Steve Hilton: Can this British-born Republican be CA’s next governor?

As the Republican candidate for California governor, Steve Hilton has a steep mountain to climb. Democratic voters outnumber Republicans almost two-to-one, and the majority of California voters disapprove of President Donald Trump, who endorsed Hilton.

Nevertheless, Hilton hopes to be the first Republican to hold statewide office in 20 years. But who is Hilton and what does he believe?

By speaking with Hilton, combing through past press coverage and reading Hilton’s own writings, CalMatters’ Jeanne Kuang details a candidate whose beliefs don’t map neatly onto one singular political ideology.

Born in the U.K. to Hungarian immigrants, Hilton later made a name for himself as a central figure in refreshing the British Conservative Party’s image under Prime Minister David Cameron. In London, he pushed to slash welfare, cut government employment and privatize government services.

After moving to Silicon Valley in 2012, Hilton landed a Fox News show where he aligned himself closely with Trump. He called for an audit into the 2020 presidential election that Trump lost and railed against American colleges for being “woke.”

But over the years, Hilton has also praised ideas that contradict GOP policies and the deregulatory campaign he promotes. In 2015 he wrote a book endorsing a higher national living wage in the U.K., generous family leave policies and forcing factory farms to pay for the environmental and health costs of their operations. He’s also critical of the right for often blaming China and immigration for inequality in the U.S.

Giles Gibbons, Hilton’s friend and former business partner, described Hilton as “a contrarian” who “challenges the orthodoxy.”

But Hilton simply views himself as a pragmatist — one who isn’t bound by ideology.

• Hilton: “I don’t like being told what to do myself, and I don’t want to tell anyone else what to do with their life either, and I think that’s a very Californian attitude.”

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With California gas prices hovering above the national average, testimony from a state watchdog unveiled that Chevron charged consumers higher prices compared to other major brands, writes CalMatters’ Alejandro Lazo.

In June a subdepartment of the state Energy Commission told legislators that branded stations charged more than unbranded ones in California at a difference that’s bigger than the rest of the country. When the Iran-war price spike was near its peak in late May, for example, California Chevron stations charged an average of $6.34 a gallon. That’s the highest of any brand tracked in the state, and 44 cents above the average station that sells gas without a major oil-company logo.

Part of the reason for this, according to the watchdog, is that California has a high share of fuel sales in which refiners sell fuel directly to branded retailers at prices the refiners set. Those agreements lock branded operators into paying more than unbranded ones for the same fuel — and those higher prices are then passed onto customers.

A Chevron spokesperson blamed California’s energy policies, not Chevron’s pricing, for the state’s high gasoline prices.

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In the latest defeat for California Native American tribes that own casinos, a San Francisco judge has ruled that the state’s attorney general doesn’t have the power to severely restrict blackjack and other table games at cardrooms across the state.

As CalMatters’ Ryan Sabalow explains, for years tribal casinos have sought to prevent cardrooms from offering blackjack, arguing that they had exclusive rights to host it and other lucrative games. Attorney General Rob Bonta sided with tribal casinos and moved to ban the game at private cardrooms earlier this year through a rule change under the state’s Bureau of Gambling Control.

But Superior Court Judge Richard Darwin ruled that the bureau didn’t have the legal authority to do that, dealing a win to cardroom operators who say the ruling once again proves their business model is legal.

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A judge last week rejected the Trump administration’s attempt to divert funds intended to provide unhoused people with permanent housing. The decision gave California a win in its battle over how to address homelessness, but the judge stopped short of banning the administration from making similar changes in the future. Read more from CalMatters’ Marisa Kendall.