HOW DRU CATCH SEES IT

The $14.3 Billion Résumé Nobody Asked For

The man who presides over the most expensive state in America - highest gas taxes, highest base sales tax, highest top income tax rate - looked at the situation and concluded the problem was that Californians still had too much money left over. According to the California Tax Foundation, as reported by the New York Post, Newsom signed 67 new tax measures into law from a menu of 156 proposals totaling $803 billion. He went with the modest option. Restraint.

Running for President on a Record People Are Literally Running From

Here's the specific absurdity: Newsom reportedly wants to run for president in 2028. His pitch to the rest of America will apparently be, "Look what I did to California - now imagine it coast to coast." He's running on a record where, per the Post, billionaires are leaving the state, employers are fleeing to lower-tax jurisdictions, and the housing affordability crisis gets worse with every new climate mandate that adds tens of thousands in costs to every new home. The résumé isn't "I fixed California." The résumé is "I made California so expensive that the people who could leave, did."

A Fiscal Machine That Runs on Its Own Exhaust

And that's the part that really stings. The California Tax Foundation report doesn't just document taxes going up - it documents a state where the tax base is actively shrinking because the people paying the most are relocating. At least seven billionaires have reportedly left over a proposed "billionaire tax" alone, per the Post. So the strategy appears to be: raise taxes, watch the wealthiest taxpayers leave, then raise taxes again to cover the shortfall created by the last round of tax increases. It's a fiscal perpetual motion machine, except instead of generating energy it generates U-Haul reservations.