California’s once soaring population has hit a plateau. So will its national political clout

The federal Census Bureau annually announces new population numbers for the country and its 50 states based on calculations of how births, deaths and migration have changed the numbers from July 1 to June 30 of the previous year.

The state Department of Finance annually announces new California population numbers, based on its calculations of those same demographic factors during the same 12-month period.

The numbers often differ, and in past years differentials of a million persons or more have emerged from the two agencies’ California calculations.

In December, the state agency declared that as of last July, California’s population was 39.529 million, a gain of 19,200 since 2024. Although arithmetically insignificant, the tiny gain was hailed by officialdom and media as proof that California is no longer losing people.

Last month, the Census Bureau released its latest estimates, fixing California’s population at 39.355 million, a decline of 9,465 souls from the previous year. It implies that California’s slide, which began in the COVID-18 pandemic, is still happening, with a net loss of 200,394 residents since the 2020 census.

Although the 174,000 difference between the two numbers is relatively tiny, from a sociopolitical standpoint one shows growth while the other shows shrinkage. Thus California officialdom claims that predictions of the state’s impending collapse are false, while its critics say California is still in decline.

There is, however, no doubt that California is, at best, at a population plateau — either gaining or losing very slowly after a 175-year history of sometimes stunning levels of population growth. During the 1980-90 decade, for example, the state’s population soared by about 6 million people, a nearly 25% gain, thanks to high levels of immigration and a lofty birth rate.

Its current stasis, whatever the exact numbers, reflects stagnant levels of foreign migration, a much lower birth rate and an ongoing net loss in state-to-state migration.

Hans Johnson and Eric McGhee, demographers for the Public Policy Institute of California, have charted that trend and in a recent report declare, “This migration, over the decades, has the power to reshape the state. From 2010 through 2024 (the year of the latest data) almost 10 million people moved from California to other states, while just over 7 million people moved to California from other parts of the country, according to the American Community Survey. In fact, according to Department of Finance estimates, the state has lost residents to other states every year since 2001.”

PPIC found that most of those leaving the state are adults without college degrees. Texas is their top destination, and one could assume they are fleeing high living costs.

California is not alone in population stagnation or loss. New York and Illinois are two others and, overall, slow- or no-growth states tend to be politically blue, while the big gainers, such as Texas, Florida and the fastest grower, South Carolina, lean to the right.

The growth differential between red and blue states will likely bite the latter after the 2030 census, when the nation’s 435 congressional seats are divvied up. Two new studies by reputable organizations project that California and other major blue states will lose a chunk of seats to fast-growing red states, based on the new Census Bureau data.

The American Redistricting Project and Jonathon Vervas at Carnegie Mellon University both see California losing four of its 52 seats, Texas gaining four and Florida getting either two or four.

The shift of congressional seats, of course, also shifts presidential electoral votes, meaning Republican candidates’ prospects will improve and those of Democrats will decline after 2030.

There’s an old saying that demographics are destiny. What’s happening now underscores that truism.