Can anything stop Gavin Newsom from becoming California’s next governor?
He faces a Republican in a state where
"If you have an 'R' after your name and you're running statewide in
Taking on rival
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"Please come campaign for him as much as possible," Newsom wrote in a Twitter response to Trump after the president tweeted a message congratulating Cox for earning enough votes to make the general election race.
Cox has a game plan: He is seeking to tie Newsom -- a former two-term mayor of
He'd rather voters don't concentrate on who belongs to which political party. He wrote on Twitter that "business people have been elected to clean up the politicians' messes in state after state, and in most cases party labels had little to do with who was elected."
Cox campaign manager
"Issues like the special-interest control and the gas tax are the things
Newsom strongly supports the gas tax increase approved last year by the Legislature and signed by Brown. He already is campaigning against its proposed repeal in November, arguing that
More than half of voters are in favor of it, according to an April poll by UC Berkeley's
"Take that single mom who has to get to work every day and she's living paycheck to paycheck ... that
Newsom's shifting messaging on single-payer health care could also be a political vulnerability.
On the concept of single-payer health care, Newsom has said repeatedly throughout his campaign that he supports the idea but has not firmly backed a proposal held up in the Legislature to create such a system.
In his victory speech on election night, Newsom called for "guaranteed health care for all." He said recently that achieving single-payer would take time, requiring negotiations around how to pay for it and how to overcome legal and constitutional challenges that would come with creating such a system.
But there is room for Cox to argue that a single-payer system would require significant tax increases, which would be necessary to replace current spending by consumers on insurance premiums and other health care expenses.
"There's exorbitant costs to that," said Rosales, the Cox campaign manager, adding that single-payer "would consolidate everything under the government."
"There is a vulnerability to exploit, and that is that he's the number one most progressive candidate
Yet there is the reality that
"Given the dynamics of statewide races in
She said on issues such as abortion and immigration, in particular, the choice will be clear.
Newsom is pro-choice and believes a woman should have the right to make her own health care decisions. Cox opposes abortion and has the endorsement of the anti-abortion group
"Once voters hear that
Cox said, when he ran unsuccessfully for president in 2008 and earlier, that he opposes abortion in all circumstances and there should be no exceptions. "I think that anybody who has a rape and incest exception to abortion hasn't thought it through. Killing the baby is not going to absolve the crime of rape," he said in 2006.
Rosales declined to answer whether Cox still holds that position.
"We're not going to comment on that. It's not an issue we're going to discuss," Rosales said.
California
"What are people going to do? Bring up the same old stories about mistakes he made in the past?" Bauman asked, referring to Newsom's 2005 alcohol-fueled affair with the wife of his campaign manager and friend. "He's apologized for those repeatedly and frankly, it's old news."
"It was a brutal primary. I don't think there's anything left to find," Lowe said. "Everything has been aired in some of the most graphic and gruesome ways possible, and he came through like roses."
Jacobs, the Republican consultant, said Cox pressing Newsom on the gas tax could "tighten up the race," but it still isn't likely to make Cox competitive with Newsom.
"The numbers are unlikely, just based on pure demographics, but that's not to say that anything's not possible," she said.
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