Xavier Becerra stumbles through interviews, Tom Steyer is taking them head on
CALIFORNIA — While Xavier Becerra is dodging hard questions, stumbling through basic policy positions,and chastising reporters, Steyer is sitting down for long-form interviews and answering questions about EVERYTHING: affordability, ICE, healthcare, corporate power, his experience leading Farallon — and even soccer.
And every interview comes back to the same issue: Everybody knows Californians can’t afford to live in California. And Tom is the only candidate who will take on the corporate special interests to bring down costs.
In the past two days, Tom joined top podcasters, substackers, and local television affiliates to answer questions about what he’ll do to tackle the affordability crisis in California and take on the special interests who are ripping people off.
“Housing is way too expensive, healthcare is way too expensive. We pay twice as much for electricity as the average American. The oil companies are robbing us at the pump every day.”
“Somebody needs to step up in this state… Someone has got to take on these special interests.”
“The lobbying group for the oil companies… said it was their fiduciary duty to charge every cent they could extract from Californians.”
“I want a buck fifty from the oil companies going directly to Californians.”
“There are no hard questions in this world, there are unprepared answers.”
On his past investments:
“I made a mistake 22 years ago, and I’ve worked very, very consistently and hard to undo it.”
On ICE:
“ICE should be abolished.”
“We can prosecute ICE agents for racially profiling people. That is illegal in the state of California.”
On healthcare:
“Healthcare is chewing up every family in this state.”
“The only way I think healthcare is a right forever in California… is single payer.”
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“There is one candidate who is pushing for real change on behalf of working people who can’t afford to live here against the corporate special interests that run this state.”
“The big corporations and billionaires are spending a record amount of money against me in this race.”
“They know that I am going to take on the electric monopoly, the oil and gas people who are gouging us at the pump.”
On affordability:
“We have the highest poverty rate in the United States of America.”
“It’s not okay to have this kind of wealth disparity. It’s not okay to be failing tens of millions of Californians at the same time the state is creating almost unimaginable wealth.”
On ICE and Trump:
“The job of a California governor is to stand between danger, violence, and powerful interests trying to hurt Californians.”
On taxing billionaires:
“Billionaires like me should be paying more.”
Steyer even went on a soccer podcast and STILL took on the hardest political issues.
“I was the first person in this race to say we should abolish ICE.”
“Immigrants built this state. Immigrants make this state run.”
“We have basically been spending our time figuring out how we can stand up for working Californians.”
And yes, he even shared who he was rooting for in the World Cup:
“I've got to say I'm rooting for Brazil, and I know that's not the popular choice because everybody thinks that the European teams are basically unstoppable, and there's an argument that that's true, but let me say this. Brazil's the beautiful game, and they've got some players that are just spectacular.
"Look, I think this campaign has become really simple, Eric, because it turns out there's one person in this race who's willing to take on the corporate special interests that are driving up costs across California.”
“The basic issue in California is Californians can't afford to live here anymore. And if you look through it, we have really high electricity costs, twice as high as the rest of the country. And I'm saying, I will create local competition and drive down those costs by at least 25 percent.”
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