen.

[00:01:41] Demon cat was, he like infiltrated my house. He came in and acted all sweet and then he turned into a demon. Anyway. He reverted to his natural form of being an demon. Got it. All right. Tonight's show, we got a lot going on. Xavier Becerra jumping into the crowded gubernatorial race with Katie Porter. Antonio Villanueva, did he jump into? I feel like I should really get a list. Who's in? Speaker Rivas?

[00:02:11] Is he it? No, no, no, no, no. That was sorry. I just saw his- It's easy to remember who's not in. Okay. So, we mean, I guess, Xavier Becerra, Katie Porter on the left and maybe Kamala Harris, we still don't know. We'll know within the next few months. Sheriff Bianco on the right. That's about it on the right. I feel like there was more on the left.

[00:02:39] I actually have a tab open if I want to go find it, but then I'm like afraid I'll accidentally close this tab. But, um, because wasn't there? Oh, um, the lieutenant governor whose name I cannot pronounce. Oh, Elena Kolonakis or something. Yeah. She's still in. Yep. Yeah. So it's getting more and more crowded. I'm not surprised by Xavier Becerra, but we're going to jump into his early announcement. His, we have his announcement video and a clip of him talking about affordability.

[00:03:09] Uh, what his thoughts are on affordability here in California and his ideas to, well, I don't think he really has any ideas on how to address it. And then we're going to talk about a study that recently came out from USC that says shocker. The reason gas prices are so expensive here in California is not due to corporate greed. It's due to the policies of California. We needed a study to actually figure that out.

[00:03:36] So, um, I want to know how much that, uh, program at USC made just on, on that alone. But before we get started, as always, we do like to start with a nice little cringe video. Um, so this one, I, this is not the way to describe. I'm going to warn everybody right now. If you have children in the room, please escort them out. This is, uh, if you haven't had dinner yet also, um, I warn you, you may lose your appetite.

[00:04:04] Uh, you've been warned. We'll give you some time. Here's the stinger of our good friend, Kamala Harris. So I was willing to give up whatever might be the tracking of Kamala Harris's particular fondness for nacho cheese Doritos. Yep. For the sake of getting a big bag of Doritos as I watched the Oscars. Uh, funny enough, people involved in this video probably were at the Oscars most recently.

[00:04:34] So this was a promotional video, one of those, uh, celebrity promotional, Hey, we're getting the word out sort of thing. And they took an interesting angle to get your attention. So, uh, we'll watch and then hopefully we're still here after we. Yeah. Right. We're going to lose everyone, but I'm not going to give away any of the contents of the video, but who's paying these people?

[00:05:01] Somebody must be, I think they, do you think that the, some of these are doing it just because they think it's the righteous thing to do? Or do you think like their publicist is like, no, this is a good idea. You should do this. And someone's paying them. I, because a lot of these celebrities. Okay. So I didn't, when you, you know, you only set this video like a couple hours ago and you're like, this is our cringe moment. I didn't finish watching it because I'm going to have to watch it again here anyway.

[00:05:29] Maybe we could kind of dive into that after we watch the video, or maybe people in the chat will have suggestions or something, but I, I'm genuinely curious about who's, are they being paid? Do they just enjoy being this cringe? Um, and who's paying them? I'm like, Kamala had to pay a lot of people to show up at a rallies.

[00:05:54] So, you know, they, they, a lot of these celebrities didn't do it just because they thought Kamala was a good candidate. They did it because they're getting paid a boatload of money. Um, so, but anyway, let's, uh, let's watch this video. Apologies in advance. If anyone's still left, um, we'll check the chat to see how everyone's vitals are doing, but here we go. I'm naked. I am completely butt-ass naked. I'm naked. I'm like, naked. There isn't a man behind me. These are my hands.

[00:06:24] Why you want me to be naked? I know what you're thinking. You're thinking Ruffalo, um, put your clothes on. To be honest, I wish I could cover my hands with my boobs, but here we are. I'm here to talk to you about voting. Did you know that ballots could be naked? And if you don't do exactly what I tell you, your ballot could get thrown out. This is, uh, my ballot. Just got it. First of all, when your ballot comes, you're supposed to read the instructions. Read and follow the instructions that come with your ballot.

[00:06:53] If they say to use a black pen, use a black pen. I know that's like literally the least sexy thing a completely naked person could say, but... But I have crumb like can of Pepsi. Is problem? Number two. In some states like Pennsylvania. Pennsylvania. Pennsylvania. There are two envelopes you have to stuff your ballot in, otherwise it's called a naked ballot. Naked ballots? And you don't want to have one of those.

[00:07:22] Number three, mail your ballot in as soon as you can. Don't sit on them. Get those things out ASAP. Like now. Do it! Get it in as soon as you can. I gotta get my ballot to the mother f***ing post office. Let's go! Please vote! Take your clothes off and vote. Vote, vote, vote. Everyone's voice matters in this election. Please vote. America needs you.

[00:07:57] Ah, is anyone still here? Or I blocked out for a second. You want a little bit of silence to like... To deal with that? I don't know. I... Words cannot describe what that... Why is that out there? Why did they do this? I... There's so many things cringe about that one video. First off, the being naked is cringe because like we get it.

[00:08:26] You're trying to catch people's attention. But you know, I... I don't know how many people want to see Chelsea Handler naked. Or Chris Rock naked. Uh... Or Josh Gad naked. Um... I also noticed you could see Josh Gad looking off to the side. I don't know if you caught that. He was like reaching and like he kind of looked over and he was reading something. And then he kind of looked back at the camera and he read something again. So I think to your point, this is definitely a coordinated like here's your script. You're gonna read this.

[00:08:55] Whether they got paid or not. I'm not sure about whether they got paid or not. Or they just did this because they think it's important to do so. Um... The Borat thing. I... I just want to look this up while the video is going on. Borat came out in 2006. Okay? It is almost 20 years since Borat came out. I think we can say Borat is officially not a thing anymore.

[00:09:23] And like reaching that far back as a cultural reference doesn't... I mean there are kids who can legally drink now who probably don't remember that movie Borat. Because they were one or two. I know I always mention my kids. Like my son is 19. Um... I don't... I don't know. He might know who that is, but I don't think he would...

