Victor Davis Hanson
American Greatness
By any measure, California is a failed state—and a national embarrassment.
Taxes? It has the highest income and gas taxes in the nation.
Roads? A Reason Foundation survey ranks it 49th among the states.
Mass flight? Between 250,000 and 350,000 more Californians leave the state than move in each year. Housing, gas, insurance, and electricity prices? The highest in the continental U.S.
Illegal aliens, the poor, the homeless, the foreign-born, and welfare recipients? The largest numbers in the U.S.
Public K–12 schools? Test scores in the bottom quartile.
Poverty? Twenty percent live below the poverty line.
So, what happened to the nation’s most richly naturally endowed—and once best governed—state?
The Left took total control—after millions of the embattled middle class fled. Millions more impoverished immigrants, legal and illegal, took their place. Left-wing Silicon Valley spawned some of the wealthiest elite liberal enclaves in the world.
The result was a neo-feudal society that was hardly democratic.
Millions of subsidized poor compose the bottom. A beleaguered middle continues to shrink. An ultra-rich apparat of left-wing coastal professionals and investors rules from the top.
As upper-bracket taxpayers fled, taxes rose on those who remained to fund expanding entitlements for newly arrived poor would-be residents. In turn, even more of the middle class left.
The remaining pyramidal economic structure ensured a Democratic monopoly—further entrenched by changing balloting laws, gerrymandering voting districts, vote harvesting, fueling public employee unions, and ignoring or undermining popular referenda.
In 2014, Californians voted for Proposition 1, a $7.5 billion water bond designed to solve the state’s chronic water storage deficit.
Included was $2.7 billion specifically designated for new reservoirs, as the last major reservoir had been built in 1980, when California had roughly half its current population.
Despite the people’s vote, bureaucracies, elected officials, and green activists blocked all new reservoir construction.
Adding insult to injury, Governor Gavin Newsom instead used $250 million from the Proposition 1 fund to blow up four dams on the Klamath River. They had once provided storage, electrical generation, recreation, and flood control.
Californians have twice voted in referenda (for Proposition 209 and against Proposition 16) to bar the use of racial preferences for contracting, admissions, and promotion in public institutions.
Most public universities simply ignored the law. They continued their “diversity” quotas under new names, relying on left-wing elected officials and judges to ignore again the will of the people.
Preferential admissions, along with racially segregated dorms and graduation ceremonies, continued under euphemisms and denials. “Theme” houses, “affinity” graduations, and “safe spaces” practice “affirmative” discrimination.
California voters in 2008 passed Proposition 11 to stop political gerrymandering by creating a supposedly nonpartisan state redistricting commission of five Democrats, five Republicans, and four Independents. Two years later, the commission took over redrawing congressional districts as well.
But Democratic lobbyists and lawyers sabotaged the goal of disinterested redistricting according to population and geography. Instead, racial preferences and the interests of the Democratic majority of incumbents prevailed to warp the intent of the voters.
Although Republicans usually achieved nearly 40 percent of the California vote in national elections, two decades later there were only seven Republicans in the 52-person congressional delegation, or a mere 13 percent of the state’s representatives.
But even that tiny contingent was considered too generous by the Left. Thus, in 2026, it will likely be further redistricted down to four or five seats.
The balloting mess in the recent Los Angeles mayoral race further reminds the nation and the world just how dysfunctional and anti-democratic California has become.
Democrats warp elections without the need for the old Chicago way of outright ballot theft or destruction. Instead, they do so in a “legal” manner by passing insane laws that ensure fraud and Democratic victories.
The winners in the strange jungle primaries—usually both Democrats—were not announced until a week after the polls closed. One of the eventual winners in mayoral race, the socialist Nithya Raman, had already given her teary concession speech after coming in well back at third on election night.
The Republican Spencer Pratt was comfortably ahead of her in second place on Election Day—only to lose, as expected, when large numbers of late ballots that broke roughly 90 percent Democratic were counted.
Remember, every registered voter is sent a mail-in ballot. If it is postmarked on election day, it can arrive at vote centers up to seven days after the election.
No one really knows whether the ballots are mailed to the dead, to former or nonexistent addresses, or to legally eligible voters—by design. In 2024, when losing presidential candidate Kamala Harris won the state by 20 points, only 0.09 percent of all ballots cast were rejected.
Anyone can register and receive a provisional ballot on the same day.
Ballot harvesting and ballot curing are legal.
Campaign operatives can round up voters, gather their ballots, and deliver them en masse to a voting center.
They can register anyone to vote, provide a ballot, and then deposit it immediately afterwards.
