By Joe Garofoli, Political Columnist April 16, 2026 (SFChronicle.com)
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From left: California governor candidates former Rep. Katie Porter, former Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, former Health Secretary Xavier Bacerra, former state Controller Betty Yee and California Superintendent of Public Instruction Tony Thurmond participate in a forum in Los Angeles last September.Carlin Stiehl/Tribune News Service
The possibility that Democrats will be locked out of the race for California governor has dramatically shrunk, political analysts believe.
That’s a huge silver lining for the party after its leading candidate, former Rep. Eric Swalwell, dropped out of the race after a Chronicle report in which a former staffer alleged he had sexually assaulted her.
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Sacramento data expert Paul Mitchell, who created an online model that simulates thousands of election scenarios, said that “the program really believes that the odds of two Republicans splitting the vote is more remote, almost nonexistent.”
Not only that, Mitchell, said, but the model forecasts Swalwell’s supporters migrating to Tom Steyer and former Rep. Katie Porter, meaning support for those two candidates could be “growing to an extent that they could actually be the top two candidates, creating a greater chance of a Top Two general election with NO REPUBLICAN, which would be quite a twist!” he wrote in an email.
Other analysts weren’t ready to go that far, but agreed that it is now unlikely — but not impossible — that Democrats will be watching the November election from the sidelines.
“I’ve been saying all along that I think that two Republicans is possible, but not probable,” said Mark Baldassare, survey director at the Public Policy Institute of California. “I continue to say it’s not probable that there would be two Republicans” on the ballot in November.
The organization released a poll Tuesday that showed Swalwell leading the race with 18% support, followed by Fox News commentator Steve Hilton with 17%, Riverside County Sheriff Chad Bianco with 14%, Steyer with 14% and Porter with 10%. The other top Democratic candidates scored at 5% or lower. The survey was conducted before Swalwell exited the race and resigned from Congress.
Since PPIC’s February survey, Swalwell surged higher than any other candidate (11% to 18%), while support for Porter decreased the most (21% to 10%).
Baldassare noted that Swalwell’s name will remain on the ballot, and it is probable that he will receive votes.
In 2014, former San Francisco Democratic state Sen. Leland Yee received 380,361 votes out of 4 million cast just two months after being indicted in a federal corruption investigation. He finished in third place in the primary, ahead of several candidates who had been actively campaigning. Baldassare noted that 69% of Swalwell’s supporters described themselves as liberal in the new PPIC poll, meaning “that they’re going to be looking for a liberal, and that’s a sizable number of people who will make it possible for at least one Democrat to get into the top two.”
There are roughly twice as many registered Democrats as Republicans in California.
Some of the migration of Swalwell supporters has begun. Steyer received the endorsement Monday from the board of the 310,000-member California Teachers Association, which had previously backed Swalwell.
CTA President David Goldberg praised Steyer for walking the picket line with teachers and for promising to reform Proposition 13, even though that will be a huge uphill battle.
“He’s been a champion for holding corporations accountable and closing the corporate tax loopholes that leave hardworking Californians behind and our essential public services without vital revenue to benefit the wealthy few,” Goldberg said.
Analysts also said President Donald Trump’s endorsement this month of Hilton “probably consolidates at least a lot of the MAGA support behind Hilton,” decreasing the chance of two Republicans advancing, said Ruth Bernstein, the senior principal with EMC Research, which was Swalwell’s longtime pollster.
Bernstein added that it’s possible that with some of the lower-polling Democrats trying to breathe life into their campaigns in the aftermath of Swalwell’s exit, “we could, instead of seeing support consolidating around one or two Democratic candidates, potentially support starts to spread between more candidates, which again, could lead to two Republicans.
“So I do think the likelihood (of a Democratic lockout) has decreased, but it’s not impossible,” Bernstein said.
April 16, 2026
Senior Political Writer
Joe Garofoli is the San Francisco Chronicle’s senior political writer, covering national and state politics. He has worked at The Chronicle since 2000 and in Bay Area journalism since 1992, when he left the Milwaukee Journal. He is the host of “It’s All Political,” The Chronicle’s political podcast. Catch it here: bit.ly/2LSAUjA
He has won numerous awards and covered everything from fashion to the Jeffrey Dahmer serial killings to two Olympic Games to his own vasectomy — which he discussed on NPR’s “Talk of the Nation” after being told he couldn’t say the word “balls” on the air. He regularly appears on Bay Area radio and TV talking politics and is available to entertain at bar mitzvahs and First Communions. He is a graduate of Northwestern University and a proud native of Pittsburgh. Go Steelers!
