GOP’s best shot at California governor’s office in decades mired in angry internal debate

RANCHO MIRAGE, Calif. — While Republicans have raced as hard as they can over the past two decades to win the governorship of California, the battle between the leading candidates to win President Trump’s party has gone from subdued to vicious.

Conservative commentator Steve Hilton accused rival Riverside County Sheriff Chad Bianco of turning a blind eye to illegal immigrants and called him an “idiot” in their first one-on-one debate in Rancho Mirage earlier this month. The law enforcement chief called Hilton, a British immigrant, a “con artist” and said he was heartless for not giving others the same path to U.S. citizenship that he received.

“What an outrageous and offensive insult that Chad has inflicted on every legal immigrant in this state and this country,” Hilton said.

The heated debate took place days before the California Republican Party is set to consider throwing support in the 2026 race for California governor. Hundreds of party delegates will gather in San Diego this weekend to decide, but it’s unclear whether either candidate can win the 60% vote threshold to receive official party endorsement.

Although registered Democratic voters in California outnumber Republicans nearly 2 to 1, most polls show the two Republicans as the top candidates in the race.

Bianco and Hilton are running against eight heavyweight Democrats who split their party’s votes in the election to replace ousted Gov. Gavin Newsom. Under California’s unique primary election system, the two candidates who receive the most votes in the primary will advance to the November general election, regardless of party affiliation.

That possibility alarmed Democratic leaders in the state, who urged the struggling candidates to fail. dropping out of school To prevent their party from being left out of the November elections.

Still, a lot of things could happen before the June 2 primary that could inflame the race. President Trump endorsed Hilton late Sunday, which could significantly impact GOP voters in the state. More than 6 million Californians voted for Trump in the 2024 presidential election, but he was defeated by Vice President Kamala Harris, one of the state’s top Democrats.

During the campaign, Bianco and Hilton frequently raised the possibility that a Republican would be elected governor, a failure of Democratic rule in the nation’s most populous state and the world’s fourth-largest economy.

“Probably for the first time in our lifetimes, really since Ronald Reagan… every legitimate poll shows either me or Steve Hilton at the top of the top two Republicans.” [every] “statewide survey,” Bianco told nearly 100 attendees over the past six months at a recent Valley Unity Republican Women luncheon overlooking lush green lawns at the Woodland Hills County Club.

Hilton, who has attended gubernatorial forums and debates more than Bianco, said the fact that polls show him trailing his Democratic rivals proves that Californians are fed up with 15 years of one-party rule.

“I’m telling you right now, there isn’t a single one of them in California who represents even the slightest degree the change we need,” he told several hundred people at Big Bear’s Calvary Chapel. “We will do this this year”

From a distance, Bianco seems outside the central cast for the GOP candidate for governor: a gun-toting lawman with a dark mustache and short hair who has devoted his life to protecting the defenseless and locking up criminals.

Recalling political strategists as well as independent pollsters in both parties, Bianco said having the phrase “Riverside County Sheriff” next to his name in the official state elections would be a big boon to his campaign.

“I’ll tell you what, if we took the names and the party off the ballot and just went to the resume — if we had you all read a resume on who you’re going to appoint as the next governor — I would win this election 100% to zero,” Bianco told the GOP caucus.

Republican gubernatorial candidate Steve Hilton greets a member of the Big Bear Valley Republican Council before speaking at a town hall at Calvary Chapel in Big Bear in March.

(Gina Ferazzi / Los Angeles Times)

But Bianco’s badge did not protect him from Hilton’s blistering attacks on the sheriff’s past statements on immigration, pandemic mask mandates and Black Lives Matter protests; That’s disqualifying for some GOP voters.

Bianco opposes “sanctuary city” laws, calls for the deportation of criminal illegal immigrants and says the border must be secured. But he also supported a path to citizenship for legal, undocumented workers and told voters lawmakers were not involved in ICE raids.

Bianco had ordered county residents to wear masks or face fines in the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic, but later withdrew Newsom’s stay-at-home orders.

That same year, he and his aides were photographed kneeling and talking to protesters following the killing of George Floyd; he has since changed this action to praying.

Bianco’s wife, Denise, accused Hilton on Thursday of endangering her husband by sending mailers to voters with Bianco’s face surrounded by circles that she described as a “target target.”

“We have all watched so much political violence against law enforcement in recent years. I never thought it would come from a political candidate directed at my husband,” she said in an Instagram post. “Steve, why do you think it’s acceptable to put my husband’s face, a dedicated sheriff, in a shooting target?”

Election security also brought to the fore the differences in the views of the candidates.

Hilton and Bianco echoed Trump’s call for GOP voter turnout to be “too big to cheat.” However, their statements regarding the allegations of abuse differed.

Hilton condemned the “total corruption in the voting system in California.”

“I said for the longest time possible that I didn’t understand why we couldn’t do things the way most places do, which is vote in one day, count in one day, get results in one day,” he said.

