The Brief

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After more than a decade being exiled from the governor’s office in California, Republicans are eyeing growing voter frustration with the dominant liberal politics of the state as a launching pad for a comeback next year.

Though lacking the statewide profiles of a deluge of Democratic contenders, a pair of GOP hopefuls with devoted conservative followings has jumped into the open 2026 gubernatorial race in recent months, hoping to persuade voters that only a radical shakeup can fix California’s problems.

“I don’t think there’s any other way of describing California today, other than the sick man of America,” said Steve Hilton, a former Fox News host and onetime political adviser to British Prime Minister David Cameron who officially announced his candidacy on Monday. “It’s just undeniable that we’re in a terrible, terrible mess in California and we have to change direction.”

Hilton is kicking off his campaign today with an event in Huntington Beach, the city that has remade itself over the past few years into the bulwark of conservative resistance in California. He follows Riverside County Sheriff Chad Bianco, a hero of the right for defying state mandates during the COVID pandemic, who entered the race to succeed termed-out Gov. Gavin Newsom in February.

Both believe that voters have grown sick of a generation of one-party Democratic rule in Sacramento and are banking on appeals to cut taxes and regulations — which they blame for making California unaffordable — to reach across traditional partisan lines.

“We are being led down a path of complete government control and socialism,” Bianco said in an interview. “This is no longer Democrat versus Republican. We’re at a point where it’s sane versus insane.”

But conservative candidates face a steep climb in a state that has not elected a Republican to statewide office since Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger won a second term in 2006.

California Democratic Party Chairperson Rusty Hicks said the gubernatorial race is about more than just who can deliver for Californians. Voters know the governor has a powerful platform to stand up to the Trump administration and they won’t want a Republican in a role that is also critical to the future of the rest of the country and the whole world, he said.

“I certainly applaud them for continuing to try,” Hicks said. “But time and time again, we see California voters see their policies for what they are, which is not in line with the values of Californians.”

Slashing taxes and regulations

More than 20 people have already filed a statement of intention to run for governor in the 2026 primary as Republicans — though few will be serious candidates and some may never qualify for the ballot at all, which requires paying a filing fee or submitting thousands of signatures from registered voters.

Only two, including Bianco, have reported raising any money for their campaigns so far. While the first fundraising report of 2025 is not due until the end of July, major donations are filed with the state on a rolling basis.

Leo Zacky, a poultry farm heir and perennial candidate who received 1.3% of the vote in the 2022 gubernatorial primary and 0.1% in the 2021 recall election, seeded his campaign last month with $50,000 of his own money.

Meanwhile, since launching his campaign in February, Bianco has reported more than $380,000 in major contributions — enough to solidify himself as an early frontrunner for conservative voters, but a far cry from the millions that some Democratic contenders have already raised.

That leaves an opening for Hilton, 55, a native of the United Kingdom who moved to California in 2012 with his wife, a public relations executive for tech companies. Hilton has a built-in audience from hosting the weekly commentary program “The Next Revolution” on Fox News from 2017 to 2023, and Silicon Valley connections that could provide the money he needs to spread his message more broadly.

Hilton said his campaign will focus on practical solutions to rebuild a “ladder of opportunity,” so that every Californian can have a great job and a great home — though many of them are ideas that the Democratic supermajority in the Legislature is unlikely to ever support.

He would eliminate the state income tax for Californians below an unspecified income level. He wants to boost housing development by simplifying building codes, ending lawsuits under the infamous California Environmental Quality Act, and promoting construction of single-family homes. He believes the state needs mandatory phonics education and more accountability for teachers based on test scores to improve student achievement.

Though he has had a long career in politics, Hilton has never held elected office himself, which he argues is an asset.

“I would ask people, how good are the machine politicians in Sacramento who are involved in this one-party rule? How is that working?” Hilton said.

Bianco, 57, was a longtime sheriff’s deputy in Riverside County who ran for sheriff in 2018 out of frustration with what he called a “pro-criminal” approach to public safety in California. During his two terms as chief law enforcement officer of Riverside County, he has been a controversial but locally popular figure, refusing to enforce Newsom’s COVID lockdown orders or apologize for his brief affiliation with the far-right Oath Keepers militia.

