By Lia Russell
The Sacramento Bee
(TNS)
Gov. Gavin Newsom said Friday he would back a national tax on billionaires, arguing that a federal push to ensure the wealthiest Americans pay their fair share would be more effective than a state effort set to appear on the Nov. 3 ballot.
Newsom said in a blog post published Friday that for decades, the richest Americans had exploited loopholes in the federal tax holes to amass record-breaking amounts of wealth and power that now threaten U.S. democracy.
“The wealthy have their own private tax code full of loopholes and exemptions that most people have never heard of, and they’re counting on politicians in Washington to maintain it and keep quiet,” Newsom said on Substack. He cited statistics that show the richest members of Generation X, Y and Z are set to gain $124 trillion via their parents in the coming years, known as the “Great Wealth Transfer.”
“If we do not act, that transfer of wealth among the ultra-wealthy will lock in a permanent American aristocracy of inherited wealth, with all the political consequences the founders warned us about,” he wrote.
On Thursday, the deadline passed for Newsom to negotiate a 5% one-time state tax on California billionaires off the ballot after he failed to reach a deal with its chief proponent, SEIU-United Healthcare Workers West.
Recommended Articles
Backers say the measure will raise $100 billion to prevent hospital and clinic closures caused by a Republican megabill signed by President Donald Trump last year.
Newsom and other opponents, like the California Teachers Association, said the measure is shortsighted and left public schools, childcare providers and others in the lurch by focusing almost solely on healthcare. He argued in his post that unless the U.S. overhauled its federal tax rules, billionaires would simply pick up and move to states with lower tax rates to shelter their wealth.
“The fight belongs at the federal level, where this broken system was created in the first place,” he wrote.
Newsom called to end billionaires’ “tax-free lifestyle loans” by rewriting federal code to tax capital gains at similar or higher rates than regular income, restore corporations’ tax rates to pre-2017 levels, and tax inheritances at higher rates to fund public goods like child care and education.
Other politicians like U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., have advocated for similar policies in the past. It’s unlikely that such efforts would succeed under the Trump administration, which has been cozy with billionaires who conduct business with the president and his family members and associates.
Newsom, eyeing a presidential run in 2028, has spoken in recent months about populist anger directed toward tech executives whose companies have earned billions while their products threaten to automate jobs out of existence and suck up precious environmental resources.
“Trickle-down economics has been a nearly 50-year experiment that has failed,” he wrote. “We have the data now: Record corporate profits flowed into stock buybacks and executive compensation. Workers’ real wages stagnated, and vibrant middle-class communities were hollowed out.”
Photo credit: Governor Gavin Newsom/Facebook
_______
©2026 The Sacramento Bee. Visit sacbee.com. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency LLC.
Sign in to get access to this free resource, and all of our whitepapers and reports.
Download this content today!
Register Now Already registered? Click here to Log In
Tags: Gavin Newsom, Income Taxes, Taxes, wealth tax, wealthy
