San Jose’s mayor knocks Gov. Gavin Newsom for choosing online antics over sensible policies.
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California is the most successful state in the nation, and as our governor rightly reminds our detractors, we are the world’s fourth-largest economy, with over $4 trillion in GDP.
But maintaining our success requires a relentless focus on the facts in the real world, not a blind leap into meme land.
That’s why I was taken aback when Gov. Gavin Newsom’s vaunted social media team disparaged an announcement from the new CEO of Bed Bath & Beyond that it would not open or operate any stores in California due to anxieties over our state’s business climate. The governor’s team responded to the feedback not with a reasoned argument, but with an extended attack in their new “Trumpian” voice of belittling those who disagree with them. Their message to the CEO (and the 6.1 million other people who viewed the post) was “take your business elsewhere.”
Given that California currently has more than 1 million unemployed residents, this was not the reaction I was expecting — or that was called for.
Gov. Newsom’s supporters say he is “breaking the internet” and “owning” Trump. But the governor, and every elected official and leader, also need to own up to the truth. And the truth is that California has the highest unemployment rate in the nation, at 5.5%, and nearly half the nation’s unsheltered homeless people. We have the highest energy and housing costs in the continental United States, and, largely because of these high costs, the highest effective poverty rate in the nation.
And now let me give you the really bad news.
These problems are even less likely to be addressed today because of the terribly misaligned incentives being baked into our politics. As Gov. Newsom’s surge in recent polls demonstrates, politicians are being rewarded for resisting, even when such resistance moves beyond taking on the excesses and abuses of the Trump administration and begins disparaging businesses merely for expressing concerns over very real problems of crime, homelessness, and overregulation.
I was elected mayor of San Jose in 2022 after offering a simple plan for commonsense change: faster and cheaper solutions to homelessness, an increase in police hiring, and tying our elected officials’ pay to performance. These seemed like pretty radical ideas to some — although not to the majority of San Joseans demanding action.
By tuning out the political noise and focusing on the basic issues that residents care about the most, San Jose has nearly completed over 2,000 new safe and decent shelter units for homeless people in less than two years — and we are shrinking our unsheltered homeless population. We are clearing encampments and requiring that people come indoors if there is shelter available. And, under our new “Responsibility to Shelter” ordinance, if someone repeatedly refuses shelter when shelter is available, they could be charged with trespassing.
Crime is going down — in part because we helped convince Californians to embrace Proposition 36 to end a cycle of theft without consequence, sending the message that serious criminal activity, like repeated retail thefts, would carry consequences.
Why would any sane person want to open a business in california? It is not business friendly.