Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra is weighing a run for California governor in 2026, according to a new report.
The unpopular Cabinet official has discussed his departure from a potential second Biden administration and already approached politicos about succeeding Golden State Gov. Gavin Newsom at the end of his term, two sources told Politico.
Becerra already has a state campaign committee that shelled out $130,000 to “campaign consultants” in 2023, according to 2023 finance filings first reported by the outlet.
In total, the campaign committee, Becerra for Superintendent of Public Instruction 2030, ended last year with more than $1.5 million cash on hand, with the vast majority of its roughly $148,500 in expenditures going toward campaign consulting.
Those payments had initially gone to the powerful Democratic lobbying group run by Tony and John Podesta, the former chairman of the Democratic National Committee — but had apparently been inaccurately entered into state records.
The filings now show the money went to Alexis Podesta, who worked in Newsom’s administration for a time, and was apparently not for consulting.
“Alexis Podesta has been paid to oversee the committee and manage its operations while Secretary Becerra has been serving in Washington, including payment of ongoing expenses and filing of required campaign reports,” the committee’s lawyer, Stephen Kaufman, told Politico.
“I gave up a really good job in California as attorney general to come do this,” Becerra told Semafor last week in an interview when asked about rumors of his departure. “I am thrilled that the president gave me this chance. I have a great job right now. Period.”
“I do miss being AG,” he said in another interview reported by the San Francisco-based outlet Mission Local. “Once you get elected and you get your budget, you’re your own boss, and you do whatever you want.”
“And as much as I’m the secretary of the department,” he added. “I still have to wait ‘til I hear from the White House on a number of things.”
Asked directly by a Politico reporter at a San Francisco event about the campaign filings, the HHS secretary declined to respond.
“I am secretary of HHS and, by law, I have to be secretary of HHS and nothing else,” he said. “So I’m gonna do my job as best I can.”
Becerra’s extra caution may have been due to having already broken federal election guidelines.
The US Office of Special Counsel found that the Biden administration official violated the Hatch Act last year by endorsing Sen. Alex Padilla (D-Calif.) for re-election during a gala in Washington, DC.
The Hatch Act, which was enacted in 1939, bars executive branch officials and employees from using their “authority or influence for the purpose of interfering with or affecting the result of an election.”
The former California attorney general and representative in the US House was confirmed by a single vote in March 2021, following a push by Republican senators for President Biden to choose another HHS nominee.
Since then, White House advisers and administration officials have leaked to the press several times about his lackluster performance as an agency head.
For a time in 2022, West Wing aides had thought of replacing him over HHS’ botched response to the Omicron variant, during which Becerra took “too passive a role,” one senior official told the Washington Post.
Ex-Biden domestic policy adviser Susan Rice also ripped him before leaving the White House in 2023 for his “b—h a–” and “idiot” response to the US border crisis, which included failing to accommodate child migrants at federal facilities, Axios reported.
Rice at one point even urged Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas not to “save” Becerra from the wrath of the president in an upcoming meeting.
If he wins re-election, Biden is expected to nominate another HHS secretary to replace him, Politico previously reported.
The Post has reached out to Becerra’s California campaign committee for comment.