There is no requirement to provide proof of U.S. citizenship to get a driver’s license. Yet a license is not even needed to register. Any credit card without a picture suffices.
And it gets worse still.
If the potential voter has no license, no Social Security number, no proof of U.S. citizenship, and no credit cards, he still will be registered—once harvesters provide him with a “unique identifier” number.
He can then vote that very day without any ID at all.
If, in California, you claim you are illiterate and cannot write your name—no problem.
You simply make a mark—anything from an X to a happy face. No one asks whether an illiterate can read the names on the ballot.
Then your handler serves as a “witness” and signs his name. Such witnesses are almost always vote harvesters, and they can sign as many ballots as they wish.
If all that doesn’t work, ballot “curers” can be called in help remedy rejected partisan ballots post facto.
Democrats now rely on the system to ensure supermajorities in both houses of the state legislature, no statewide Republican officeholders, a tiny vestigial Republican congressional contingent, and almost exclusively Democratic-appointed liberal judges.
The more Democrats control the state, the more socialist, anti-democratic—and autocratic—California becomes.
Their gift to the nation is a third-world failed state, now in danger of societal collapse.
Fires rage—given ideologically driven prohibitions on brush and forest management, cuts in fire departments, and sheer bureaucratic incompetence.
Multibillion-dollar boondoggle rail projects rust.
Billions of welfare dollars are stolen with impunity. Illegal aliens who cannot speak or read English are given passes to obtain commercial trucking licenses—as if California’s critical road signs are written in some language other than English.
A quarter of residents can’t pay their sky-high power bills on time—and correctly assume that the state and the utility companies will mostly foot their delinquent bills.
Since 2020, over 100,000 criminals have been released early from state prisons—and most have little fear that their present and future crimes will earn them another prison sentence.
Half the state’s births are paid for through state-supplied welfare coverage.
And now the homeless without addresses or IDs can determine elections.
In sum, import poverty; romanticize illegal immigration; demonize the middle class; drive out private-sector capital; and exempt elites from the consequences of their own ideology—and you’re left with a state where democracy dies, along with everything else.
Discussion (41)
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Log In to CommentI read all these comments and one reference I do not see. This is one the founders knew and talked about: that is, virtue, character, based on the biblical worldview these founders had big time. They all knew the bible and its commandments and supported them. That is the root of what made America great and until we return to these roots and live out the principles in the Word of God, we shall suffer the consequences. It is all by choice of the people themselves. Will they choose God or themselves? The condemnation: Everyone did what was right in their own eyes.
Maybe when Donald Trump finishes his 2nd term he’ll run for governor of California. Not likely though, I imagine New York has first dibs.
Dear Valiant Sir Victor, I have knighted you on purpose. Thank you for your expert insight and your letters from home where I was born and raised. My husband and I moved away from California to SE AZ 20 years ago. I still miss the beauty of the state and especially driving up the 101 to Morro Bay. I have so many fond and nostalgic memories of it all. I'm 85 now, a vigilant conservative and realize I will not live to see the necessary restoration take place in California. Perhaps the locusts have eaten too much. We live in a smallish city and have found a comfortable life here. If you ever want to take a vacation you are welcome to come visit us and stay with us. Getting away can be a breath of fresh air. God is a mover a shaker and a healer. May you be in the palm of His hand where no one can ever pluck you out of it! Blessings and wishes for you. Thanks again from Barb and Phil in Arizona..
It’s all by design. Look at agenda 25/30. It calls for all dams to be destroyed.
One suggestion to help turn around the mess in California. Require Proof of US Citizenship to Vote !!
I’ve lived in California 82 years. The state started its death spiral in the 1990’s and has gotten worse over the years. The voting system is a mess, and that is exactly what the radical left wants.
Note that UC faculty just stepped out of line and signed a letter asking that they bring back the SAT. Too many ill-prepared students are wasting time and resources and failing after admission. The abysmal failure of K-12 education is no accident. It is the result of the education system being turned into a political operation (Exhibit A is Chicago where it produced Barack Obama) and ultimately weaponized into outright sabotage. The limp-wristed Alleged News Media has run away from this ghastly truth for decades, a rare snapshot by an independent can be seen at endteacherabuse.org/Escalante.html if you ever wondered what happened to the calculus program in the movie "Stand and Deliver" LAUSD KILLED IT. Tragedy for those denied their human potential but it sure did work for Karen Bass and her ilk. BTW the Democrats stole the Congressional-13 in the last election, displacing John Duarte by 110 votes using undocumented students bussed into polls on election day to cast provisionals. Also a "not in the news" item that exposes the NEXT stage the Left has in mind: in Berkeley in 2024 City Councilman Rigel Robinson was terrorized into resigning. He wrote a letter of explanation in the local Berkeleyside web site citing threatening notes on his door and verbal attacks. No media covered this story and no legal authorities did anything about it (his sin was not being vociferous enough in condemnations of Israel).
