Gavin Newsom is generating heat for Kamala Harris on gas prices

SACRAMENTO, California — Gov. Gavin Newsom is trying to do something about California’s high gas prices — and the state’s Republicans want to make sure the rest of the country knows about it.

Newsom’s bid during the last week of the state’s legislative session to expand regulators’ authority over oil companies is giving California Republicans an opportunity to hitch the state’s perpetually high fuel prices to the Democratic Party’s new standard bearer: fellow Californian Kamala Harris.

“Newsom is following Kamalanomics in pushing terrible policies not grounded in economic reality,” Rep. Vince Fong posted Wednesday on X.

Swing-state Republicans are piling on. Arizona’s state Senate president, Warren Petersen, wrote Newsom today warning of “dire impact” from the proposal he unveiled Tuesday, which would authorize the state to order refiners to store more gas. Newsom’s administration says the extra supply would dampen price spikes driven by supply shortages.

The oil industry argues Newsom’s move would only exacerbate supply-driven shortages since refineries have limited storage capacity. They say it’s more likely to drive costs up than bring them down, putting at risk not only California consumers but those of its neighbors at a time when the state is under the national microscope.

The Western States Petroleum Association, which covers Nevada, Arizona and Oregon along with California, started running ads Tuesday in Sacramento and in-state swing districts that question why the state is tinkering with gas prices just as inflation is starting to come down.

“Because of the state of the presidential race, because of the very visible presence Newsom had on the national stage, it’s inevitable California policies will be discussed at the national level,” WSPA spokesperson Kevin Slagle said in an interview. “Our intent is to try to stop bad policy in California, but it would not be surprising if it became part of the national discussion.”

Newsom spokesperson Alex Stack said the proposal was aimed at saving “hundreds of millions of dollars every year by helping prevent gas price spikes — including for those states like Arizona and Nevada that get their gas from California.”

“But these profit spikes are good for Big Oil and their Republican backers, which is why they’re trying to stop this,” he said.

Newsom, a prominent surrogate for Joe Biden’s reelection campaign, took some GOP fire earlier in the summer when Nevada Gov. Joe Lombardo objected to California potentially imposing a cap on oil refineries’ profits. Newsom authorized the California Energy Commission to do that in a 2022 law; the agency plans to make a decision this fall.

Now that Harris is the nominee, California policies are at even more risk of Republican attack.

“People are looking at California as really a warning, not as like a beacon of what you should do,” said Assembly Minority Leader James Gallagher, a Republican from the Sacramento suburbs. “They’re saying this is a warning for what you shouldn’t do.”

Harris has backed away from other energy policies she supported earlier in her career, like a ban on fracking. In an interview on CNN on Thursday , her first since accepting the Democratic nomination for president, Harris reiterated that she wouldn’t ban fracking. She also hasn’t been involved in California’s recent oil industry crackdown, which includes a lawsuit seeking to recoup climate change damages from oil majors and new restrictions on how close oil wells can be to homes, schools and other sensitive sites.

But Gallagher said he thought she should respond to the in-state debate.

“Do you think that the energy policies adopted in California, which have led to some of the highest energy costs in the nation, are good policies or bad? Would you do restrictions on domestic oil wells like we’ve done here in California? Would you do that nationwide and hurt our own domestic energy production? I think these are all very good questions for Kamala Harris; like, this is your home state.”

Neither the Harris nor the Trump campaigns responded to requests for comment, but they’re likely to face questions about California at their first debate on Sept. 10.

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