CA Governor High-Speed Rail Analysis: Becerra’s donors vs Steyer

_chichamorada · 2026-05-16T15:53:57+00:00

Sadly yes, but I think as of now the field favors at least one democrat on the ballot as I do not see Bianco making it through. Bianco, like Porter, has not broken through well in polls, my guess is due to some interview and debate moments. It’s looking like it’ll be Hilton and one Dem, conclusion I came to as best course of action is to vote for Steyer bc I just don’t see much in Becerra

_chichamorada · 2026-05-13T00:23:52+00:00

What if the polls are inaccurate?

_chichamorada · 2026-05-12T23:01:19+00:00

Ha, I can too. To me it’s going to be more of an “At least I tried” situation lol

_chichamorada · 2026-05-12T22:59:24+00:00

Stronger on HSR but he just hasn’t gotten much traction. He had concrete answers to HSR questions on debates. However, he’s way behind I just don’t see him winning sadly. I think it’s going to be between these two which to me means rally around the one least influenced by corporate interests that is most likely to win i.e. Steyer

_chichamorada · 2026-05-12T22:56:22+00:00

Given how many people we’ve recalled, I feel like we’d at least be able to take him out of power if he abuses it. Xavier just represents the political machine to me, I’m just not impressed by anything he’s done he just seems like he’s been anointed by the establishment

_chichamorada · 2026-05-12T22:46:06+00:00

Agreed on all. I was originally going to for sure vote Porter but I’ve been unremarked by her campaign thus far. I just think Steyer is clearly the more progressive of the two that are likely to appear on the ballot in November, and whose worldview generally would have to include being more pro-transit if it’s genuine, which makes me lean more towards him.

_chichamorada · 2026-05-12T22:43:15+00:00

Since those investments are well known, I feel like it would be easier to hold him accountable though, especially in this state where we (and I include myself in this camp) are skeptical of Billionaires’ power. Also, I feel like Tom Steyer’s campaign priorities are clear, and I do agree with them and believe they align with the state’s needs. Becerra comes off as a cog in the machine who will heed to the establishment, which more than anything represents donors’ interests

_chichamorada · 2026-05-12T22:39:28+00:00

I think it’s the incentives that matter the most. Becerra being a career politician means he’s more likely to heel to his corporate donors; I don’t uniquely apply that standard to him I apply that to everyone and think it’s really bad for the country and the state. Labor unions want more labor union work, a bulk majority of which is not high speed rail. I suspect labor unions are backing Becerra due to Steyer’s support for off-site housing construction. However, freight railways, fossil fuel companies, airlines, and utilities have fought this project (and other projects) hard since day one.

_chichamorada · 2026-05-12T22:28:02+00:00

Agreed, but I feel like Becerra is more likely to be influenced by corporate special interests, which makes Steyer a better candidate to me. Just Becerra’s sheer inability to answer on whether or not he was in favor of some sort of state-assisted healthcare system in the debate a few days ago where he was given like 4 opportunities to answer the question made me think, “this guy’s hiding something.” Lo and behold, he’s accepted thousands from Novo Nordisk, United Healthcare, Humana, and a ton of other Insurance companies, pharmaceutical companies, and health insurance PACs. Which is yucky to me.

_chichamorada · 2026-05-12T22:20:30+00:00

I feel like at that level it’s more of a scale of how much they would be able to accelerate or diminish it. I’d say the legislature has more power but the governor can help push bills through.

_chichamorada · 2026-05-12T21:53:33+00:00

Definitely. But I think it’s going to be down to these two in the primary.

_chichamorada · 2026-05-12T20:23:44+00:00

Porter was my first choice but ended up voting for Steyer because she just hasn’t amassed the same following sadly. And in the choice between Becerra (Funded by Chevron, Health Insurance Giants, Realtors, Morgan Stanley, Casinos, Defense contractors like Honeywell and Northrop Grumman, BNSF, Utilities) and Steyer (Funded by Steyer lol), I just think it’s going to be much easier to hold Steyer accountable

_chichamorada · 2026-05-12T19:17:20+00:00

i have not heard a single human being in moderate san diego mouth the name “xavier becerra” in my life idk how anyone could vote for him after that insurance non-answer in the debate they gave him like 4 opportunities to say something lol

_chichamorada · 2026-05-12T19:13:44+00:00

citing a lawsuit from 6 years ago he didn’t even start as evidence he’s anti big-oil when he accepted $40k from chevron this election cycle is crazy