[00:09:51] You know, social media like does tend to kind of like reuse old content. And so it's like, it's like possible that he would know who that is from little clips on TikTok, Instagram, etc. But that he wouldn't necessarily know the movie. There was... Was there a TV show and a movie? I don't know. See, I don't even remember. And I know I watched something at that time. Um... There were two movies. Yeah. So it's... He's not really relevant.

[00:10:19] And so I don't know who they're trying to reach because the older people like us, I feel like we're like a little more mature than that type of content. And so if they're trying to reach Gen Z, then they're really reaching far back to irrelevant things, irrelevant pop culture. But, um... So that was this from the most recent election? Um... That's a good question. I just found it was...

[00:10:49] It was something that was on X recently. Like I just saw it pop up within the last 24 hours. So I don't know if it's... Maybe it's... Uh... What is this? I probably should have done a little bit more research on this. No, it's fine. I didn't look into it all either. Is this a Pennsylvania election or something? I'm not quite sure. Or did it have to do with Wisconsin? Yeah. See, I don't know if...

[00:11:19] I don't know. And I... Like I said, you sent it. And I watched part of it. I was like, that's enough. And then I was living my best life not watching that. But, um... As I said before we hopped on, I'm not offended by naked people. I just think it's so ridiculous when they have to reach that far to try to get... Like, is that really all they have for their talking points? And yes, I get the reference.

[00:11:48] Your ballot can be naked, whatever. But I would... Don't you think it should have been done like, don't be naked like your ballot? Uh... Yeah. Maybe that... See, you could have written this script a lot better and been like, Hey, being naked is good, but your ballot being naked is not good. So don't be like us and be naked. Like... See, that's even better than what they wrote. Because they basically just talked about like, hey, we're naked.

[00:12:18] But also, here's how you vote. And it's like, so you caught my attention just by being naked with has-beens and people who I don't really know. That's... Sarah Silverman, is she still relevant? I guess. Somehow she's still... She has a show with weird pets or something. Um, Chelsea Handler has a show. So, not sure who the rest of the game. I mean, Chris Rock. Um... Yeah, I mean, I know the names. Chris Rock is just waiting for the next Adam Sandler movie to drop.

[00:12:48] You know, back in 2006. Um, that's so it's like, is this... Them trying to be relevant? I'm... I'm just confused by the whole thing. Because it's so ridiculous. It's so stupid. It seems... This is my thought is that like culture has shifted so much. In terms of left versus right. And like the left has gotten more cringy. Because it used to be the left was like they would drive culture.

[00:13:17] And like you followed it because it was cool. Like the left was cool. They had, you know, Barack Obama and they were cool. And they drove culture. Now I feel like the right is driving culture because you have a lot of comedians with podcasts and stuff like that that are really popular. They're driving culture. And a lot of these left, leftist political influencers, not even political influencers, they're just actors, are catching up to it. And it's, it's like that video we saw where they were doing the choose your fighter thing.

[00:13:46] Or they got this like that lady who was like from the tales of the crypt doing skibbity and stuff like that. Like all that, like they're chasing culture as opposed to leading culture. I mean, if you're rolling out Borat and Borat has to make an appearance in your video, like you're not, you're not driving culture. You're now you're old and cringy and like it doesn't make any sense anymore.

[00:14:12] So, but maybe that's a point to like why this was such a bad video. We don't even we couldn't watch that and be like, I don't even know what this is for. Like what, what election is this for? So when that was made, um, just cause I'm curious, you can keep talking. I've just like, uh, while you're looking that up, let's jump into our next story.

[00:14:39] Cause I'm the 2020 election, but even still, I'm not going to be a good idea. All the points remain because, um, those people, I don't think were relevant in 2020 either. Like I just, they, they like, and then the 2010s, you know, and under like they were early 2000 and, um, and I'm not saying they can't still be funny or they can't do their things. I'm just, it's just weird.

[00:15:08] Um, and Sarah Silverman, like why she made everything about her boobs. It just has to do with boating. Got to get your attention. Um, this might be the one instance where it's beneficial if you were listening on audio, cause you didn't have to sit through that video and watch it with us. So good for the audio listeners. Uh, all right, let's, let's move on from naked people to the newest, uh, person to jump into the race.

[00:15:38] Uh, Xavier Becerra, no surprise there that Xavier Becerra jumped in. So again, we'll get into, uh, we'll watch his announcement video first. We'll do a little bit of background and then we'll hop into his interview with Alex Michelson of KTLA. I think it's KTLA. Um, he has a show called the issue Fox LA Fox. Yeah. It's KTLA and Fox 11, but I'm sorry. I don't ever mean to correct you. There's a lot there.

[00:16:06] I'm always like, as a KTLA, there's a lot of local channels. You got to keep straight, but let's watch his announcement video and we'll, we'll discuss. And then we'll talk more about the Sarah himself. So thank you. Xavier Becerra. Um, first out of the gate affordability. I'm starting to notice a trend of the big talking points in California. Affordability seems to be the big thing.

[00:16:33] It's kind of like, uh, you know, in 2024, there's always a, there's always a theme. There's always a top hot button issue that everyone talks about affordability always in California. Uh, I wanted to go over this real quick because he does have a long record of being in public service. Yes. Uh, he's been around, he's been around the block for a long time, long, long time, longer than Borat was a movie, much longer than that.

[00:17:00] Uh, he started off as a member of the California state assembly in the 59th district. And that was in December of 1990. That was for a couple of years. And then he moved on to be a member of the house of representatives and the 30th district. That was from 93 to 2017. So that's a long time. Yeah. Okay. Um, and then he was vice chair of the house democratic caucus from 2009 till 2013. So long time there as well, making a lot of, uh, friends up there in DC.

[00:17:29] Then he came back to California, became the 33rd attorney general of California from 2017 to 2021. He was plucked in 2021 to be the secretary of health and human services for Joe Biden. Um, so he's had a long, long time in public service and he's now coming back home, returning. So he can be governor of California.

