CA governor candidate Steve Hilton campaigns in SLO County. ‘Time for change’
Steve Hilton, a former Fox News host and one of the leading contenders for California’s governor’s race, recently visited San Luis Obispo County to tout his vision to “Make California Golden Again.”
The Republican candidate visited Santa Margarita on Saturday for a meet-and-greet event hosted by the Paso Robles Republican Women Federated organization. During an exclusive interview with The Tribune prior to the event, Hilton said his message boiled down to one word — “Califfordable.”
“It’s very simple, $3 gas, cut your electric bills in half, your first $100,000 tax-free, a home you can afford to buy. That’s it,” he said. “And if we do that, you really will make it easier for people to live here and not move out.”
Hilton previously served as an advisor for British conservative Prime Minister David Cameron. In 2012, he moved to the United States to become a visiting scholar at Stanford University and went on to host the Fox News show “The Next Revolution” for six years. He continues to contribute to the network as a “prominent voice in conservative media,” Fox News said.
According to a recent UC Berkeley-Politico poll, Hilton has managed to maintain a top spot in the governor race, leading with 19% of support from likely voters, as a crowded field of progressive gubernatorial candidates jockey to be the Democratic pick. Billionaire Democrat Tom Steyer is in second place with 13%, while Democrats Katie Porter and Eric Swalwell are sitting at 11%, along with Republican Riverside County Sheriff Chad Bianco.
Hilton said the state was a “total disaster” after 16 years of Democratic control.
“I just think it’s just a very obvious argument that it’s time for change,” he said.
Hilton plans to cut government spending, build single-family homes
Hilton’s campaigning on a wide range of issues affecting Californians, including reducing taxes, cutting government spending, and increasing single-family home production.
His tax reduction plan aims to end all income tax for those making under $100,000 and install a 7.5% flat tax on earnings over $100,000, according to Hilton’s campaign website.
Hilton said the tax cuts are possible if government spending is returned to pre-pandemic levels. The state’s budget has ballooned from $215 billion in 2019-20 to a nearly $349 billion proposed budget for the 2026-27 fiscal year.
He plans to make the extensive cuts by following the Trump administration’s playbook and enacting DOGE, or a Department of Government Efficiency. Once helmed by billionaire Elon Musk, the department facilitated massive layoffs, ended government contracts and defunded several agencies in an attempt to slash federal spending.
Hilton launched his own Cal Doge in January to expose “corruption, fraud and waste” and implement government reform, according to a news release. After a preliminary review, he said his campaign had already discovered an estimated $250 billion that could be cut across large state programs.
“A huge proportion of our budget is now being diverted from actual services to the public to luxury benefits for government union members, pensions, health care and so on,” he told The Tribune. “So that’s a huge area we have to look at.”
He also intends to reduce housing costs in California by rapidly building more single-family homes in the state. Hilton said part of the reason he decided to run was due to his increasing frustration with a “totally broken” state Legislature that seemed more beholden to unions than families seeking a safe suburban home.
If elected governor, he pledged to cap some housing taxes and erode California’s Environmental Quality Act, or CEQA, by making it more difficult for private groups to file lawsuits to block housing.
“They call it sprawl. I call it the California Dream. That’s what people want in California,” Hilton said. “We’ve just got to be very ambitious in opening up new space to build, including new towns and cities.”
Hilton pledges to work together with Trump’s border czar
Hilton, an avid Trump supporter, said he also supports the president’s mass deportation tactics and the closure of the U.S.-Mexico border.
“It’s just very corrosive of a society to have mass law-breaking incorporated into everyday life in the way that we’ve seen for the last 50 years,” he said.
He commended border czar Tom Homan’s efforts to “lower the temperature” after mass protests erupted in Minneapolis after two citizens were shot and killed by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
If elected governor, Hilton said he would work together with Homan to “make sure that all laws are peacefully enforced.”
As for immigration reform, Hilton said the country already has an effective, though lengthy, pathway to citizenship in place. It’s also one he’s deeply familiar with — the British-born candidate told The Tribune it took him nine years to become a legal citizen in the United States.
Gubernatorial candidate seeks to expand energy operations on Central Coast
Hilton supports expanding nuclear energy, oil and natural gas operations across the state.
In SLO County specifically, Hilton said he would push to keep the Diablo Canyon nuclear power plant operating past 2030, plus he intends to explore options to expand nuclear energy production in California.
Hilton said he’s extremely opposed to any possible offshore wind power projects off of California’s Central Coast.
The proposed project off of Morro Bay’s coast is “literally dead in the water when I’m governor. No way,” he said. “This idea of industrializing this beautiful coast and in the name of climate is totally unacceptable.”
In the short term, he said the state needs to cease funding wind and solar projects and shift to more natural gas and oil drilling, including offshore efforts.
“As long as we are using oil and gas in California, why don’t we use California oil and gas instead of importing it from halfway around the world,” he said.
Hilton will enter a Democrat-controlled Legislature if he becomes the state’s next governor, but he said his past experience at 10 Downing Street has given him ample expertise working with politicians from across the aisle. He also added he wouldn’t be afraid to sign executive actions to implement his agenda, as well as fight hard on the campaign trail to get more conservatives in office.
“It’s not healthy to have one party rule,” he said. “And a bit of balance is a good idea.”
This story was originally published March 17, 2026 at 5:00 AM.