California became a cesspool years ago, hollywood is DEI-ing, billionaires are leaving, billions in medical fraud and other badbusiness in sacramento being addresses, whole place is going to hell, smart money moving to texas, will the last person leaving, please turn out the lights
"So come on, Victor, give me a thread to grasp onto to begin unraveling the mess my State is in." Did you vote? Give money to Spencer Pratt? Knock on doors and campaign for him? Why is it Victor's responsibility to give you answers when you know what the answers are but don't want to put the work in yourself?
What makes this such a tragic story is that not so long ago California was considered a wonder of American ingenuity and innovation. California’s highways, cities and airports were examples to the world. Let California serve as a cautionary reminder to successful states like Texas, Tennessee and Florida of precisely what not to do. To VDH, as always a fantastic article. Praying for your health and your family.
VDH. Great admirer of yours. And you probably have many millions who soak up your comments. I dont think you have to convince anyone about the spiral the dems are pushing us into. I think someone with your wisdom should put out a workable plan of attack (figuratively) of how to save America, because we know the dems are not stopping at the CA border. Let the smart working class get familiar with the obtainable remedies.
Bill Wittlfe indicated in a utube that as balls came in after election day & Ramins numbers increased, interestingly, Bass numbers didn't increase exponentially. He totals stayed fairly static as the other liberal candidate increase dramatically & Pratt feel ever further behind. Seems if lineal votes were still coming in, they wouldn't be so obviously weighted for Ramin. Just saying according to BW.
California is a joke.
Democracy is the theory that the common people know what they want, and deserve to get it good and hard. H. L. Mencken
It’s worse than that VDH. Huge government spending increases and everything only gets worse. CALPERS and CALSTERS are grossly underfunded and will not cover their future pension obligations. All the state and local bond measures, which never deliver what was promised, could only be sold with high interest returns. The future repayment obligations are not budgeted for. When they come due, the State, counties, and many cities will not be able to pay them. Our one party state keeps kicking the can down the road. The Golden State: Pay More, Get Less.
So, when the ballot box fails it’s citizens, then the cartridge box becomes the avenue of change, tragically.
I'm a fourth generation Californian. My great Grandmother was one of the first "gringo" babies born Mariposa in 1858. Five of my eight adult Grandchildren have left California for the exact reasons you cite as have two of my four children. It breaks my heart to see what the Left has done to our beautiful state. I don't know what to do. The Communists have taken over the Democratic Party. Back in the days of Pat Brown the Democrats were bad, but never as far left as they are today. JFK must be rolling over in his grave.
I wonder is someday there will be a reckoning, in the manner of the WWII Nuremberg Trials, where the rulers of Calif will claim that they broke no laws when they stole elections, money, etc., because it was legal in the state to do so. I also wonder if this ‘pleasant fiction of a court’ will develop a concept, similar to the historical concept of modern international human rights, whereby these modern rulers can be also found guilty of crimes against humanity. (I ask myself, somewhat rhetorically, who is really taking a page out of the NAZI political strategy handbook?) I would have thought that Federal law would have already stomped their guts out over all of this theft of so much value. Perhaps the experiment in criminal leadership needs to run a bit further, or get a bit bloodier, before someone decides to take appropriate legal actions I moved out of that state a long time ago - we go where Uncle Sugar sends us. Initially with regrets (ca 1975), and then as the tide turned with a sense of freedom and escape. Sadly, I don’t think I’ll live to see that lost feeling return.
VDH Like you, I am a Conservative. Like you, I love this country. Like you, I am a Calfornia Resident. I agree with everything you said in "Is California Reaching Critical Mass?" So, I'm left with So what? What should I do about California? I've lived here four times. I want to continue to live here. So What? Why do you and everyone I know and respect say how horrible it is (and it is), but NO ONE offers any solutions? So come on, Victor, give me a thread to grasp onto to begin unraveling the mess my State is in.
Great analysis and synthesis, as usual. This reads like the epitaph of my beloved home state where I was born, raised and educated as a 5th generation Californiano. I have never found a comfortable way to earn a living and feel comfortable with a lifestyle in the state after graduating university, and so have lived and worked in 46 different countries. I am naturally an optimist, but this state of affairs makes me truly sad.