[00:17:59] Uh, I mean, that announcement was all right. I mean, there wasn't, wasn't really too much controversial about it. It wasn't as bad as like, uh, Katie Porter's Katie Porter's was like, so over the top. It felt like it was like, she had like actors and stuff like that. Maybe that's what he's kind of making fun of is that like Katie Porter came out with this video that she was in a room with all of her like staffers. And she's like giving a speech with her whiteboard about like, this is what we need to do. And pop, pop, pop, pop, pop. Um, so he's going for the much more casual look of like button down.

[00:18:29] And you know, here I am in front of my camera. Took a while to find this too. I had to go on X and find this video. Any initial thoughts from his, um, Um, announcement video. Yeah. Like you said, it wasn't, wasn't like, so. Okay. Like Katie Porter, as we talked about last week, hers was very much just like all these things that it felt like a congressional ad versus a California ad. And, um, I did watch the full interview, which I know we're going to get to that, but I did watch the full interview.

[00:18:58] It was about 25, 30 minutes. I don't know. And while I do appreciate some of his talking points, I do like he's, he's right. And despite that. So his dad was like a farmer turned to construction worker. Um, I think he only had his dad, a sixth grade education or something. And yet they were able to come to California, him and his wife and their four kids. And they were able to like the California, they, they, uh, achieved the California dream.

[00:19:27] You know, they became, um, they were able to put their four kids through college and stuff like that. And that's obviously nobody with the sixth grade education can even do that. It, it, even with a college education in California, that's so hard these days, um, with the affordability. So yes, he's, he's absolutely right on, but I know we're going to kind of segue then into some other stuff. And so we'll add thoughts, you know, what I'm referring to. Um, yeah.

[00:19:55] Um, him mentioning the Trump thing, he didn't like pound Trump. So it wasn't too bad. I think he was just kind of mentioning, like, I have this experience. Okay. He does, whether we agree with him or not, he has that experience. So, you know, there, there were, uh, if you remember back, uh, not too long ago, when it was like two months ago, feels like at this feels like a lifetime ago. When the whole thing, the talking point on X was, okay. Junior has no experience.

[00:20:25] He's not a medical doctor. He shouldn't be running HHS. Xavier Becerra has literally no medical experience. Um, he was never a doctor, never a nurse or something, but that doesn't give him the experience. He, I think he, I am not. I think he represented hospitals. Like that was his, like when he was in private practice, I think he represented hospitals and big medical companies.

[00:20:52] Um, that's about it. But that was, you know, before 1990, because then he became a politician in 1990. So if people want to go after RFK and be like, oh, he has no medical experience. He shouldn't be HHS. Well, they put in someone and I'm not sure why they put him in here. When they named him as HHS secretary, I was like, really? It's very confusing. Like I, I was like, I don't know anything about that.

[00:21:19] He's ever said about health that makes him qualified to be HHS secretary. Um, I was more qualified than he was for that role. I should have nominated his wife. And, um, I mean, RFK junior at least has been talking about health for a long time. And, you know, he's a 65 year old man and better shape than I am. So, um, but as this is just one instance, um, you know, he took over as HHS secretary.

[00:21:46] 2021, there was obviously the transition between Trump leaving COVID was still raging at that point. So Biden and his team got in, they were not quite done with the mandates when they got in. It was like probably, they probably could have just not done mandates, but they decided we're going to go full bore into mandates.

[00:22:03] Uh, so he got sued and he got blocked by a federal judge in Louisiana when he tried to enforce requiring employees and volunteers with the headstart early education program to wear masks and be fully vaccinated against the Corona virus. Uh, this came in a case of Louisiana versus Becerra, which names health and human services secretary Xavier Becerra as a defendant.

[00:22:27] Um, the matter was consolidated in May with plaintiff St. Sandy bricks lawsuit against presidential Biden of where the same headstart, Matt. So headstart is what kindergarten, like little kids. Like it's, it's like, are they, I think they're doing like preschool now. And then they're trying to make preschool two year olds. So I don't, anyway, somewhere from two to five years old. Yeah, it's, it's very, very young. Um, it required anyone older than age two to wear masks while indoors.

[00:22:55] So to give you an idea of this is what he did early in his time as a, I mean, this is a 2021 first year as the secretary of health and human services, he was issuing mandates to make sure two year olds wore masks indoors. In 2021. So just to give you an idea of how qualified he was to run health and human services. You froze. I hope you're still there. That's what he's known for. Or one of the things he's done.

[00:23:26] Did I, did I drop out again? Yes, you did for just, just a few seconds. Just a few seconds. Fingers crossed. We're good. We're good. Okay. So, yeah, I was just saying that that's right out the gate. I, big fan of the mandates in the mass. Probably why our, our thumbnail has him in a mass because he's, he's Mr. Mandate, Mr. Mandate, Mr. Mass. All right, let's watch the video now of him. He, he did the circuit, did a couple of interviews after he announced, did one with Alex Michael.

[00:23:54] So he did a full one, but this is a clip talking about affordability, which seems to be the centerpiece of his campaign. And then we'll comment after that. Too expensive to live in California for a lot of people, right? That housing affordability. It is. All the rest of that. But whose fault is that? Because Democrats have had a super majority in Sacramento for decades now run every statewide office. Isn't that the Democrats fault? Well, it's a growing issue.

[00:24:24] We've had, remember, we've had Republican governors as well. Yeah. Arnold Schwarzenegger was elected in 2006. 2006. I guarantee you homes in California in 2006 were too expensive back then. I know, but it's gone up a lot in the last 20 years. We have not tackled it the way we should. And I think principally the reason we have this issue in California on prices is because we haven't built enough. And that means it's a tight market. Everyone still wants to come to California. People may be leaving, but there are a whole bunch of people who would love to be at a live in California.

[00:24:53] But from a policy perspective, what specific change are you proposing that would be different than the status quo right now that would make a difference and make prices less in California? Yeah. I can tell you that status quo business as usual is not on California voters mind as the thing to do. And so I think all of us are going to be talking change. But here's what I would do.

[00:25:17] I would take the experience I had having to lead this country at the Department of Health and Human Services out of a pandemic, a once in a lifetime pandemic, having to negotiate for the first time in our history, the lower prices for prescription drugs of some of the most expensive drugs that our seniors on Medicare program have to use. I would say you need to bring the problem right to the table with the best experts there. You scrub it and then whatever is left, whatever is clean and survives, that's what you do.

