{"id":431769,"date":"2026-08-13T13:44:11","date_gmt":"2026-08-13T13:44:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/431769\/"},"modified":"2026-08-13T13:44:11","modified_gmt":"2026-08-13T13:44:11","slug":"becerra-easily-leading-california-governors-race-defined-by-partisan-split-poll-shows","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/431769\/","title":{"rendered":"Becerra Easily Leading California Governor\u2019s Race Defined by Partisan Split, Poll Shows"},"content":{"rendered":"

Democrat Xavier Becerra holds an 18-point lead over Republican Steve Hilton among likely voters in the new poll from UC Berkeley, a stark contrast to June\u2019s messy primary contest.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

California gubernatorial candidate Xavier Becerra, right, speaks as Steve Hilton looks on during a 2026 California gubernatorial debate in Bridges Auditorium at Pomona College in Claremont on Tuesday, April 28, 2026. The poll shows Hilton’s favorability rating underwater among independents, with 31% viewing him favorably and 59% unfavorably.\u00a0\u00a0(Keith Birmingham\/MediaNews Group\/Pasadena Star-News via Getty Images)<\/p>\n

Former Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra is leading Republican businessman Steve Hilton by a double-digit margin in the race for California governor<\/a>, according to a new poll from UC Berkeley.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The Institute of Governmental Studies poll found about 55% of likely voters saying they\u2019ll support Becerra, 37% backing Hilton and just 7% undecided.<\/p>\n

Becerra\u2019s 18-point lead marks a stark contrast to June\u2019s messy and crowded primary contest, which included numerous serious Democratic candidates and remained unsettled until the very end<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\"\"Steve Hilton, Republican gubernatorial candidate for California, during a gubernatorial debate at KRON Studios in San Francisco, California, on Wednesday, April 22, 2026. California will hold its primary election on June 2, where the top two finishers advance to the general election in November regardless of party affiliation.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s shaping up to be a pretty traditional Democrat versus Republican general election matchup with strong partisan preferences kind of dominating everything,\u201d poll director Mark DiCamillo said.<\/p>\n

California\u2019s electorate is largely Democratic \u2014 Republicans are outnumbered by Democrats nearly 2 to 1, and independent voters make up more than one-fifth of the electorate.<\/p>\n

Partisan leanings appear to be driving voter opinions in the governor\u2019s race, DiCamillo said: 88% of Democrats are backing Becerra, while 91% of Republicans are behind Hilton.<\/p>\n

\"\"Chad Bianco, Republican gubernatorial candidate for California, Xavier Becerra, Democratic gubernatorial candidate for California, and Steve Hilton, Republican gubernatorial candidate for California, arrive for a gubernatorial debate at KRON Studios in San Francisco on April 22, 2026. <\/p>\n

\u201cIn order for Hilton to win, he really has to go after the Democratic constituencies,\u201d DiCamillo said. \u201cIf you look at, for example, no party preference voters, sometimes you try to peel those off if you\u2019re a challenger on the Republican side.\u201d<\/p>\n

But with a strong majority of independents viewing the Republican businessman negatively, \u201cit\u2019s a tall order,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cHilton represents the Republicans. He\u2019s the standard bearer. And the reason people are voting for him is because that\u2019s what they\u2019re voting for,\u201d DiCamillo said. \u201cUnfortunately for Republicans and for Hilton, there\u2019s not enough of them.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

The survey was conducted online in English and Spanish from Aug. 3 to Aug. 9 among 4,207 registered voters; a sample of 2,310 were considered likely voters in the November general election.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Democrat Xavier Becerra holds an 18-point lead over Republican Steve Hilton among likely voters in the new poll…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":431770,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[7,9,8],"class_list":["post-431769","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-california","tag-california","tag-california-headlines","tag-california-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/431769","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=431769"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/431769\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/431770"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=431769"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=431769"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=431769"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}