Newsom calls for a national billionaire tax, then turns on California's own wealth-tax plan

SACRAMENTO, CALIFORNIA: California Governor Gavin Newsom, in his latest political push, advocated taxing the wealthy as a plan to address growing economic inequality.

In an op-ed posted on Substack on Friday, June 26, Newsom wrote that it’s “time for an economic reset in America,” describing the widening economic gap among citizens as a critical issue in his economic agenda ahead of an anticipated presidential run.

Gavin Newsom renews call for national billionaires tax

In the Substack post titled “It’s time for a national billionaires’ tax and a new social compact,” Newsom renewed his call for a billionaire tax, including a “true minimum tax on billionaires and those with a net worth of $100 million.”

He also proposed a national public equity fund, under which Americans would hold a stake in the monetary gains generated by the artificial intelligence industry.

“When 10% of the people in this country own two-thirds of the wealth, when we have minted the first trillionaire in human history, and yet your wages have stagnated, and your healthcare costs have skyrocketed, something is fundamentally broken,” Newsom wrote.

“Over the decades, the American economy has been engineered for the very top, a story as old as time: Money buys influence, and influence rewrites the rules. Those rewritten rules funnel even more wealth to the few. Under this weight, democracy itself starts to buckle,” he added.

Gavin Newsom opposes California billionaire tax measure

However, Newsom opposed a California ballot measure that would impose a one-time 5% tax on residents with a net worth of more than $1 billion.

The proposed California Billionaire Tax Act, backed by a labor union, aims to help cover rising healthcare costs and pay for other state programs.

While Newsom said he understands the goals behind the proposal, he argued the measure is too limited because most of the money would go toward offsetting federal spending cuts instead of supporting other priorities like schools and housing.

Flaws lie in federal law

The governor called for changes to the federal tax system, including stricter inheritance tax rules, saying they would help stop the creation of a “permanent American aristocracy of inherited wealth.”

“Wealth is movable, and it shops for the state with the lowest taxes,” he wrote. “The fight belongs at the federal level, where this broken system was created in the first place.”