Asked by a voter in March about election fraud in California, Bianco responded that he was confident law enforcement in California was making sure such fraud “didn’t happen here,” while acknowledging that such “cheating” had occurred in states like Ohio and Pennsylvania in the 2020 election.

But that same month, more than 650,000 ballots from the November election were seized as part of an investigation to determine whether they were counted fraudulently.

Bianco suspended the investigation shortly before the California Supreme Court halted it for further review.

California voters haven’t elected a Republican as governor since Arnold Schwarzenegger’s re-election in 2006. Two Republicans on the ballot in the June 2 primary hope to change that.

(Justin Sullivan/Getty Images)

Hilton attempted to capitalize on these positions by labeling Bianco a “slick sheriff,” an attack that appealed to some voters.

“The man is lying. The man is not honest about kneeling on BLM, which is unacceptable,” said Agnes Gibboney, 71, of Rancho Cucamonga. “Moreover, it is unacceptable to come up with three or four different excuses and then get angry at the voters for asking this question.”

Bianco labeled Hilton a shape-shifting opportunist, pointing out that she supported the climate change agenda when advising British Prime Minister David Cameron, expressing support for views expressed by Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) in the 2016 presidential election, and posted a picture of Hilton. Hilton hugs Newsom on social media.

Following the Rancho Mirage altercation, Bianco said, “Steve is a fraud. He’s a liar and I’m not just going to sit by and let him do this anymore.” “When he starts attacking me, he starts attacking my MPs, my profession, I will not allow this anymore.”

“He just reshaped himself for this gubernatorial election and everyone is starting to see through that,” Bianco said.

Hilton, the son of a Hungarian family who immigrated to England, served as an advisor to Cameron before becoming an American citizen. At campaign events, supporters gifted Hilton with Kézimunka, a traditional Hungarian embroidered fabric sewn with hearts, as well as stars and stripes swimsuits.

“My mother and father are Hungarian refugees fleeing communism,” Hilton said. “I am fighting to ensure that this state I love does not become the country I left… I have renounced my UK citizenship. I am for California and America.”

Hilton has become the more visible of the two candidates and is benefiting from the fact that GOP voters have seen her speaking on Fox News for several years.

Both men argue that one-party Democratic rule in California is destroying a state once seen as the epitome of the American dream.

Hilton describes the state’s leaders as “far-left lunatics.” They ruined the greatest, most beautiful place on earth,” and modified a popular Texas joke about someone all hat and no cattle to describe Newsom.

“It’s all hair, nothing. Don’t you think it’s time we had a governor with less hair in California?” said Hilton, who had a smooth crown.

Bianco calls the state’s Democratic leaders “far-left psychopaths” who have implemented policies, taxes and fees that force Californians to flee the state.

“We all know the government has completely failed and we’re ready to take our state back,” he said, later adding: “They don’t want our lives to be better. I do… Nobody leaves California because they want to. It’s the government’s agenda and policy that hurts California and makes it bad.”

Many of the candidates’ promises are nearly identical, including fighting the budget shortage, lowering gas prices, increasing capacity in state prisons, protecting gun owners’ rights and keeping transgender athletes out of girls’ locker rooms.

Both promise to lower California’s vehicle registration fees; It’s a proposal reminiscent of former Republican Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger’s promise to repeal the car tax during the 2003 recall election, immortalized by his campaign throwing a wrecking ball at an Oldsmobile in Costa Mesa.

Schwarzenegger was elected governor soon after.

GOP strategist Rob Stutzman, a former Schwarzenegger adviser who is aligned with neither candidate in the 2026 race, added that no candidate from either party can match Schwarzenegger’s global appeal or voters’ familiarity with the state’s newest Democratic governors (including Jerry Brown, scion of a famous political family) or Newsom’s charisma.

“Voters think this is an uninspiring list of candidates. And in fact, the impressive list is made up of people who chose not to run, right?” said Harris, Sen. Alex Padilla and Atty. Gen. Rob Bonta. “So it’s no surprise there isn’t much interest.”

Although Hilton and Bianco have been personally friendly before intersecting roads Public criticism of each other at the state GOP convention in September has increased in recent weeks, which could sway many undecided GOP voters in the race.

“My main bet is to see if they’re going to follow God’s will. So I pay attention to what they say and what they do,” David Solomon, a 42-year-old retired Air Force IT specialist, said after seeing Hilton speak in Big Bear. “It really depends on who can put their plans into action.”

Jane Price, a 77-year-old Sherman Oaks resident, said she is concerned that Republicans’ failure to unite behind one candidate will give Democrats an advantage in the governor’s race.

After seeing Bianco speak, a founding member of the woman’s GOP group said, “We don’t want to leave, right? This is a problem.” “The state of California is in danger. We were thriving here in California. But now it’s just a downhill slide. We need people who appreciate what California means.”