California’s Climate Rules Leave Working Class Behind

The next time Governor Gavin Newsom puts on his detective hat and tries to get to the bottom of the “price gouging” that is supposedly driving absurdly high gas prices in California, he should start with the most obvious culprit in the state: himself.

Earlier this month, Newsom’s California Air Resources Board (CARB) voted to approve changes to the state’s Low Carbon Fuel Standard (LCFS), potentially adding $.65 cents a gallon to the already punitive cost of gasoline. Although consumers may be recoiling at the thought of even higher prices, political leaders must be relishing the opportunity to make it more difficult to own and operate an internal combustion vehicle.

It’s obvious that California Democrats and their national counterparts are pushing the state and nation into a rapid Electric Vehicle (EV) future that is having dreadful consequences for families and workers.

Of course, this leftist project is under the guise of “doing something” about climate change, regardless of practicality or without any cost-benefit analysis.

Newsom, for example, issued an executive order mandating that by 2035, all vehicles sold in California are zero-emission, a standard met only by plug-in electric vehicles. Although nobody, including the governor, can say with any precision how an all-electric vehicle fleet would change global climate, if at all, it’s easy to see how current EV policies are harming consumers today.

EV subsidies are forcing lower- and working-class fuel consumers to pay for wealthy folks’ expensive electric vehicles. “Greening” the electricity supply in California has been a major driver of skyrocketing electricity rates. After all, what good would it be to run electric vehicles on coal power? This has pushed up rates nearly 4-times faster than the national average over the past decade. Pacific Gas & Electric’s residential electricity rates are double the national average.

As reported in The Wall Street Journal, “California households owed $2.1 billion in unpaid utility bills at the end of 2023, more than four times the amount in 2019.” While climate effects may be tough to predict, policy makers should have seen this outcome from a mile away.

That’s not even counting economic pain caused by the never-ending attacks on the petroleum industry here, which cost jobs and add around $1.50 in government costs to a gallon of gas, before the LCFS bump earlier this month. Soon, Californians could be paying more in taxes and fees for every gallon of gas than some states pay for an entire gallon.

Elitist Progressives put unpredictable and microscopic changes in potential future weather ahead of blue-collar jobs and affordability today. It’s no wonder that the Republican party is making huge inroads among working class voters.

These policy-induced high energy costs are one of the reasons why, when adjusted for cost of living, California has the highest poverty rate in the nation.

Between California’s highest-in-the-nation gas taxes and stealthy taxes such as the LCFS, California is banking profits from oil that would make John D. Rockefeller blush. Poorer Californians, who already spend more of their incomes on basics such as transportation, are paying the price.

California is also about to ban Diesel RV sales in the state in a few weeks, choking off another practical, affordable living and travel option for our citizens. It never ends. Just for once, I’d love to see a more balanced approach from our politicians that acknowledges California environmental policy is creating the nation’s worst poverty. If that is a price the dominant political class is willing to inflict on our citizens, so be it. It would be nice to at least hear it.

But I stand with the working-class families who are struggling to get by and the many companies who are trying to survive in this hostile state. I support American sovereignty and American jobs. The government gas price gouging and reckless push towards electric vehicles must stop.