[00:25:47] And we've not been willing to do that because of all the politics, all the old ways of doing things. We get caught up in this knee jerk reaction that we can't do it that way. Time to change. But is there a specific policy change that you would propose to make a difference on some of these affordability issues? I think so. Housing development. I think everyone agrees we don't build enough. It's not enough to say, OK, we all agree we don't build enough and then not do anything about it.

[00:26:15] OK, if we all agree, then everyone from all sides of this sit down, scrub it, because this is what I had to do with COVID. This is what I had to do when we're trying to get rid of monkeypox, Mpox. This is what I had to do when we were figuring out what prices to negotiate on the drugs. You figure out where we could go and then you go and you just say, damn the torpedoes. We got to go. Let's talk.

[00:26:39] Quite the stretch trying to figure out how being secretary of health and human services is going to translate into enacting affordability or making California more affordable. He was really stretching it. I know politicians love to stretch their experience and be like, oh, I did this and therefore I got this, you know, macro skill of like I can do this.

[00:27:00] And it's like, well, OK, so you as secretary of health and human services somehow made you more equipped to be governor to negotiate because of medication. Like that's where you're going with this. And then the whole we're going to scrub it. No, no, we're just going to we're going to scrub it and we're going to start over. We're going to scrub it and start over. Well, I mean, that's a nice sentiment to scrub it and start over.

[00:27:29] But as we know, if you follow the show. I don't think the unions are going to let you scrub it and start over. The unions are going to push back on anything you try and do and push back on the status quo because unions are doing pretty well in California. They certainly don't want to lose the power that they have and all the money they're raking in. Somebody in the chat said that was a whole lot of nothing. Yeah, that's absolutely true. Correct. Absolutely. There were no specifics at all.

[00:27:57] It was basically I you know, I was secretary health and human services and people like cool. I don't know if that makes you governor material. Any initial thoughts about that video trying to. So many thoughts about that, that short clip. But I kind of wish we were going to watch the whole video and like take a shot every time he says scrub it, except that we would die. Oh, I should have counted since I like I said, I did watch the whole video. So, again, there was no policy there.

[00:28:27] And I appreciate that, you know, that Alex Michelson pushed back on that. And I understand. First of all, I understand that I'm not qualified to run for governor. I understand that you can't do things you're running. You kind of don't want to give away your exact policies, because if you have a really good idea, other candidates may use your same policies to, you know, and whatever.

[00:28:54] But and I understand you can't possibly know every little strategy going in until you're in and then you have to start dismantling things. I don't understand what he kept meaning by scrub it and see what sticks. Scrub it, scrub it. We'll see. Like that was weird. 2006 was an expensive year for housing at the time.

[00:29:19] My husband and I had just gotten married and we were looking to buy a house and I was a stay at home mom. And he didn't have credit as a not bad credit, but like he had never used a credit card in his life. We didn't we didn't qualify because we just like I didn't have an income. He didn't have credit.

[00:29:39] And we were everything we were looking at in Orange County was like in the 600,000 range, which was at that time super crazy expensive. That's still in today, you know, well, interest rates. I don't even remember what they were. Yes. 2006 was it was expensive. So was 1980. Like I know my parents bought their house high. They still own it. They paid it off and you know, it's obviously worth way more.

[00:30:09] But funny enough. 2011. We were able to buy a house for that much money. So like, you know, the real estate just like it comes and goes. It drops interest rates. Like everything is crazy. Um, so yeah, in 2011, I think we were able to like we bought for just under 600 our first home, which again, that's a still today's like I remember thinking, oh my gosh, this is so expensive.

[00:30:37] And it was but nothing like today. Okay, so he doesn't have ideas. I think he probably really does have the passion, the drive because he like when it goes into the whole long interview, he keeps going back to you references his parents like we my parents were able to do this. Nobody can do that today. Absolutely.

[00:31:00] Um, we're never going to go back to those times, but we do need to try to like going forward, you know, get control on things and I don't, I don't know how you get control on things like real estate. And of course, because of the recent fires in LA rental supply and demand like the supply went down, the demand went up and people are like, oh, I can rent out my house for X amount of dollars. But then buying right now with interest rates is kind of crazy.

[00:31:29] And I don't know how people are buying these days. Um, that is my initial thoughts on that. I would encourage anyone to actually go watch the full interview because you're going to see that he talks about scrubbing things and see what sticks. And again, I don't know what that means, but that's like his answer to everything. Well, we're going to scrub it from scrub it. Like, okay, I don't get that. Scrub it and start all over. That's gonna be his new thing. Scrub it. He'll be handed out. Scrub it. We're kind of for that.

[00:31:56] Like we're like burn it down and start over, but I don't start all over. Not literally burn it down, but he's gonna be, his thing will be, he'll have Xavier Becerra, um, scrub daddy. So he'll be throwing those out at campaign stops with his like Xavier Becerra. You can steal my idea. Xavier Becerra. It'll just make you, they'll make great content for cringe moment of the week. I have a question. And I don't, I don't have the answer for this, but just want to hear your thoughts.

[00:32:25] Right now. A lot of the candidates that they're talking about affordability and do you think these things are actually affecting them now or that they've just gotten so much pushback from everyone else talking about affordability that they're like, Oh, maybe we need to take advantage of that and start talking about that. I think a lot of these, uh, top contenders have very expensive.

[00:32:54] Um, they have very expensive polling companies and consultants who probably go out and do internal polls and they say, you know, what is the top issue facing California voters and affordability probably is at the top. It's, I would always say it's always at the top. So they, they base their messaging around that. I don't think it affects anybody like this. Like Xavier Becerra was just recently secretary of health and human services. He was previously attorney general.

[00:33:22] I don't think the guy's hurting for affordability. Maybe Katie Porter is because she records all our videos on a flip phone. Um, but most of these candidates, no, I, I, I think it's, they're just doing the polling and they're looking at the tea leaves and they go, ah, affordability is what they want us to run on. Got it. Okay. But they don't really have any solution to affordability.

