NEWSOM HAS A WAYS TO GO TO END GAS SPIKES

Speaking in Exeter, New Hampshire, on Jan. 19, 1992, in advance of the state’s first-in-the-nation primary, President George H.W. Bush responded to the perception that he was an aloof politician indifferent to the misery caused by a recent national recession by declaring, “Message: I care.” Bush went on to lose an election in which he was once a heavy favorite, and the moment came to symbolize the emptiness of so much political rhetoric. His line was a meme before the word meme was even a thing.

Speaking in Sacramento on Dec. 5, 2022, Gov. Gavin Newsom convened a special session of the Legislature so it could place a cap on oil refinery profits in the state. Citing huge profit increases seen industrywide, he blasted oil companies’ price fluctuations and dismissed as spurious the longtime defense that California has gasoline costs nearly 40 percent higher than national averages because of the state’s heavy regulations and recurring issues with refinery maintenance. “For me, this is about never seeing those spikes again,” Newsom said. “You guys are all being screwed and taken advantage of.” Message: We care. A lot!

But what can he actually do about it?

The populist issue of excessive energy costs is a potent one to highlight for the governor, one with the potential to boost his national profile. Besides gasoline prices that are among the very highest in the U.S., Californians also pay higher rates for electricity and natural gas, with San Diego perhaps hardest hit of all. This led the governor on Monday to ask the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission to investigate why California has much higher natural gas prices than most of the nation. The next day, federal regulators said some relief could be near with the expected Feb. 15 resumption of full supplies from an El Paso-to-California natural gas pipeline. It had been closed because of a pipeline explosion in August 2021 in a rural area southeast of Phoenix.

Was this just a coincidence? Or was it one more sign of the extent of corporate efforts to manage the news? Cynical explanations are embraced by many.

For one example, veteran California pundit Thomas Elias argues that the decline in prices since Newsom’s December announcement is a sign California’s Big 5 gasoline makers — Chevron, Marathon, PBF, Phillips 66 and Valero — are running scared.

But if Newsom truly believes he has a strong case to make for gouging — if he’s ready to take on the energy experts who see market forces and the state’s moves to phase out fossil fuels, not shadowy CEOs, as driving prices — then why hasn’t he forcefully and publicly fleshed out his case? Why isn’t he funding sweeping research into what UC Berkeley’s Severin Borenstein calls California’s “Mystery Gasoline Surcharge”? Why isn’t he following up on his Dec. 5 secular sermon with an announcement that he has fine-tuned and beefed up the bill ally Sen. Nancy Skinner, D-Berkeley, introduced a day later at his request to target oil companies’ gouging? The Capitol is littered with bills Big Oil has killed over the years, so why will this one be different?

This week, Los Angeles Times columnist George Skelton detailed the seeming absence of progress on the bill. Among the details not pinned down, at least publicly: How can a penalty on “excess” profits avoid being considered a tax, which would require a politically impossible two-thirds vote of both the Assembly and Senate to pass? Is there a legally tenable definition of what constitutes “excessive” profit? And given that gas stations can still raise pump prices whatever is done to refineries, will Newsom’s proposal actually bring relief to Californians?

On Thursday, one of Newsom’s press aides told an editorial writer that the governor is working with the Legislature on policy specifics, so perhaps progress is coming when legislative activity ramps up in March, as is the norm. But Newsom’s agenda, as reflected in his Jan. 10 budget speech, is so vast — homelessness, housing, crime, immigration, education, mental health care, preparing for the next pandemic and more — that only so much is possible. Newsom’s impassioned plea that we’re all being screwed may end up as a meme, and nothing more.