VDH, NYS is right behind Cali. I have worked in NYS Govt for 27 yrs. Started under Giuliani in NYC now under Susan Cacace in Westchester. There's a clear understanding of how utterly reprehensble the D Party are. What's happened here is the former R Party are now calling themselves D. So the NYS D Party is now 2 parties: The R Party circa 1990 and the current D Party of Stalinist Red/Green nutjobs. By any means necessary, brother. Any means. Stay string, VDH
My neighbor had a dog like this once, it just loved rolling in its own dung.
California is the prime (U.S.) evidence of death by ballot box.
It is so sad to see California like this, it has the best natural resources and weather in the Country. There are parts of the city I grew up in Stanislaus County that make me almost cry when I drive thru them. The damage is self made and could have been avoided, but I fear it is too late to change the State. Victor, my prayers and good wishes are with you. God bless.
California is a reflection of what the Democrats want for all of the states. Maine is next on the agenda.
Good to see you back in old form Victor. We keep praying for your health to continue as we can't afford to lose your paragon of perspicuity in these very difficult times. I quote: "When people think more highly of themselves than they should (Rom. 12:3), they stop relying on divine guidance." I watched your podcast with Jack this morning and you said it best. No matter how much our voters hate high fuel/food costs/Iran conflict and blame POTUS, the alternative come the mid-terms and 2028 election will be far worse than the hatred for Trump. One of the MAIN reasons I watch and listen to you is simply due to your expert analysis using empirical data as the bedrock to your conclusions. The pseudo-intellectuals on the left can't even spell 'empirical.' God Bless America, our military and Veterans. Stay healthy Victor!!
Unverified voter signatures or "marks" on harvested ballots arriving in envelopes lacking postmarks, ballots that are countersigned and dropped off by a witness not required to give name or address, up to one week after polls have closed. No hope for any change or improvement in California.
An incredible summary of how the Left has destroyed CA.... and I thought Illinois had lefty problems. Our incompetent politicians look like geniuses compared to these folks.
If the Founders considered America an experiment to see whether mankind could rule itself, then we may have lasted longer than they expected.
Democrats and Leftists (almost always exactly the same people) destroy everything they touch. I am from Montana and retired....age 69. I moved to this State in 2010 to marry my wife. She is-essentially-stuck here because of her job. Thus, so am I. Accurate and well written article Mr. Hanson. Indeed, this State is a 'dumpster fire'. Tick-Tock....Tick-Tock....Tick-Tock....the clock is running Democrats and Leftists. And you all will NOT like it when it reaches midnight.
Jefferson said, “the government you elect is the government you deserve.” Which is why they mandated universal schooling. Now the progressive mantra adopted by a majority is, to quote me, “ I want to do what, where, and when I want, without repercussion or consequence. The degree to which you ensure this, I will vote for you and not care what you do.”
Idiocracy at its finest.
Denial and it more severe form delusion, which is rooted in mystification. That is what has happened to the democrat voters. Similar to a cult, or a highly dysfunctional family or group.
And they're just getting started. Just wait until they shove the mileage tax down our throats. A failed state for sure.
Will the last one to leave please turn off the lights.
Excellent overview of a tragic situation. Thank you.
The Left destroys everything it touches; prime example California as VDH summarizes item after item. Millions of people in California now know what voters in Venezuela, Cuba, North Korea, Russia, and China feel like…utterly frustrated! Worse yet, just like cancer, it is metastasizing across the country. Some in the US feel as though this is a California problem, let them stew in their own lefty sewage. This is not true. The corrupt voting machine has major implications in the balance of power in Congress. As a result, that giant sucking sound is the result of billions of US federal (not state) tax dollars being fed to the debacle state of California. Reasonable people across the US should be able to file a massive class action lawsuit against the despicable politicians in California to put them where they belong: prison.
Thanks Victor! Yet, in spite of all The liberal abuses, the majority of Californians keep voting for the abuses! They are the most self-destructive morons on the planet!
VDH, all well said. A tragic summary of what the Democrats have done to California, my home state since my birth in 1946 (except for a few years in Hong Kong and New Jersey). I have never voted BLUE and never will, their evil is too much to withstand.....
Answer: 1. Organize. 2. Go to guns. 3. TWP all communists starting at the governor's mansion. It is evident one cannot exercise legacy "voting" in a fair and legitimate "election". Sat Cong !
I apologize for my negativity, pessimism, and sour outlook. I'm 64 and have lived in the state my entire life. It will not got better only worse, the other states will follow. The left has used illegal immigration, and the legal ones too, as a weapon of mass political and cultural destruction. All it will take is another (D) president to open the borders again and finish the job. None of it can be reversed, only coped with.