[00:33:45] And I think I was, you know, Alex Michelson, he takes his knocks for being not, you know, he gets a lot of great interviews. He talks to the governor a lot. He gets a lot of pushback or he gets a lot of flack because he does not push back on a lot of people. We met Alex at an event. He was a nice guy. Um, but this time he actually pushed back and I saw that video and I was like, yeah, there hasn't been a Republican governor and him trying to slosh it off and be like, oh, that's not going to be.

[00:34:15] I know that, you know, there's been Republican governors in there as well. Just for reference. Okay. Schwarzenegger got in because of the recall and was in until 2011. Before that it was Pete Wilson, which was what the early nineties. Like that was Pete Wilson's time. I, this is long before I ever came to California. I was just a kid at that time. And then before that it was George. If you guys can help me with his pronounce. Do come. I, I, it's funny. We just discussed this because of a whole Reddit thread that I think we were.

[00:34:45] Both maybe accidentally on, not that we were actually on it, but we didn't realize we were like reading the same thread. And now I'm like, this is information is escaping me. I swear the news cycle every day. It's so crazy that I'm like, I don't even know what happened yesterday. I only know what. It's a lot. I know what's going on today. So to put it in perspective, let's lay the groundwork. Why is it?

[00:35:11] I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. It was 71.

[00:35:40] But yeah, that whether it was around that time, 75 is not relevant. It was, that's nearly 50 years ago. We were not alive yet. Like that's no, no. No. And if you're blaming the faults of California affordability on Republicans controlling both the assembly and the state Senate 50 years ago, that's a problem. The next time Republicans actually controlled a chamber, not both chambers, just a chamber

[00:36:10] was for one year around like 95 and 96. 95 and 96. What's going on everybody? I want to take a quick minute and talk about today's sponsor for our show stop box. If you're not familiar with stop box, it is a firearm retention device, no electronics, no biometrics, nothing like that, that can get in the way. If there's an oncoming threat and you need quick and easy access to your firearm, it is literally just this finger combination on the top. You push it in. Boom. Hear that nice little click.

[00:36:40] And it is wide open for you, for your firearm. Uh, it can fit compact, subcompact, even full size pistols, which is a good thing. It is nice. They have added this new magazine extra magazine holder. Also very nice. My wife and I both have our own stop box because we both know that when there's an oncoming threat in seconds count, you don't want to be fumbling around with electronics or keys or biometrics or anything like that. So now listeners of this show can enjoy 10% off their order at stop box.

[00:37:07] If they go to stop box.com forward slash California underground, they'll get that discount support the show. You can support stop box and this is probably made in the good old U S of a so go to stop box.com forward slash California underground for your discount. And let's get back to the show. That was literally it. And since then it has been Democrats controlling the legislature since 96.

[00:37:33] And between that time, there was one Republican governor who was Arnold Schwarzenegger. And was he a Ronald Reagan far, like, you know, super conservative governor? I wouldn't think so. I, from what I know, he was mostly a moderate Republican, probably, you know, people called him a rhino. He was just like mostly a conservative Democrat at that point.

[00:38:01] Um, so that's it. So in that span of time between, if you want to go all the way back to 2011 and say since 2011, well, you know, that's why we have housing affordability crisis because Arnold Schwarzenegger in 2011, it's like, you're really grasping at straws to try and put any blame outside on Democrats, which is why, again, I think Alex Michael said, I give him props.

[00:38:29] That he pushed back on this is like, are you kidding? Like you guys have had a super majority. You've controlled every state office for more than 30 years or 20 years. Like it has not been a Republican state in a very, very long time. Um, and just for sort of the visual aid here, this is what I found when I was looking this up. So this is, um, some Fred economic data. You can go look this out. They have a lot of data.

[00:38:59] So if you can go down, this is the housing index goes all the way back to 1980 or 1975. Look at that. Um, that's the housing index way back down there. 41. There's every gray section is the recession. Um, so this is right around the time that Arnold Schwarzenegger was done. Q4 of 2011. Right.

[00:39:26] What does the price do after Arnold Schwarzenegger leaves? And this is Jerry enter Jerry Brown, correct? Enter Jerry Brown. And then Gavin Newsom. Um, so it went from down here with Schwarzenegger, right? Three 85 to all the way up here. My mouse can't even go that far. That's a nine, six, eight.

[00:39:55] So almost triple since Schwarzenegger has left the housing pricing housing price index for California has gone is tripled. And even here, you're right. Like real estate. Yes. Real estate does go up. It was a slow progression. There was the housing boom. Yes. This is where right here. Obviously this is subprime mortgages and this is why we had the collapse. But if you look again, Arnold Schwarzenegger left office Q4.

[00:40:25] And then this is the trajectory of housing affordability. I don't even think from here to based on the subprime, that was the only other time it tripled. And then there was a huge collapse. I kind of mentioned, which this is specific to West Oakland, not the entire state of California, but I have this as a highlight on my Instagram page because I did a deep dive into this a couple of years ago.

[00:40:52] There was an article I read about, it had to do with equity, like climate change equity in West Oakland. And I, I just, I did a deep dive into like, why are, why are they suffering so badly? And, uh, it was like racism in housing economics and other policies over decades. Like people were complaining. Okay.

[00:41:19] So I started researching and, um, West Oakland used to be this very thriving, well-to-do area with lots of, um, like lawyers and doctors and stuff. And it was booming for other reasons. Again, I don't want to get too far into this cause whatever. But, um, what I found was that there was policies that were enacted. California legislator was Democrat controlled. Congressional was Democrat controlled.

[00:41:49] And, um, and there was just things that they were being pushed out basically. And they were kind of like, they built freeways around this specific area of West Oakland and, um, these housing policies that went on. And the housing act of 1949 was an expansion of the federal role in work mortgage insurance and public housing. It was part of president Harry Truman's fair deal.

[00:42:13] And, uh, in Congress, the bill was sponsored by Robert Taft, Republican and Democrats, Alan Allender and Robert Wagner. And it was passed by the 81st United States Congress. The House majority was Democrat that session. And, um, so again, I'm just kind of like quickly trying to read here with the, so I had written fact with the exception of a very brief period from 1995 to 1996, the California assembly has been controlled by Democrats since the 1970 election.

[00:42:45] Um, these policies are literally driving people out and driving a house and cost of mortgages. And, um, there was like, I went into some bills that Nancy Skinner had authored and just stuff like that.