Sheriff Chad Bianco of Riverside County speaks during a news conference at the U.S. Capitol in Washington, D.C. on May 15, 2024.

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He said he’s now running for governor because, like many Californians, he is tired of how the government has failed a state that people otherwise love. Many of his priorities align with Hilton’s: Bianco would like to completely abolish the state income tax, get rid of laws that he said are driving farmers and ranchers out of business, and leave environmental regulation to the federal government.

And echoing the Trump administration’s Department of Government Efficiency initiative, Bianco said he wants to eliminate wasteful spending such as the high-speed rail project and multibillion-dollar programs that have not reduced homelessness.

“The number one job of government is public safety,” Bianco said. “All the rest of it is fluff.”

The anti-Trump bump

California Republicans have been jubilant since the November election, when they flipped three seats in the state Legislature as President Donald Trump increased his vote share in nearly every county. At a party convention in Sacramento last month, they strategized over how to build on the momentum by leaning into issues such as affordability and crime that appear to be helping them gain ground, particularly among Latino voters.

“That tells us that Californians, on the local level and when it comes to the laws that are being passed in Sacramento, they’re looking to Republicans,” Corrine Rankin, the newly elected chairperson of the California Republican Party, said in an interview. “They're rejecting the failures that are coming out of the Capitol by the Democrats.”

In a February survey by the Public Policy Institute of California, only 48% of likely voters said the state is going in the right direction, compared to 51% who said it’s going in the wrong direction — underwater, albeit the highest approval in two years.

To win the governorship next year, Rankin said the state GOP would eventually unite behind a candidate who can help Californians understand how that dissatisfaction is driven by what Democrats in charge of the state are doing.

“We need change here in California. Californians expect change and we’re positioned to deliver,” she said.

But the modest advances of the last election belie a GOP that is still far from competitive in California. Trump only received about 38% of the vote, losing to Democratic nominee Kamala Harris by more than 20 percentage points, and Republicans lost three U.S. House seats.

The 2026 midterms, in which Democratic anger at the Trump administration could produce an even more liberal electorate, will be a difficult political environment for the California GOP to snap a statewide shutout that dates back to 2010. In 2022, no Republican candidate for statewide office came within 10 percentage points of victory, and most lost by about twice that margin.

Andrew Acosta, a Democratic political consultant who is not working on the governor’s race, said there are substantive problems in California for serious conservatives to campaign on. “The Republicans have a lot of fodder if they did it the right way,” he said.

But candidates so closely tied to Trump are unlikely to overcome the deep anti-Trump sentiment in the electorate and win the governorship next year, Acosta added. “There’s zero chance of these Republicans.”

Both Hilton and Bianco are vocal Trump supporters. Hilton’s campaign even references the MAGA movement with a “make California golden again” slogan, and he rolled out an endorsement on the first day from Vivek Ramaswamy, one of the architects of Trump’s DOGE initiative.

Though some Democratic candidates are already tapping into the fury at Trump to fuel their campaigns, Hilton said the focus is misplaced.

“None of that helps a single person in California,” he said. “These are real issues. So if Democrat candidates want to deflect from that and become national political commentators, then good luck with that.”

Bianco said Democrats have done “outstanding psychological warfare” for decades convincing people that Republicans cannot win in California, which has suppressed conservative participation in elections. But things have finally gotten so bad, he said, that those frustrated voters will turn out next year and elect a Republican governor.

“We can’t blame Donald Trump. Donald Trump doesn’t have anything to do with California and the laws that have been passed in the past 20 years,” he said. “I believe that the majority of people, of hard-working Californians, have conservative leanings.”

This article was originally published on CalMatters and was republished under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives license.

The 2026 Milan Cortina Winter Olympics kicked off in Milan on Friday evening, local time. Athletes representing over 90 countries march into the San Siro stadium filled with thousands of spectators during the opening ceremony in Milan.

