On "Forbes Newsroom," Matt Taglia, Senior Director of Emerson College Polling, discussed a new poll on the California governor's race, as well as Gov. Gavin Newsom's approval rating and if his state's voters want to see him run for president.
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00:00Hi, everybody. I'm Brittany Lewis, a breaking news reporter here at Forbes. Joining me now is
00:07Matt Taglia, Senior Director of Emerson College Polling. Matt, thanks so much for coming back on.
00:12Thanks for having me, Brittany.
00:14I'm really excited to speak with you today because you have a poll regarding the June
00:192026. So it seems like light years away, but it will be here sooner than we know it. Primary
00:24for California's governor. What did you find? Who's the front runner? Yeah, Brittany, it does seem like
00:30light years away, but folks are interested and some folks are tuned in right now. So I think the
00:36big story here is that it really depends on whether or not former Vice President Harris decides to enter
00:44the race. With her in the race, we have her at 31 percent, Katie Porter at 8 percent, and then all
00:51others are below 5 percent with 39 percent undecided. Now, if the former Vice President,
00:58former presidential candidate Harris decides not to run, then it is really sort of an open race.
01:05Porter jumps a little bit up to 12 percent. All unders, though, all other candidates, though,
01:11are under 5 percent there with a majority undecided at 54 percent. So again, you know,
01:17this really, really hinges on whether or not Harris decides to run. That's really interesting because
01:22Harris hasn't even jumped in the race yet. So when you take her out of the equation,
01:25the numbers don't even change. So talk to us about that a little bit. Is that normal to see people
01:32this excited about a candidate who hasn't even yet said declared that they were joining the race?
01:38Yeah, and I can't think of too many other instances where this has been the case. But,
01:43you know, I think it does speak to her name ID more than anything. We do see excitement among
01:52Democrats specifically. So 49 percent back Harris when she is on the ballot versus Porter, 13 percent
02:00among Democrats. But she also picks up 23 percent of independents. And we see the highest support among
02:07these younger voters, 18 to 29 year olds. She has 46 percent support there. Again, I think that is
02:13very much a name ID contest. She's been in the news recently. She obviously was just on the
02:19presidential ticket. So I think that that's really giving her a leg up here. But I also don't want to
02:24discount that. You know, some of these candidates would have to spend millions and millions of dollars
02:29in order to get the same name ID as Kamala Harris. So she walks into this race, if she decides to,
02:36with a substantial lead.
02:41When you're looking at the numbers, when Harris enters the race, she's at 31 percent. But there
02:45is another group leading the charge. And those are undecided voters at 39 percent. Who does that
02:51undecided help more? Because when you're looking at Harris, she arguably has the most name recognition
02:57on this list because she was vice president. She was presidential nominee. But does it help the
03:03smaller names more because voters don't have as much of an opinion on them as they potentially do
03:09Harris? So I think that that is a fair point. And I think that there is some room here for growth,
03:16especially for Katie Porter. She does pick up when Harris isn't on the ballot. She picks up a little
03:23bit more support among the older voters. And that's exactly who you're going to want to court
03:27in a primary situation, be it Democratic or Republican, in this case, nonpartisan. But
03:33regardless, I think that that is one sort of thing that she can boast there. On the other hand,
03:41I think eventually this undecided factor is going to help one Republican. So if Republicans can coalesce
03:49around one candidate right now, that candidate who is a Republican and is and has some support is
03:56Bianco. If Republicans can decide and coalesce around one candidate, I think that undecided vote
04:03will ultimately help that candidate. They'll want to have someone be in second place so that the top
04:10two are not both Democrats. How competitive as of now is this race shaping up to be? If Harris jumps
04:18in, is it almost like as of now game over? Does a Republican have a shot? I mean, what does that really look
04:25like? Yeah. And again, I think it's going to be tough for another Democrat to rise to the top with
04:35Harris on the ticket. You know, she is walking in with such high name ID. She has a substantial lead
04:43this early when we are roughly, what is it, April? So 13 months out from the primary election. I think
04:52that that's really, really tough. Again, I think, you know, the state Republican Party, other Republicans,
04:59they're going to be looking at this and they're going to certainly want a viable Republican candidate
05:04who can make it up to the top and they're going to be putting money into that. So, you know, I do. I think
05:10that it's ultimately competitive in a general election. Probably not. But at the primary level, I think that there is
05:16a strong chance that it would be, in the case of Harris, a Harris and a Republican candidate in the
05:22top two slots. And if Harris decides not to enter the race, then I would still say it would be either
05:29Porter, maybe one of these other Democratic candidates, but likely, almost certainly a Democrat on top
05:37and more likely than not, a Republican in second place. One thing that's exciting is that this
05:44primary is over a year away. So I'm sure you and I will have plenty of conversations on it. We're
05:50talking about the future governor of California, but I do want to look at the current governor of
05:54California, and that is Gavin Newsom. How do Californians view the job that he's doing now? Because
06:00as we remember, just at the beginning of this year, LA was ravaged by wildfires. Newsom took the brunt of
06:08criticism for how he handled that. What do voters think of him now? Yeah, and it's not the best approval
06:15rating we've seen for a governor. 33% approve of Newsom's job performance versus 42% who disapprove. Let's
06:23compare that for a second to President Trump. In California, as we know, one of the most Democratic
06:30states in the country, 28% approve of Trump's job performance versus 56% disapprove. So there is
06:37certainly a distance there, but those approval numbers specifically, that 28% and 33%, that's a fairly
06:43small distance between the two approval numbers there. So that's a little striking to see for a Democratic
06:51governor, and I think we see a little bit more of that further down the polls. We get into the issues, and then we get
06:57into the question of Newsom running for president. I want to get into that because Gavin Newsom has been
07:04trying to make inroads with conservatives. He started a podcast and had Charlie Kirk and Steve
07:09Bannon on as guests. That was viewed as largely controversial. He's also moving more towards the
07:15middle in different views, like trans athletes in women's sports. And this is the description of his
07:20podcast. It's time to have honest discussions with people that agree and disagree with us.