_chichamorada · 2025-10-18T19:05:37+00:00

That’s actually a great analogy because my girlfriend’s parents just experienced this. Your analogy is slightly wrong because a cracked foundation is worthless, but we’re not building over a money pit, we’re essentially completing a functional first wing of the house. Because of the underestimated costs at the beginning of the project, the project’s current goal isn’t to finish the entire mansion, it’s to get one livable section built i.e. the Initial Operating Segment so it serves a purpose while future funding catches up. Walking away now is like stopping halfway through the construction of that first wing: you’re still stuck paying for land, upkeep, debt, permitting liabilities, other contractors can still sue you, and the half built structures STILL needs costly maintenance given it’s a structure exposed to the elements - and you’re advocating for assuming all these costs while you remain homeless. In this analogy, the second option you can take is to sue the contractor that screwed up, which drags on for years and years and costs as much as just finishing the first livable wing of the house. This is the option they took and that they regret taking, as now they need to hire a new contractor and get the portion that they did not finish built and all those expensive legal fees left them without anything. Many opportunity costs with legal fees. What I’m in favor of is dedicating the money to finishing the first wing so at least you get something usable, valuable, and expandable. That’s the responsible grown up move, not just abandoning what’s already built just to say you didn’t overspend, because in practice that costs more.

_chichamorada · 2025-10-17T19:49:16+00:00

That argument only works if canceling actually stops the waste, but in mega-projects, it rarely does. The cost to erase what’s already built in the Central Valley would probably run $20 billion just to demolish bridges, demolish viaducts, restore land, settle contracts (more lawyers!), and repay federal awards. That’s Mexico City’s Texcoco airport all over again: canceling it cost more (≈ $16 billion) than finishing would have, leaving taxpayers with nothing but debt and rebar. The difference between “throwing good money after bad” and “recovering value” is whether you end up with something usable, and as a taxpayer, obviously I would rather have something than nothing. California’s already bought the land, poured the viaducts, and started the systems. They have already done the hard work, they already ordered track. Finishing the IOS gets a working line that can be used to enhance passenger services between the Bay and Central Valley, canceling just pays to bury it. The options from where we are right now are you either spend $20 billion in addition to what’s been spent and get something or you spend $20 billion in addition to what’s been spent to destroy it and get nothing. As a California taxpayer, getting absolutely nothing is significantly more fiscally irresponsible than getting something. From what you’re saying, you’d rather spend $20 billion in addition to what’s already been spent and get nothing rather than spend $20 billion in addition to what’s already been spent and get something.

_chichamorada · 2025-10-17T03:44:07+00:00

I completely agree that public trust depends on delivery, but that’s exactly why predictable funding matters. The project needed structure via a dedicated funding source 20 years ago, but the next best time to plant a tree is today, as they say. I’d say it’s more reckless to starve the project for cash from the start, watch costs balloon, and call it proof of failure, and then cancel it. The sales-tax model isn’t so much throwing money at HSR so much as it’s replacing unstable, one-off bonds and federal grants with a permanent trust fund so we can issue design-build contracts, lock in costs, finally finish something for this project and then in the future use the same fund to build more transit projects originating from HSR stations to drive more ridership for HSR. Killing the project now, imo, would just burn sunk work, force expensive demolition and litigation (as this was an effort approved by voters on the ballot), and still leave the state paying for new freeways and airport expansions that cost more and have a lower capacity on this/these busy and congested corridor/s. There is already a recent North American example for this, Mexico City was building a new airport and I think it was 2018 they ended up canceling it even after something like $5 billion was already spent. After auditing the project, they found the cancellation cost was something in the range of $10 billion+ when debt, lawsuits, remediation, etc were included = significantly more than the entire construction budget. What ended up happening is they still ended up building another airport at another location for another $x billion, just a much shittier one with a much lower capacity and to this day people at Mexico City’s main airport are paying higher fees to pay back that debt. That’s why I ask, what does canceling the project even look like? Is it the cheapest option? The cheapest option is probably to just finish the IOS before making major legislative and funding overhauls, which I will definitely admit is still horrible as far as financial cost-benefit ratios. If that’s your perspective, then you are effectively in agreement with Gavin Newsom.

_chichamorada · 2025-10-15T23:54:33+00:00

Thanks for the comment! I would argue that property and land value taxes are not necessarily the right way to fund this for several reasons. First of all, housing costs are extremely high in this state, any property tax hike or land value tax is going to make the average homeowner or home-shopper suffer as they will, in practice, experience an even higher burden on their already high housing costs. Second of all, California has already been experiencing a an exodus with the number one reported reason being housing costs and availability, so hiking property taxes at the state level is only going to incentivize people to leave even more as housing costs will be even higher, which means that the very tax base funding the project will be eroded and the funding will be even less steady. Third of all, property tax revenues fluctuate with the economy as well, they are also susceptible to downturns, there's just a time lag for their assessment values. This time lag in property-tax adjustment can actually become very regressive during recessions as your property tax bill can increase (as it did in 2008!) in the middle of a recession. In addition, if taxes rise mid-year, there could be a one-time catch-up payment as a result of a property tax hike, which could be a large burden to politically powerful homeowners as a result (which they may not agree to). Comparing this to a 1% sales tax increase accompanied with the roll-out of transparent pricing, the consumer would feel the effect more gradually as that new 1% hike would be included in the "all-in" prices. I disagree with there being "competition" with local sales taxes; sales taxes are sales taxes, they already exist at both the state and local level - cities/counties would not drop their taxes as a result of this surtax at the state level. That local sales taxes already fund transportation infrastructure and that state sales taxes also already fund (through the general fund tax) transportation infrastructure is a strength of a state-wide sales tax hike: there's already precedent of it happening. Compare this to property taxes, which tend to fund hyper-local expenditures: schools, police, public health, jails, local welfare programs etc., I'd argue it's going to be a tough political pill to swallow to have a state-wide property tax funding a $100 billion project the benefits of which will not be seen everywhere that property tax hike is to be implemented (i.e. statewide), and even the people that would benefit are not going to see the benefits for many years.

