Gubernatorial Candidate Steve Hilton: Newsom and AG Bonta Want to Steal 6 More Republican Seats

“Gavin Newsom is trying to steal five House seats from Republicans so Democrats can flip the House and impeach President Trump,” said Gubernatorial Candidate Steve Hilton posted on X Sunday. “This is not about Texas. It’s about Newsom’s presidential ambitions. I will not let it happen. Next week I will be laying out a plan to stop Newsom.”

Tuesday, Hilton made good on his promise.

“I wish we weren’t here. I wish this wasn’t necessary,” Candidate Steve Hilton said Tuesday morning at a press conference in front of the California Attorney General’s office.  “We’ve got so many problems in California – working people are struggling everyday with how expensive everything is, or the hassle it is to do anything in California…”

“Just yesterday I was announcing my plans to improve public education in California… there’s just so much in the real world to solve,” Hilton emphasized.

Steve Hilton was there to announce his “legal action to stop Governor Gavin Newsom and Attorney General Rob Bonta from ramming through an illegal, mid‑decade redistricting scheme designed to shred the state constitution and rig California’s elections.”

“We’re outside the Attorney general’s office… the scene of the crime,” Hilton said.

Steve Hilton said that in 2008 the people took the redistricting power away from the politicians by voting for an independent citizens’ commission to draw the electoral districts.

The California Citizens Redistricting Commission is a state agency created by the passage of California Proposition 11 in 2008, also known as the “Voters First Act.”

In an effort to influence the midterm elections, California Governor Gavin Newsom and Attorney General Rob Bonta announced intentions last week to blow up California’s independent redistricting commission, effectively tampering with the state’s electoral maps mid-decade… because TRUMP.

Gov. Newsom plans to redraw electoral district boundaries for the state’s members of the U.S. House of Representatives. However, California is currently very gerrymandered already, even with the state’s supposed “fair-representation” California Citizens Redistricting Commission known as “We Draw The Lines.”

Most Californians would rather deal with the California Citizens Redistricting Commission than Gavin Newsom and Democrat politicians drawing House districts. That can be fixed later, as Hilton has promised.

Hilton noted that even with a citizens redistricting commission, Republicans are still underrepresented in Congress, thanks to “15 years of one-party rule by redistricting.”

“They want to steal six more Republican seats,” Hilton said. “Republicans have 40% of the vote, but only 6% representation.”

He said that Gov. Newsom and AG Bonta know it is unconstitutional to seize power from the people and give it back to politicians.

Article XXI of the California Constitution says:

In the year following the year in which the national census is taken under the direction of Congress at the beginning of each decade, the Citizens Redistricting Commission described in Section 2 shall adjust the boundary lines of the congressional, State Senatorial, Assembly, and Board of Equalization districts (also known as “redistricting”) in conformance with the following standards and process set forth in Section 2.^[1]

Article I, Section 4 of the United States Constitution, the states and their legislatures have primary authority in determining the “times, places, and manner” of congressional elections. Congress may also pass laws regulating congressional elections.^[2][3]

The Times, Places and Manner of holding Elections for Senators and Representatives, shall be prescribed in each State by the Legislature thereof; but the Congress may at any time by Law make or alter such Regulations, except as to the Places of chusing Senators.^[4]

Hilton said that Newsom’s and Bonta’s scheme of holding a special election to amend the California Constitution for the next three elections is unconstitutional. “They think they can ram it through the Legislature with the Democrat supermajority – a product of gerrymandered districts,” Hilton said. “We cannot take the risk they will rig our elections.”

“They have not thought beyond their immediate desires – winning the midterms,” Hilton said.

He presented a legal opinion by JW Howard Attorneys (below), which said the governor and Attorney General cannot legally do redistricting midway through the decade because the California and United States Constitutions specify that every 10 years a census is performed in the country, and from that updated census redistricting takes place.

Both the California and U.S. Supreme Courts have upheld that districts must have roughly the same population. Without a census, this cannot be done. “The only way to know if districts are roughly the same is through a census,” Hilton said.

As Hilton said, “Look at California’s changes in just five years – people are leaving the state – millions have left.”

Hilton cited the 14th Amendment’s  Equal Protection Clause, which California and federal courts have upheld: one person, one vote.

The governor’s redistricting scheme cannot be performed without violating the California and U.S. Constitutions, Hilton said. “And, it is not enough for Gov. Newsom and AG Bonta to amend the constitution via special election – they would need to repeal the Equal Protection portion. But it would still violate the U.S. Constitution.”

“The law is on our side; the California and U.S. Constitution are on our side,”Hilton added. “There should never be a special election.”

“California started it. Democrats hijacked and corrupted the ‘independent’ districting system, to gerrymander the maps and give themselves TWELVE more House seats than they would have with fair representation,” Hilton told the Globe, which is exactly what we reported Monday.