The performance paid homage to Italian music, art and culture with tributes to composers, visual artists and films in a colorful spectacle. Performers included Italian actress Matilda De Angelis, American singer Mariah Carey, Italian singer Andrea Bocelli, Italian rapper Ghali and Italian ballet dancers Antonella Albano and Claudio Coviello, among dozens of other dancers.

Here is a selection of images from the opening ceremony:

Italian ballet dancers Antonella Albano and Claudio Coviello perform during the opening ceremony.

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Colorful dancers perform under large tubes of paint suspended above them during the opening ceremony.

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Italian actress Matilda De Angelis (center) performs with dancers dressed as the three great masters of Italian opera: Giuseppe Verdi, Giacomo Puccini and Gioachino Rossini.

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Mariah Carey sings during the opening ceremony.

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Performers dressed in the colors of the Italian flag line up during the opening ceremony.

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Members of The Corazzieri, the Italian Corps of Cuirassiers, raise the Italian flag during the opening ceremony.

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Two performers are suspended between two large rings.

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The Olympic Rings are revealed above dancers during the opening ceremony.

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An aerial view of the athletes parading into the San Siro stadium.

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Stoats Milo and Tina, the Paralympics and Olympics mascots, dance before the Olympic opening ceremony.

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MILAN — During the first days of the 2026 Milan Cortina Winter Games, the long shadows of Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell spread to touch the Olympic movement.

While in Milan, one of the top organizers of the 2028 Los Angeles Summer Games faced calls to step aside after his emails turned up in the latest tranche of Epstein documents released by the U.S. Justice Department.

"I will be in nyc for four days starting April 22...can we book that massage now," wrote Casey Wasserman in an email to Maxwell in the spring of 2003. A few days later, Wasserman said, "The only thing I want from Paris is you."

There's no indication of criminal wrongdoing in the emails, which were sent more than twenty years ago. But for a prominent figure like Wasserman, who heads an influential sports and entertainment agency, any association with the pair is fraught.

Maxwell was sentenced to 20 years behind bars in 2022 for conspiring to sexually abuse minors. Epstein died by suicide while awaiting trial in jail in 2019.

Wasserman has kept a low profile since news of his emails broke. He appeared publicly this week at a gathering of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) in Milan, where he touted progress developing the L.A. Games but didn't take questions from reporters.

In a statement, Wasserman said he never had "a personal or business relationship with Jeffrey Epstein" and he apologized for his flirtatious exchanges with Maxwell. "I am terribly sorry for having any association with either of them."

That hasn't quelled the controversy. A growing number of political leaders in L.A. have called for Wasserman to step down from his role as one of the leading public faces of the next Summer Games.

"Casey Wasserman should step aside immediately," L.A. City Councilmember Hugo Soto-Martinez said in a statement sent to LAist. "Anything less is a distraction and undermines efforts to make sure the Games truly reflect the values of a city that is for everyone."

L.A. city controller Kennith Mejia, who monitors the city's finances, said on social media that "Los Angeles cannot trust our financial future to someone connected with Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell." Mejia added that "Wasserman must take accountability and resign."

Questions of Wasserman's future keep surfacing in Milan as the first sports competitions get underway. IOC chair Kirsty Coventry acknowledged at a press conference Thursday that she's been asked repeatedly about the scandal.

"Casey has put out a statement. I have nothing further to add on that," she said. Asked about the fact that Wasserman hasn't spoken directly with journalists, Coventry said, "I'll have them come find you guys and have a little chit-chat."

The head of the U.S. Olympic and Paralympic Committee, Gene Sykes, also faced repeated questions about the matter in Milan on Thursday.

"Casey's made a statement that reflects the perspective he has on what came to light, when the emails were released, with the rest of the Epstein file," Sykes told reporters. "We have nothing to add to that, his statement stands on its own."

Sykes went on to voice confidence in Wasserman's leadership. "I have more confidence today in L.A. 28's operational capabilities, its leadership, the quality of what its doing and how well they're executing than I've had at any point of time," he said, pointing to the L.A. bid's strong fundraising.