[00:43:09] And it was like, they're blaming, they often blame Republicans, but they don't go back and look at the policies that were actually enacted and voted on that started this whole domino effect, which was passed by Democrats. And I'm not, I'm not saying Republicans never do anything bad. That's, that's not what I'm saying. But in this, this instance, there was a whole lot of things going on that were being passed by Democrats that started this issue.

[00:43:39] Even more, it's trying to pass the buck to any Republican for affordability right now in 2025 in California is wild because it's like they haven't had control or influence at all. And in fact, even though, yes, you've put these policies in place, you've also had the super majority and everyone in control of all levers of power that you could have fixed it.

[00:44:09] If these problems, if these were bad policies in Xavier Becerra's words, you could have scrubbed them. You could have fixed them. You've had like, there's nothing standing in your way. If you all came around and were like, Hey, Lex, let's fix support affordability and make houses better. You could have done it. You've had like 120 times. Why weren't you suing the issue? Whoever that was causing these bad policies. Yeah.

[00:44:36] Why, why weren't you looking into why housing is so unaffordable in California? So to blame it on Republicans, even remotely is wild to me. And there are people, yes, people on Reddit who are like, Oh no, the Republican governors definitely have some blame in this. And it's like, what, what world do you live in? That Republican governor, like Arnold Schwarzenegger in 2011 has anything to do with why no one can buy a house in California.

[00:45:05] Right. Like that is some immense major league copium to be like, it's not our fault. Well, there was Republicans in there as well. They did some stuff too. And it's like, no, like you've, you've had control. You, we literally have a shirt online on our store. You can go check it out. It literally says if progressive policies were California would be a utopia.

[00:45:29] And the truth is they don't, and we've seen it firsthand, but they refuse number one rule in politics. Well, number one rules, you always follow the money. Number two is that politicians will never, ever, ever, ever admit that they were wrong and go back on a policy. And that's where we're at in California is you have a ton of Democrats who supported a lot of these bad policies in the past. Now have to kind of like buckle down and be like, no, these are good policies. These are really good policies. We just have to tweak them.

[00:45:59] And it's like, you can just admit defeat and be like, these didn't work. And like, we have to move on. We have to scrub it. Um, but yeah, that's literally, yeah. Scrubbing the state is literally Hitler. I want to thank, uh, Amy for it's Duke may Jen. That's how you pronounce that governor's name. The Republican governor before Pete Wilson. And he was, he was governor long before. I think he was governor before I was even born here in California.

[00:46:28] So long before I ever showed up. Um, and I think certainly Republicans have bad policies and maybe Schwarzenegger did play a role in things, but again, they've had control for 14 years. And if, and it takes time to unravel all of that and to undo all, you know, I, I get that, but they've had 14 years and haven't fixed anything. And it's only gotten worse.

[00:46:58] So yeah. Like, I don't know. I just, I don't understand. And I'm, I'm not like being a Schwarzenegger apologist here. Like I, I probably did vote for him because we, you know, we recalled what's his face. And it was, yeah. So I, like, I probably did vote for him. I don't, I'm pretty sure it did. And then when we reelected him, I'm pretty sure I was not excited about him.

[00:47:26] And I probably voted for him in the primary because he was the option, but, um, certainly like I was not like Gary Coleman, right? Oh, I think it was. I try to erase these things from my memory. Like, um, you know, like sometimes we have to unfortunately vote the lesser of two evils or whatever. And, um, so yeah, I'm not sitting here even like saying, oh, Schwarzenegger was so wonderful and he did all these amazing things.

[00:47:53] That's not, that's not what I'm saying, but we've had 14 years to fix things and we haven't fixed things. Yeah. With nothing standing in your way. Supermajority means you can literally ram things through as fast as possible. Even if the governor doesn't like it, you can still override it. Like there is nothing standing in your way if you want to fix things and you haven't fixed things.

[00:48:16] Um, one last thing before we move on to our next topic, this might be a really good strategy, or this is a good angle for someone like a Chad Bianco to go after. Is to just pound this over and over and over again of you're going to hear a lot of these Democrats come out and say, well, there's been an affordability crisis and we got to fix it. Well, you've been in power for almost two decades.

[00:48:46] So why haven't you done it? Right. You're all going to point to the point. You've actually fixed. Yeah. And so I think that if the Chad Bianco team or any, anyone out there who's not a Democrat, who's going to run for governor is listening. That might be the angle to go is go. You guys have been promising you'll fix affordability this time. If you just elect us this time, we'll figure it out. Um, and we promise we won't raise taxes to do it. So, which, okay.

[00:49:13] I guess Sarah did that with the, like he was saying, look, I was able to bring down the cost of medications. Therefore, you know, I could translate that into housing is maybe what he was trying to say. And, you know, if he gets elected, we'll see.

[00:49:32] But, um, I want to know all their, these people that are jumping in, if Kamala Harris does jump in, did these, these people, surely they voted for her for president. Right. And so I'm curious if like, like, I would love to interview that, like, did you vote for Harris or did you vote for Trump or did you abstain?

[00:49:55] And then if she jumps in and they're still staying in the race, because they're going to be like, oh, her policies is going to be like, why did you vote for her president then? Like, I'm just curious about that. Now, again, they could be like, well, Trump is evil and she was the lesser two evils or whatever, but I don't know. It will be interesting. Stick together. They don't really like to mostly turn on each other. Hmm. Yeah, it's a good. That's why he said he's already come out and said he's not going to drop. That's becoming the new question.

[00:50:24] He's not going to drop out if she jumps in. So as every of us area is not dropping out, which I think if he's not dropping out, that means Katie Porter likely is not dropping out. Um, so we all know that Rob Bonta probably bowed out because I think Kamala Harris's people got to him. That's my tinfoil hat theory is that they got to him because he was flirting with it. And then all of a sudden he said, no, I'm not going to do it. Um, so, uh, all right. Tony Thurmond.

[00:50:52] He's in the Tony Thurmond. Right. Right. Who news just came out this week that he is working side jobs to supplement his income because he only makes $200,000. As school superintendent for the whole state, he should just go be a CEO of a homeless nonprofit. They make good money. All right. Next story is about a study that just came out, uh, regarding oil or gas prices here in California.

