POLITICAL UPDATE | EVAN MCLAUGHLIN, POLITICAL DIRECTOR

Tested and Ready

Why CPF Chose Xavier Becerra for Governor

The 2026 election for state candidates and ballot measures has shaped up to be tremendously consequential for California’s firefighters. Voters will elect a new Governor – the chief executive of state government – after a crowded field of 61 candidates was whittled down to two following millions of dollars in ad spending in the June primary election.

Voters will also face state and local propositions before making major decisions about the levels of fire protection and emergency response services that they’re willing to fund.

The Governor’s race is garnering the most attention. Gov. Gavin Newsom will have completed two full terms at the end of the year. Technically, this is the first time the Governor’s Office has opened up since Newsom was elected in 2018, but because Newsom and Jerry Brown were such heavy favorites in their initial elections, 2026 is really the first time in two decades that the race for Governor has been wide open.

Because the race attracted a very broad range of candidates – from a Big City Mayor to a County Sheriff to multiple Members of Congress – the CPF underwent a long deliberative process to educate the candidates and our own members about the opportunity a new Governor will have in improving the fire service around the state as well as the health and safety of the men and women who are sworn to serve it.

At CPF, we’ve agreed to consider three major factors when evaluating candidate endorsements:

Candidate experience: Does a candidate have any experience working with firefighter unions and fire departments during their professional career or as a politician?
CPF’s core state issues: Does a candidate have command of the issue areas that are priorities – improving retirement security, reforming the broken workers’ compensation system, creating and strengthening opportunities for fire-based EMS, protecting voters’ choice to raise revenue for local fire departments, and other areas – for CPF at the State Capitol?
Campaign viability: Does a candidate have the existing support among voters – and the ability to raise the resources necessary – to run a strong and successful campaign?

After subjecting the candidates to policy briefings with the CPF President and the legislative team, an eight-hour ride-along with a CPF local at a fire station, a town-hall interview at the CPF district meetings, and an hourlong interview with the CPF Executive Board, the Executive Board voted to endorse Xavier Becerra in the 2026 Governor’s race.

So how did Becerra stack up when it came to the 3 criteria used by the Executive Board?

Candidate Experience:

Becerra is the son of a union construction worker who personally understands the challenges facing working Californians. He himself worked as a union tradesman represented by the Laborers International Union of North America (LIUNA) before being the first in his family to attend college.

Becerra brought that deep appreciation for collective bargaining and union rights with him to public service. As California’s Attorney General, he defended union contracts following the Janus case so that workers’ collective bargaining rights over wages, benefits, and working conditions would remain untouched in our state. When Gov. Jerry Brown wanted the state to alter the “California rule” that protects firefighter pensions, Becerra refused, arguing that pensions that were earned meant they would be pensions paid.

As a Member of Congress, Attorney General, and HHS Secretary, Becerra has stood up for the health and safety of our members by expanding workers’ compensation presumptions for firefighters, increasing SAFER Grants to add needed staffing to local fire departments, advocating for protection against cancer-causing chemicals, and protecting retirement guarantees.

CPF Priorities:

Becerra is fully informed of CPF priorities and stated his strong support for lowering the retirement age and allowing new collective bargaining rights to strengthen public safety pensions for firefighters who fall under PEPRA. He supports workers' compensation reform, including making the post-traumatic stress injury (PTSI) presumption permanent. He opposes the Local Taxpayer Deception Act, which corporations are submitting to voters in November 2026 to cut local fire department funding by hundreds of millions of dollars.

Becerra supports fire-based EMS and reducing wall-time, and he has committed to consulting with CPF about key appointments the Governor makes in the next administration: State Fire Marshal, Emergency Medical Services Administration (EMSA) Director, Natural Resources Secretary, and others.

Campaign Viability:

CPF closely tracked the polling of likely primary voters to determine that only a few candidates had a realistic chance of winning the Governor’s race. Becerra consistently showed up at the top – or near the top – in the polls following the departure of Eric Swalwell from the race.

Becerra is running as a Democrat, and that will make some CPF members uncomfortable. But when it comes to running statewide, it’s important to know what’s likely to happen. Just as when we look at legislative races, CPF locals in that district are presented with the facts about voter registration, past election performance, and demographics to find which political which political party best fits their district. California – where the next Governor must run statewide – is no different. The last time a Republican was elected to statewide office in California was Arnold Schwarzenegger – 20 years ago in 2006. Since then, there have been 44 statewide candidate elections here, and Republican candidates have won exactly zero of them.

It’s for those reasons that the CPF Executive Board voted to endorse Xavier Becerra in May, and he emerged from the June primary election as the top vote-getter in the Governor’s race. You can learn more about the endorsement at FirefightersForBecerra.com.