07:24It's time to answer the hard questions and be open to criticism and debate without demeaning or
07:28dehumanizing one another. And many people see this as him laying early groundwork to run for president.
07:34Is there an appetite for that?
07:37Well, in California, at least, no, not necessarily. So 59% say no, Gavin Newsom should not run for
07:45president versus 41% who say yes. As you might expect, Democrats are more bullish about Newsom
07:53running for president. It's a 60-40 split, roughly. Now, I wouldn't say that that's overwhelming if 40%
07:59within your own party in your home state say that you should not run for president. That's maybe not
08:06the odds that you want. And then when you look at Republicans and independents, it's three quarters say
08:11that he should not run for president. So I don't know, necessarily, that the podcast is breaking through.
08:17I don't know that these olive branches to the other side are going to really help him in the end.
08:23But I also don't know that, you know, Californians speak for the rest of the country.
08:28Does this mean that he couldn't win a primary in, say, South Carolina or on Super Tuesday?
08:34He very well might. And he could potentially be a viable presidential candidate. But when you look at the
08:41views at home among his own constituents right now, they are not favorable towards him as president.
08:49When you're looking at these statewide races and the national race, obviously, to be president,
08:55when you're looking at California in particular, what are some of the top issues facing voters still now?
09:01Is it like in 2024, the economy, immigration and other? What does that look like?
09:07It's very similar to 2024. We still see the economy, the top issue for folks in California.
09:15That's 40 percent. And that's remained true across the country for the most part.
09:20In California, it gets a little interesting, though, because housing affordability is 24 percent.
09:25So that's the second highest issue. You combine those two categories, the economy, including inflation,
09:32jobs, et cetera, plus housing affordability, which is another component of the economy, really.
09:38Then you're at roughly two thirds of the electorate who say that one of these is their top issue.
09:45And what's also interesting in California is that, you know, usually when we see housing
09:50affordability track up as a major issue, it's younger folks. It's folks who are in their 20s
09:57and 30s who are thinking about buying a house or hope to buy a home someday, but can't right now
10:03because of either interest rates or prices or for some other factors. That's not the case in California.
10:08It ranges between all of the different age breakouts. I think everywhere folks are feeling the housing
10:16crunch in California. That's certainly reflected here. And I think that, you know, this in conjunction
10:22with the economy are really fueling the approval numbers that we saw for President Trump and for
10:30Governor Newsom. And I'm curious how the tariff issue impacts people's view of the economy,
10:36because President Trump earlier this month unveiled a sweeping tariff plan. And since he really started
10:43in January, he's threatened, paused, started and escalated trade wars with our allies and adversaries
10:50alike. How do voters in California view this tariff plan? Yeah. And so we asked, you know, how folks tend to
10:58view tariffs and who ultimately pays for tariffs. And so we found that 60 percent say that it's a tax on the
11:06consumer. 22 percent say that it's a tax on the foreign country who has been levied, had tariffs
11:13levied against them. That's pretty similar to what we found nationally. Here, though, we find that 40 percent
11:21of Republicans say that it's a tax on the consumer. It's a little bit different from the nationwide
11:25numbers that we see, but it is still, you know, very different from how Democrats tend to view it.
11:3077 percent say it's a tax on the consumer. I think that we're seeing that also reflected in that economic
11:37number up at the top. 40 percent say it's their top issue. And then when we talk about the stock market
11:42getting a little bit further down, folks are fairly concerned about the recent swings in the stock
11:48market obviously due in part to tariffs. We've seen the tariffs roil the stock market. Global markets
11:56lost trillions in the immediate aftermath. When you're looking at tariffs and how voters view the
12:01market volatility, how does that break down really by demo? Yeah, so we see a lot of overall concern
12:07here for the recent swings in the stock market. We see 44 percent overall are very concerned. 28 percent
12:15are somewhat concerned. Only 28 percent are either not that concerned or not at all concerned. So I think
12:22it's fair to say that people are seeing the volatility in the market. They're likely seeing
12:27some effect on their accounts, be it bank account or their investments. And when we look at this by
12:33party, you wouldn't necessarily think that there's a partisan split in, you know, how the economy is
12:39performing, how stocks are performing, how their how their own accounts are performing. But we see 58 percent
12:45of Democrats are very concerned about the recent market volatility, whereas only 25 percent of
12:51Republicans say the same. And then 36 percent of independents say that they're very concerned.
12:57So again, I think that there is overall a lot of concern here, but there is a bit of a partisan tilt
13:02to this. And Democrats overall have much more than any other party here.
13:10Well, Matt, there is certainly a lot to look out for when it comes to both the California
13:16gubernatorial primary as well as the tariffs. And I'm sure you and I will have plenty more
13:21conversations on them both. Thank you so much for joining me.
13:25Absolutely. Thank you, Brittany.