[00:51:22] Now, if you remember, go back in the way back machine about December of 2024, Gavin Newsom, once again, called a special legislative session. I don't think these are connected as to why they came out. Um, but he started this special legislative session to get to the bottom of why gas is so darn expensive in California. Still waiting on the results of that special legislative session. Don't know what happened. It's the second time he's called it. No, no questions. They signed NDAs.

[00:51:51] That's my, that's my sorry. Uh, they'll, they'll come out with results, but everyone will have NDAs and they won't be able to tell you what the results are. Uh, so that was his all thing. And his corporate greed, that was what he was pushing. It's corporate greed. Always. Always. Always. Corporate greed. What's that? It's, it's just always corporate greed. Absolutely. It's always corporate greed. Uh, that was his. This whole thing. Corporate greed.

[00:52:19] That is the number one reason why gas is so darn expensive. It's not because of us. It's because of those darn corporations. So a study came out this week from USC. We're going to watch a video from KTLA. This is KTLA, not Fox 11, different ones. Um, talking about it. And then we're going to discuss the shocker that it's California policies, not corporate greed of why gas is so darn expensive here in California.

[00:52:47] A USC professor says California's high gas prices are the result of state policies and lower production and not price gouging. Marshall Business School professor Michael Misch released a report this month detailing why Californians pay so much for gasoline. He identified seven factors that have pushed prices higher for decades, most of which have to do with state taxes and environmental regulations.

[00:53:15] The professor also says that higher labor costs and lower production rates are pushing prices higher at the pump. And he expects that trends to continue as we approach California's 2035 target for banning the sale of new gas powered cars. You know what I have to say to that? Do tell. Surprise, surprise.

[00:53:49] Surprise. It's California policies, not corporate greed as to why, uh, why our gas prices are so high. But I'm sure anybody who has been paying attention knows that's exactly you didn't need a study. You didn't need USC. You didn't need a special legislative session. Everybody I'm pretty sure has figured out that it's because of policies. Um, so this USC professor, professor Michael Misch. I think that's how you pronounce his name.

[00:54:18] Apologies if that's not how you pronounce it. Uh, he offered the following conclusions in his study on 30 to 50 years of data on California's high gas prices. Quote, the primary conclusion from this study is that California's high gasoline prices and supply dilemmas are by design engineering or serendipitously largely self-inflicted. And the result of directed policies and a litany of regulations, taxes, fees, and costs.

[00:54:47] The economic evidence is abundant. California refiners have not engaged in widespread price gouging, profiteering price manipulation, unexplained residual prices or surcharges, magical or otherwise. The golden state's gasoline price dilemma is the result of a complex interactions, regulatory and political policies, and the subtleties of refinery operations and global crude oil prices and in-state centric supply and demand.

[00:55:15] Specifically, California's high gasoline prices can be attributed to, uh, and this is just a list, environmental policies, reporting, costly reporting and compliance to regulatory environmental mandates, in-state business, general operating and refinery costs.

[00:55:30] Declining in-state oil production, refinery, gasoline production, increasingly higher taxes and policy and regulatory costs, such as cap and trade, gasoline inventories, general disincentives associated with Governor Newsom's mandate for California Air Resources Board's 2035 objective to eliminate internal combustion engines. So, uh, he finishes, he says, California is highly dependent on oil imports from Iraq, Brazil, Guiana, Guiana, and Ecuador.

[00:56:01] So, uh, I did want to show this graph that for all the oil California has under its, uh, under its, its feet. We, we don't really, we don't really, we don't really go after it.

[00:56:19] Instead, we get it from foreign countries because nothing says we care about the environment and reducing carbon emissions like getting oil shipped to us from Iraq or Guiana or Saudi Arabia or Colombia or Brazil.

[00:56:41] So, so nothing says we really care about the environment and we want to make sure that people get out of their gas guzzling cars like shipping oil halfway around the world or all the way around the world just so we don't have to pump oil. I know. I do love those environmental policies where it's like drilling here is really bad for climate change, but drilling over there, it's not.

[00:57:10] Like, okay. We've talked about this before where it's, um, it, it, it's interesting that they are fine with what is likely they're not doing it environmentally sound in most of these countries. They don't care about the environment in most of these countries. The worker conditions for all they care about workers and unions, the workers are probably getting paid basically like wage slave labor.

[00:57:40] Oh, I'm sure. Like they're not getting paid like a. There's probably like 12 year old kids. Yeah. There's 12 year old kids working on this stuff. Like it's, they're fine with the evil over there where they don't have to see it. Right. But as long as they can virtue signal and say, look, we've shut down how many oil. I remember Gavin Newsom bragged at one point about how many oil wells they'd shut down in California.

[00:58:09] Um, now I'm having deja vu. I feel like we've done like a whole episode on this. We've totally got. Yes. There was definitely, we went through all of the oil refinery or oil wells that were offline or taken offline, which is a lot. There's only like a couple left now. So nothing says environmentalism and we care about workers rights, like getting oil from third world countries and dictatorships.

[00:58:34] So I've read that through about, if I'm saying this correctly, 400,000 tons of oil a day in California. No, I'm sorry. We produce 400,000 like barrels, gallons of oil a day, but we consume 1.8 million a day.

[00:58:56] To tell, to give you an idea of how much we're importing, but don't we also export some, which doesn't make sense to me if we, or do we just export like products after the fact? I don't know, but either way we're, we're bringing in far more than the, like what we have available.

[00:59:20] Like we're, you know, we're only going through our own 400,000 gallons, barrels, whatever it is. The unit is 400,000. And we, and we have, we have the supply here. Yeah. And then, so yes, of course it's that, that's one thing that drives up the cost because we have to pay for it to come here. And, and then we're just killing the climate outside of California, but.

[00:59:50] I believe this is a Calipublican policy. We should drill here because you can ensure workers are getting paid a fair wage. They are getting protected under worker, proper working condition standards. You can ensure that the oil wells are doing it correctly and cleanly. And it would be a, you know, economic boom for here in California. Like we're not getting off gasoline tomorrow. That's just the bottom line.

