California is tearing at the seams, and Gavin Newsom knows it. On Wednesday, the governor went on the attack against a Republican lawmaker who dared to challenge his party’s grip on power. The offense? Suggesting the state might be better off divided.
“A person who seeks to split California does not deserve to hold office in the Golden State. This is a stunt that will go nowhere,” Newsom told Nexstar Broadcasting and FOX-40 reporter Eytan Wallace.
The man who sparked the governor’s outrage is Assembly Minority Leader James Gallagher of Yuba City. Gallagher rolled out a bill to slice California into two states along a north-south line. His measure, AJR-23, would carve off the liberal coastal strip while uniting the conservative inland counties into a separate state. He’s calling it a “two-state solution,” a phrase more familiar in discussions about the Middle East but now being used to describe California’s internal political war.
Gallagher didn’t mince words. “The people of inland California have been overlooked for too long. It’s time for a two-state solution,” he said.
Gallagher hit back on social media after Newsom’s rebuke. He reminded the governor that he had been “duly elected six times over, and I assure you my actions represent exactly how my people feel.” His warning to Newsom was direct: “We will not allow you to strip us of representation.”
For Gallagher, this battle goes far beyond drawing boundary lines. He frames it as a fight to protect voters from Sacramento Democrats who, he argues, are reshaping congressional districts to cement their grip on power.. He accuses them of trying to silence rural voices and “rig the political system forever.”
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The blue part of the proposed two-state solution map would be the Democrats. They would still have the coastline. Meanwhile, the yellowish side of the map would be the conservatives and Republicans.
If the plan went forward, California’s political geography would be transformed. The inland state, solidly conservative, would immediately rank among the largest right-leaning states in America. The coastal state would still be enormous, home to nearly 30 million people and firmly controlled by progressive power centers like San Francisco, Oakland, Los Angeles, and Silicon Valley.
Here is the proposed map:
The divide would roughly follow Interstate 5, the spine that cuts 800 miles from the Mexican border to Oregon. On the east side would be Sutter County, Gallagher’s home base, along with Kern County, where former Speaker Kevin McCarthy is rooted, and the Inland Empire counties of San Bernardino, Riverside, and Imperial. Even Truckee, perched high in the Sierras, would fall into the inland bloc.
Meanwhile, the coastal strip would retain not just the deep-blue centers of power but also Orange County and San Diego County, areas that lean more to the center. State Senate Republican Leader Brian Jones, who represents San Diego, reminded Californians that Newsom was not elected “to play gerrymandering games to boost his presidential campaign, [but] to solve problems here at home.”
Gallagher’s language has been sharp and colorful. He blasted the governor’s actions as a “mid-decade power grab” and a “mockery of democracy.” His most vivid words carried the sting of the frontier: “Don’t p— on my boots and tell me it’s raining. These are rigged maps, drawn in secret to give Democrat politicians more power by dismantling the independent commission Californians created to keep them out of map-drawing.”
That commission was meant to keep politics out of redistricting. Yet Democrats pushed through a resolution for the November ballot to bypass the process entirely. Gallagher warned plainly: “Californians should choose their representatives, not the other way around.”
Resistance came not only from Gallagher. State Sen. Roger Niello of Fair Oaks stepped in during a legislative session, refusing unanimous consent and forcing a slowdown of the redistricting process. His charge was blunt: “The majority party drafted new congressional districts behind closed doors with D.C.-based political operatives to undermine the work of California’s citizen-led commission in charge of redistricting.”
Senate Republicans issued a sharp joint statement of their own. “Democratic legislators have also been crystal clear about their support for independent redistricting as recently as July.”
The spectacle reveals the truth. California’s ruling class is not defending democracy; they are entrenching themselves against it. Gallagher’s inland state idea may sound radical, but it is rooted in frustration shared by millions who feel abandoned by Sacramento.
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