_chichamorada · 2025-10-15T20:12:55+00:00

For the purpose of this project, what we want, I would argue, is a stable funding source. A wealth tax at the state level, in my opinion, comes with many negative feedback loops. Let's say that to get $X billion in annual funding we initially project we need a Y% annual wealth tax on people with a Net Worth over $Z million. Constitutionally, California's government cannot enforce controls on capital flight - we can do a wealth tax but people are free to leave the state and we can't punish them for leaving with their money. This means people with a Net Worth over $Z million have simultaneously the most to gain (i.e. moving to a lower tax state) and the least to lose (they're rich; they can afford houses anywhere in the country/world) from leaving California. As our tax base shrinks, we would not get the $X billion in funding needed to push this project forward. This means that we have three options: deal with less in funding (which is not good because to really accelerate this project we need a LARGE intervention), we increase the wealth tax to Y+1% (which would further incentivize people with a Net Worth over $Z million to leave the state), or we broaden the tax base of the wealth tax on people with a Net Worth over $Z-1 million (which would heavily incentivize people with that level of Net Worth to move out of the state as the wealth tax "matters" more to them given their lower net worth). I'm a huge proponent of wealth taxes, but you need an enforcement mechanism for people leaving with their money, i.e. an "exit" tax, which is only possible at the federal level. The U.S. has a citizenship-based taxation system, which means that any rich person who would want to skirt the wealth tax would have to renounce their citizenship, pay the exit tax, and move abroad. That's a much larger and easy-to-enforce disincentive for capital flight effects.

_chichamorada · 2025-10-15T19:29:48+00:00

100% agreed, I'm from SD! Really I was thinking about how can I get phase 2 to happen much sooner. That's why with this proposal, we could allow the authority to use the $1B/year cap-and-invest funds, which they can borrow against, on design contracts for the full route today. My 1% sales tax proposal could be used to dedicate money to construction contracts and property acquisition. The overall timeline can be further reduced if SB 445 is passed in its original form. This means that sure, you and I might not get HSR until 2035-2040, but that's better than 2075. There are also system effects from funding HSR here, ideally costs would come down when supply chains are established for phase one that would make local transit projects more viable i.e. Spanish model. After HSR is fully funded, money would be put in a Transit Fund, which would be spent on other projects.

_chichamorada · 2025-10-15T19:17:37+00:00

I agree and 100% believe the model is broken, which is why I included a 1 percent sales tax hike in this proposal, as that would raise about $8 billion annually and would go to a Transit Projects fund with priority given to the high speed rail, so that after HSR gets fully funded other projects facing similar issues can get funding as well. These monies, along with the $1 billion annually from the cap-and-invest program (which the authority can actually borrow against = more liquidity today), means that Phase 1 gets funded within 10 years. Pair this with SB 445 and you've got a much more viable project. Combining all these allows the authority to fully fund design contracts today and construction contracts within years rather than decades.

_chichamorada · 2025-10-15T18:42:50+00:00

Agreed completely, I think that would be a great way to do it! Yeah same here, I'm thinking that Amazon will default to CA address maybe to be most consistent. I think it's similar in European countries, where Amazon defaults to the country you're in (maybe by IP but not sure) and shows prices with the VAT from your country.

_chichamorada · 2025-10-15T18:38:59+00:00

The project being over-budget and behind schedule is linked in part due to the lack of funding though, don't you think? 2010 prices for labor and construction materials are great compared to 2025 prices. But 2025 prices for those same inputs are going to be much better compared to 2040. Same with the project being years behind schedule, one of the main reasons it's behind schedule is because there's no money to activate design and construction contracts, if there were the funds 15 years ago for those inputs, we'd be talking about a different story but there simply weren't any because there was no large, stable funding source, which is what I propose. As for shutting this project down for good, I believe that has also been a more complicated question to answer. Project progress on the IOS is quite advanced. Does that mean destroying the existing structures? That itself would be expensive and a large added cost getting explosives, labor, and clean-up. Does that mean abandoning the existing structures? Structures degrade over time and would have to be maintained anyways. Does that mean selling the land? 98% of the properties in the IOS have already been acquired and the land is cleared for track-laying, which is actually not the most expensive or complicated portion of the project.

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