[01:00:18] Like we're, we're not getting off of it anytime soon. So why not make it here, make it something that we can enjoy and benefit from and profit from the California just doesn't want to do that. Fun fact at the turn of the century, California around the 1920s was the number one leading oil producer in the nation.

[01:00:43] Fun fact more than Oklahoma, which at that point, Oklahoma was like number one. And then California overtook them. Um, and I think the United States geological survey said that California had enough oil to last 200 years. And this was in 1920. Okay.

[01:01:06] So we have a lot of oil, but for some reason we just don't, we, we'd rather ship it from Guyana, which I feel like I'm probably butchering that name. I don't even know where that is. If anyone in the chat knows where Guyana is. Um, why are we not getting some from Oklahoma? I mean, I get like, we, we should be getting it from California, but why are we going out of the country?

[01:01:31] I don't know because it's cheaper, I guess it's, um, but it always seems odd that it's cheaper to ship it. Yeah. Wouldn't it be less carbon to not ship it all the way around the world? Uh, so this was an article you sent me a little bit ago. And this is from 2022 from Vince Fong, who is now Congressman Vince Fong. Uh, and he was advocating that we need to start.

[01:02:02] What's that? Sorry. I said, fun fact, he was on our show. Yeah. Former guest of the show. Vince Fong is a great guest. Uh, we should probably get him on again now that he's a Congressman. Uh, so he and Carlos Villa Pudua, I'm sorry that if I butchered that name, they were advocating that California needs to start drilling here. Drill baby drill. Um, because of how much we have.

[01:02:29] And he said the oil industry, blue collar jobs pay an average salary of $123,000 per year. That's a good salary. Pretty shabby. Not too shabby. Um, so yeah, a bunch of people going wild in the chat right now. I want to make sure I get to your guys and stuff. Uh, Amy said, I live in Kern County in Houston. It's just about killed the oil industry here. Yeah. That's where a lot of the oil is from.

[01:02:58] I think that was where, um, most of our oil in California is from. Somebody said, I know it's ridiculous. My son and I were just talking about the amount of pumps that aren't operating anymore. Um, by an electric vehicle, charge it up at a station that's charging it by a diesel generator. It's true. Makes sense. That is very true. And as someone who owns an electric vehicle, I am. I am not immune to the irony of the fact that I'm charging up a car that is still powered somehow by oil.

[01:03:29] Uh, when I was growing up, I remember there was a lot of oil platforms between Huntington Beach and the portal law, the port of Los Angeles. And I think most of them are gone now. There was actually a hearing a couple of weeks ago. I was trying to find the results of that hearing, but they actually, some of the Democrats quietly had a hearing, a committee hearing about reopening or bringing back online.

[01:03:54] Some of these offshore drilling because of, so it was pretty interesting that they were considering it, that it even made it that far. I live in Santa Fe Springs. It was called little Texas at one time. We had hammer head pumps all over the place at one time. Um, yeah. And he said, Vince Fong is my Congressman. He's great. Yeah. Vince Fong is a good guy. He was, he was a lot of fun when we had him on. Uh, they'd rather let people grow weed than drill for oil.

[01:04:24] Go figure. Yeah. I mean, they'd rather let, uh, you know, criminal cartels grow in some of the most beautiful areas of our state than drill for oil. So we have so much oil here and have the ability to drill it here. A couple of drilling companies where I live have closed that have been in business for decades. Yep. It's sad. We have a lot of natural resources here in California and we don't even scratch the surface.

[01:04:51] I think, I think again, it's kind of ties in with the area of Sarah and all that. Uh, California policies have hamstrung how great this state could be and how prosperous this straight, this state could be. And, um, it's, it's sad that I don't know what he's going to do to scrub it away or change it. Uh, but these policies have definitely added to the affordability issue.

[01:05:18] So, uh, they're talking about EPA deregulation for offshore drilling. Oh, okay. There you go. So it's a no shocker, no surprise. We all know this. I know anybody who's tuning into the show, not surprised that it is California policies that have added to the price of gasoline. We all knew this. Uh, there is a study now that is from USC. We're still waiting on the special legislative session and the results of what's going to happen there. I doubt it.

[01:05:47] If there's one thing, you know, about Gavin Newsom, he does like to start things and never finish them. In fact, you're very good at like keeping tabs on the stuff that he started and then like doesn't complete that. You know, we did a couple of months ago, he was touring the red counties and he had like a jobs package that still waiting on that jobs package. He had a binder full of, you know, blank paper that he's waiting around.

[01:06:14] He's like, we're going to fill up this binder, which have nothing to do with California, but like just these binders, like stop flashing your stupid binders. Everybody put down the binders and do something real. Uh, so I said, look at the timber industry up in Humboldt County up there and they ruin that too, but instead we'll import wood from Canada. Yeah. There's a lot here. There's a lot of natural resources here.

[01:06:41] So any final thoughts on, uh, the shocking and I'm sure surprising study that California gas prices are high because of our policies, not because of, corporate greed. Surprise, surprise, surprise. Um, I love that. I know that was like 20, 23 or a year ago, but I still love it.

[01:07:10] Um, I feel like we're just like going to have to do an episode on like things that were great in California and the policies that killed them or ruined them or whatever. That might actually be a really interesting episode. Interesting. And it would be like a series of like six episodes, three hours each. Yeah. All the stuff that killed it. So, um, all right. So that's our show for tonight.

[01:07:39] Uh, make sure you like, share, subscribe, review all that stuff. Thank you everyone for tuning into the chat. That's why we do this live on Tuesday nights. So people can tune in and give us their thoughts. Love to hear you guys in the chat. It makes it a lot of fun. Um, so, uh, with that said, make sure the one thing you can do that to support the show is you could buy a shirt, support nuclear, um, stop brown at support nuclear. That's one of my favorite shirts. Speaking of energy here in California, uh, you can go check that out.

[01:08:08] California underground dot live. That's our website. The shop is on there, but the one thing you can do that is 100% free that you can do to support the show is share it with somebody else. And with that, we will see you on the next one later.

[01:08:37] Thank you for listening to another episode of California underground. If you like what you heard, remember to subscribe, like, and review it and follow California underground on social media for updates as to when new episodes are available.