A long list of corporate executives, academic leaders, physicians, scientists, politicians, members of European royalty, and others, have been caught up in the Epstein scandal. A growing number of them have resigned, been fired, or been forced to step back from public life.

If you're wondering whether it is truly worth the $8 million to $10 million cost per 30 seconds to air a commercial during the Super Bowl, just ask the creative minds behind the pro-Jesus advertising campaign "He Gets Us."

According to Come Near, the group managing the "He Gets Us" campaign, after airing commercials in three previous Super Bowls, they have seen nearly 10 billion video views, more than 70 million visitors to their website HeGetsUs.com and an awareness of the campaign so high that 40% of adults in the U.S. now know about He Gets Us.

And they expect that awareness to only expand with their fourth Super Bowl ad this Sunday titled "More," focused on the pressures many feel in modern society to pursue more of everything.

"There's not a lot of moments like this. … We're looking for moments where people really congregate," says Simon Armour, chief creative officer for Come Near, which has crafted the "More" ad as part of a campaign called "Loaded Words." "We're constantly asking, 'Are we really meeting people where they're at?'"

Offering a distinctly non-commercial message in the middle of the world's biggest advertising showcase is certainly one way to stand out. But that's only one of the many messages featured in an event that set a record last year — and the year before — as the most watched single telecast in U.S. history.

A dive into the raft of ads airing in the Big Game that were released early, aimed at rocketing around social media to build buzz before their debut Sunday, revealed the typical mix of celebrities, nostalgia, special effects and bold humor we see every year.

New in the mix: A few efforts encouraging fans to build their own Super Bowl commercials, including an option from Uber Eats allowing users to make 1,000 versions of celebrity-filled ads and a contest sponsored by Artlist.io, an AI platform for video creation, offering $60,000 for the best subscriber-created spot.

And, as we have seen in recent years, there's a decided lack of commercials offering any kind of sharp social message. At a time when America seems more divided than ever, most advertisers don't seem keen on spending millions to address the social or political issues of the day.

Of course, the most impressive messages may not surface until the Big Game itself. But here's a look at some of the most interesting commercials unveiled in advance, offering a look at the bold swings marketers are about to take on the biggest stage in media.

Best use of a self-deprecating celebrity, Part 1: Raisin Bran's 'Will Shat'

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One of the coolest things in modern pop culture has been to watch Star Trek icon William Shatner morph from an overacting, self-serious stick in the mud into a goofy celebrity who begrudgingly accepts that it's better to play along with his peculiar kind of fame rather than resist it. The 94-year-old comes full circle with this ad for Raisin Bran that deftly spoofs both the result of eating all that fiber, Shatner's roots in science fiction and the scatological word game people likely have played with his last name for eons, introducing him in the commercial as a character named Will Shat. My favorite moment: when he looks over at a pet and asks, "Is that dog a Shih Tzu?" As a bonus, the Shat-man even made news in real life, when paparazzi thought he was eating a bowl of cereal while driving (he was actually posing for a photo shoot.)

Most touching reference to Big Brother: Ring's 'Search Party: Be a Hero'

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Tell people that video doorbell company Ring can remotely link a bunch of cameras to look for something, and many may wonder if they've stumbled into a George Orwell novel. But show people how Ring cameras can be tasked to help find some of the 10 million dogs who go missing every year — using its new, free Search Party feature — and you have a teary, sentimental spot for the Big Game that pulls on the heartstrings while downplaying any concerns about Big Brother invading their privacy (fear not, Search Party is a program you have to opt into).

Best argument to Hollywood for using AI: Xfinity's 'Jurassic Park … Works'

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Cool as it is to suggest that one tech geek from Xfinity could have kept all the dinosaurs from escaping Jurassic Park, the telecommunication company went one better in this ad – basically showing the potential for de-aging and computerized imagery in film by creating new scenes for the 1993 movie featuring stars Sam Neill, Laura Dern and Jeff Goldblum. In Xfinity's new spot, they're jogging with herds of dinosaurs and posing for pictures with a T. rex instead of running for their lives. Of course, a happy ending invalidates the film's whole "egotistical man shouldn't meddle with natural ecosystems he doesn't understand" message. But it will probably sell an awful lot of Wi-Fi service.

