Gavin Newsom faces growing pressure to intervene in a scrambled California governor’s race

By Edward-Isaac Dovere, CNN

(CNN) — The scrambled race for California governor left in the wake of Eric Swalwell’s sexual misconduct allegations isn’t officially Gov. Gavin Newsom’s mess. But it’s one that many top Democrats want him to consider trying to clean up.

Since CNN and the San Francisco Chronicle broke their stories about Swalwell on Friday night, Newsom has been in a marathon of calls and meetings about the governor’s race, according to a dozen leading Democrats, several of whom have spoken with him.

Four people familiar with Newsom’s thinking tell CNN he’s still trying to make sense of where the race actually stands now, eager for new polling data and trying to sort out whether the Swalwell collapse intensifies the chances of California Democrats’ red-alert scenario: Two Republicans advancing in the nonpartisan June 2 primary and locking Democrats out of the governorship entirely.

“He’s watching it closely and he’s going to do everything he can to prevent a lockout,” is as far as one person who has spoken to Newsom would go.

On the line is not just the direction of the state Newsom has lived in his whole life. As the term-limited governor gears up to run for president, his successor will be in a position to burnish his record or reverse it, back him up or approve investigations and disclosures that could be problems for a future White House campaign.

Swalwell had been inching forward almost by default: a Venn diagram between primary voters who sort of knew who he was and state political insiders who decided he was fine enough, which together put him in the high teens in most polls. Whether that would have been enough, or enough to slowly build to more in the fractured field, was never clear.

Now everyone is left guessing where that support will go, including if whether it will split or go to one candidate. Advisers to several of the leading contenders say they can only make what they admit are wishful guesses.

Newsom has spoken to Rep. Nancy Pelosi, the former House speaker and still a powerhouse of her state’s politics. Phone calls and texts have been pouring in. He’s been sitting in meetings with advisers. Everyone is asking the same questions. No one has the answers, especially because not even the candidates who’ve never moved out of the low single digits have shown any interest so far in dropping out, and at this point, all of their names will remain on the ballot regardless.

The next few weeks will be a test of how much sway the top Democrat in the state has over his party. Even if he wants to help a very fractured field coalesce by making an endorsement, could he?

“People are saying, ‘Show some leadership, Gavin Newsom,’” another person in the governor’s orbit told CNN. “But what does that look like here? He’s not someone who likes picking winners and losers inside his own party like that.”

Through an aide, Newsom declined an interview request.

Newsom tried to avoid a fractured field

Newsom had a preferred candidate: Sen. Alex Padilla. They’re not just friends and political allies. Newsom appointed Padilla, who had served in the California State Senate and as secretary of state, to the US Senate after Kamala Harris became vice president. Then he gave Padilla a prime speaking slot at last summer’s announcement of the Proposition 50 ballot initiative that successfully re-gerrymandered California to produce five additional Democratic-friendly House seats.

Over phone calls and a meeting in Washington, Newsom pushed Padilla to think hard about leading the state he loves. The video of Padilla being tackled and restrained while trying to interrupt then-Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem during a press conference in Los Angeles captured exactly the story he could tell in a state where Trump is deeply unpopular.

Padilla came close. Really close. Close enough that when his aides got the invite to a Zoom call in early November, they thought they’d hear him make it official — only to have him instead tell them he wasn’t going to run. His wife was opposed in the end, and he decided that running wouldn’t be the right call for his children.

Newsom wasn’t on that call, but he was just as surprised by the decision. In the months since, he decided to let the race play out on its own, not tipping a hand in any direction.

That remained the case even after his longtime political consultants signed on to run an independent expenditure group that had been airing ads supporting Swalwell before immediately shutting down last Friday. It wasn’t tacit support from Newsom — but Newsom didn’t stop them, either.

A lack of star power

According to people who’ve spoken to him, Newsom feels just as blasé as many Californians about their choices for a larger-than-life job once held by Ronald Reagan and Arnold Schwarzenegger.

Newsom worries that Tom Steyer, the billionaire investor, would be too all over the place on positions and management to effectively run the state. He worries that Katie Porter, the former congresswoman, would drive business out. He has had a contentious personal relationship with San Jose Mayor Matt Mahan. He ran against former Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa eight years ago, and the strain between them is still there. He has reservations about how former Biden Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra, appointed by former Gov. Jerry Brown to be state attorney general after Harris was elected a US senator in 2016, handled that job.

Aides to several current campaigns tell CNN that they have been seeing in focus groups some frustration with Newsom’s record as governor, but his popularity among California Democrats, enhanced by his fights with Trump, remains sky-high. Most expect that if he did make an endorsement in the race, he would at least try to move in conjunction with Pelosi and Sen. Adam Schiff, who endorsed Swalwell, as well as Padilla.

No set plans have been discussed yet, advisers to several say, though they are sensitive to how some Democrats may have felt embarrassed by the Swalwell endorsements they quickly withdrew Friday. Between votes in the Senate on Tuesday, Schiff told CNN that he didn’t have time to discuss the political fallout in California or what he might do.

But a spokesperson noted that Schiff “has been warning that Democrats could get shut out of the runoff in the governor’s race — it is a distinct possibility that none of us can afford to ignore — and he is determined to do all he can to prevent that outcome.”

The only thing most involved know for sure is that a last-minute write-in campaign from Harris, who has not had any FOMO since she passed on running for California governor last summer, doesn’t exist beyond political chatter.

Mail-in ballots will begin going out in just under three weeks. Multiple people close to Newsom think that’s about the amount of time he has.

“Certainly Gov. Newsom is an important voice in California, has been and continues to be, but he is not the only voice,” said Rusty Hicks, the California Democratic Party chairman. “I know that he is watching this very closely and may or may not get involved in the future – but that’s a question for himself.”

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Correction: This story has been corrected to reflect that former Gov. Jerry Brown appointed Xavier Becerra to be state attorney general, not Gov. Gavin Newsom.