Newsom’s Gas Blame Game Targets Trump

California governor speaking at a podium with flags in the background

As California families choke on $7 gasoline, Governor Gavin Newsom is pointing at President Trump and Iran while standing on a mountain of his own policies that helped create the pain.

Story Snapshot

Newsom blames Trump’s Iran campaign for a nationwide gas spike while California prices remain among the highest in America.
Years of taxes, refinery closures, and climate mandates have turned California into an “energy island” highly vulnerable to every shock.
Even some Democrats and consumer advocates say Newsom’s agenda helped drive margins and prices higher.
Trump’s pro-production, low-tax energy approach offers a stark contrast to California’s deliberate cost-raising model.

Newsom Pins California’s Pain On Trump While Defending His Own Agenda

Governor Gavin Newsom is working overtime to convince Californians that their “insane” prices at the pump are really Donald Trump’s fault. In a March 10 statement, Newsom’s office branded the current surge “Trump’s Iran price spike,” arguing that oil is a global commodity and that prices are jumping in red and blue states alike, not just California.^[5] The release claims more drilling or refining in California “would not necessarily help,” and insists the real solution is accelerating the state’s clean-energy transition.^[5]

Newsom’s own talking points, however, quietly concede that policy choices move prices. His office boasts that over the past two years, California used new laws, SBX1-2 and ABX2-1, to impose “first-in-the-nation transparency and oversight” on refiners and claims those tools made prices “stable and significantly lower” than the extreme spikes of 2022 and 2023.^[5] You cannot take credit for using state power to change prices and then pretend Sacramento policies have nothing to do with the bill that drivers are now paying.

Decades Of Democrat Policy Built An Expensive, Fragile “Energy Island”

Long before the latest clash with Iran, California was already paying a heavy premium at the pump. The federal Energy Information Administration reports that California usually has the nation’s highest gasoline prices because of stacked state taxes, environmental rules, special fuel blends, and limited refining and pipeline infrastructure. Chevron estimates that each gallon of California gasoline carries roughly $1.26 in state taxes, fees, and regulatory costs, a structural burden that has nothing to do with Trump, Iran, or “Big Oil greed.”

Critics inside and outside the state say this is not an accident; it is the designed outcome of a political crusade against fossil fuels. A Fox News report notes that California’s average price recently sat around $5.33 per gallon, highest in the country, and highlights claims that fifteen years of one-party Democratic rule piled on taxes and regulations while driving producers out of the state.^[3] Industry and policy analyses describe California as an “energy island” that relies heavily on imported fuel, making prices both higher and more volatile whenever something goes wrong.

Refinery Closures, Margins, And A Governor Who Refused Tax Relief

Refinery capacity is a major part of the story. Politico reports that Newsom pushed special legislative sessions in 2023 and 2024 targeting refiners, opening the door to profit caps and new storage mandates; a former Democratic Assembly majority leader warned those moves made Newsom “directly responsible” for higher gasoline prices and saddled Californians with “yet again, another cost.”^[3] Those laws require refiners to give a year’s notice before closing, and major facilities in Los Angeles and Benicia have already filed their closure notices.^[3]

Consumer advocates also acknowledge that margins – the money refiners make on each gallon – are playing a big role. Jamie Court of Consumer Watchdog told local media that refiners are making about a dollar more per gallon than they did earlier in the year, roughly $1.50 per gallon in total, and explicitly said Newsom is “responsible for that extra dollar that refiners are charging us.”^[2] At the same time, Newsom repeatedly rejected calls for a state gas-tax holiday even as prices spiked, choosing to preserve revenue for Sacramento instead of giving immediate relief to strapped commuters.^[1]^[3]

War Adds Fuel To A Fire Sacramento Helped Light

No serious observer denies that global events matter. A California Energy Commission official told lawmakers that if conflict around the Strait of Hormuz persists, crude oil could jump $40 to $80 per barrel, adding another $1 to $2 per gallon at the pump, and described the situation as a “crisis” largely outside state control. Newsom’s office similarly points to nationwide price increases of about fifty to sixty cents per gallon since Trump’s strikes on Iran began, arguing that all Americans are being hit.^[5]

The key difference is that Californians start from a much higher baseline. Heritage Foundation research finds that Californians often pay about a dollar more per gallon than other Americans because of high taxes and heavy regulation layered on top of global prices. Independent analysts list multiple state-driven factors: boutique fuel standards, costly climate programs, and a shrinking refinery fleet combined with dependence on imports. When war or market shocks arrive, California’s intentionally constrained system turns what should be a painful forty- or sixty-cent bump into eye-watering $7 signs on station marquees.

Trump’s Energy Vision Versus California’s Punishing Experiment

While Newsom scolds Trump for supposedly raising gasoline prices, the Trump administration is again leaning into an American energy dominance approach: more production, more refining, more pipelines, and tax relief for drivers. Interior Secretary Doug Burgum recently highlighted that the department has approved thousands of drilling permits to support the president’s agenda of lower prices and strong domestic supply, in sharp contrast to California’s steady closure of refineries and layering of new restrictions.^[3]

For conservatives, the lesson is simple. Energy is not magic; it responds to incentives, investment, and regulation. California’s leaders chose policies that make driving more expensive in the name of climate virtue, then blame someone else when families cannot afford to get to work or take their kids to practice. Until voters reject this model of intentional scarcity and government overreach, California will remain the progressive laboratory where ordinary people are treated as guinea pigs – and $7 gasoline is a feature, not a bug.