Best use of a self-deprecating celebrity, Part 2: TurboTax's 'The Expert'

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Adrien's Brody's over the top antics while portraying a TurboTax expert – despite the company's insistence that the program helps keep taxes "drama free" — is a delicious send-up of his own self-serious reputation. (My fave moment is when he screeches "If there's no drama, then there's no Adrien Brody!") It's almost enough to make you forget the record-setting arrogance of his way-too-long best actor acceptance speech at last year's Oscars ceremony. Almost.

Best headfake around men's silly sensibilities: Novartis' 'Relax Your Tight End'

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What's the best way to let men know there's now a less, um, invasive way of checking for prostate cancer than the old school finger method? This commercial, featuring football heroes like former New England Patriots tight end Rob Gronkowski and former Tampa Bay Buccaneers coach Bruce Arians urges men to relax their tight end — complete with shots that seem to depict that relaxation — thanks to the invention of a blood test to check for early signs. It's all a bit of cheeky good fun — OK, I couldn't resist that one — aimed at getting men to get over their hangups and get tested regularly for a disease that has an impressive survival rate if caught early.

Best use of class warfare: Hims & Hers' 'Rich People Live Longer'

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Fresh off a controversy from last year, which found the telehealth company criticized for not being fully transparent about the side effects of its weight loss drugs, Hims & Hers is back with a spot that declares "the wealth gap is a health gap." Rapper and actor Common provides the voice-over for this spot, which shows wealthy people accessing all kinds of treatments and preventive care as the narration notes, "all that money doesn't just buy more stuff — it buys more time." Watching a big corporation spend millions pitching its products as an affordable way to bridge that gap, at a time when medical expenses are one of the leading causes of bankruptcy in the U.S., feels a little odd. But it's also a stroke of genius.

Best parody of a competitor: Pepsi's 'The Choice'

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This spot, starting with a computer-generated polar bear getting confused after picking Pepsi over Coca-Cola in a blindfolded taste test, works in all kinds of ways. It pokes at Coke's longtime use of computerized bears in its own Big Game ads back in the day while indulging a bit of nostalgia. Extra points for a moment later in the ad that references the infamous Coldplay kiss cam incident and a cool cameo from impish director Taika Waititi.

Most questionable joke: DoorDash's 'Beef 101'

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In the ad, 50 Cent presents the latest iteration of his beef with Sean "P Diddy/Puff Daddy" Combs as an epic exercise in tongue-in-cheek trolling. He reaches into a DoorDash pouch to pull out a bag of Cheesy Puffs, a pack of combs and a bottle of cognac he says is "aged four years … or 50 months. Who's keeping count?" But I bet Combs, now sitting in federal prison after his conviction on prostitution-related charges, surely is. And those who recall the allegations of sex crimes and abuse which surrounded the Combs trial, might not find a commercial seeking laughs by referencing that traumatic situation to be much fun at all.

Most shameless pandering to bro culture: Bud Light's 'Keg'

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Football legend Peyton Manning, comic Shane Gillis and musician Post Malone seem mostly wasted in a nonsensical ad featuring an entire wedding party tumbling down a steep hill in pursuit of a single keg that fell off a dolly. Gillis gets the punchline, turning to the camera to say, "I give it a week," presumably in reference to the wedding. I'm betting most viewers forget about this uninspired ad even quicker.

Best use of a conspiracy theory I might actually believe: Uber Eats: 'Hungry for the Truth'

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This spot continues the concept Uber Eats floated in last year's Super Bowl ad, featuring Matthew McConaughey insisting the NFL organized this whole professional football thing as a ruse to sell more food. This time, he's torturing poor fellow movie star hunk Bradley Cooper — who mostly looks like he just wants to be seen wearing gear featuring his beloved Philadelphia Eagles — pointing out all the NFL players named after food. But when he shows Cooper that the NFL Hall of Fame building looks just like a juicer — gotta say, I was nearly convinced.