Democrat Xavier Becerra’s lead over Republican Steve Hilton in California’s governor race has shrunk to under six points after their first debate, a new internal campaign survey shows.
Breitbart News reported that a Hilton campaign survey taken October 1-2 found Becerra ahead 45.7 percent to 40.1 percent, a 5.6-point edge among 1,020 California voters.
That is a sharp change from a Hilton campaign poll released last month. In that earlier survey, Becerra led 52 percent to 37 percent. The new numbers show a 6.3-point drop for the Democrat and a 3.1-point gain for the Republican.
Fourteen percent of voters remain undecided. Pollster David Wolfson conducted the survey for Hilton’s campaign after the candidates’ first debate.
When those undecided voters are forced to choose, the picture shifts again. The survey found 72.5 percent go with Becerra and 27.5 percent pick Hilton. The race is tighter than it was a month ago, but the Democrat still holds the larger share of soft support.
Public averages tell a wider story. RealClearPolling’s compilation of recent surveys from the L.A. Times/Berkeley IGS, KGTV-TV/SurveyUSA, Politico/Citrin, and the Public Policy Institute of California gives Becerra an average lead of 21.8 points. The Hilton internal numbers are not reflected in that average.
Campaign polls always carry an asterisk. They are paid for by one side. Still, the movement inside Hilton’s own tracking is real enough for Republicans looking for any sign that California’s deep-blue governor’s race can be contested.
Hilton spent the weekend drawing a hard line on identity, immigration, and results. He framed Becerra as a career insider who has taken California voters for granted, a theme that also surfaces in coverage of a campaign account scandal Hilton has pressed for fresh FBI review.
Hilton said Becerra “offers NOTHING” because “he is a smug, arrogant, machine politician mediocrity who is taking you for granted.”
He went further on his own background and on the state’s direction:
"Unlike Xavier Becerra, I am an immigrant. Unlike Xavier Becerra, my father was an immigrant. My stepfather too. My whole family. Unlike Becerra (because I’ve been out there listening to the people), I know Becerra’s policies have destroyed the California Dream. My plans will restore it."
That is a direct challenge to the governing record Democrats have defended for years in Sacramento. High housing costs, crime, and out-migration have left many lawful residents wondering what happened to the state they once knew.
The first debate produced a heated exchange on immigration. Becerra turned the issue into a personal charge against his Republican opponent.
"You seem to welcome immigrants who look like you, but deport immigrants who look like me."
Hilton’s reply centered on lived experience and policy outcomes, not skin color. He argued that Becerra’s approach has failed the people already here legally and the communities absorbing the costs of weak enforcement.
Becerra’s own history on migrant policy remains a live issue for voters who remember his tenure at Health and Human Services. Reporting has covered claims he mocked migrant children in private while running that department.
Separate accounts have also described grim results after releases from federal custody. One federal adviser said more than 40 migrant children died following HHS releases on his watch. Those records sit poorly beside debate-stage lectures on compassion.
Whistleblower allegations from the same period described trafficking and abuse at a facility Becerra once praised. Voters hearing the new immigration attacks can weigh those claims about a facility he called a model against the rhetoric.
On affordability, Becerra pointed at President Donald Trump rather than Sacramento’s long run of one-party rule. He told CNN the burden was already heavy and that Trump “just made it worse.”
"the cost of living was already big. Donald Trump just made it worse."
California’s housing shortage, energy prices, and tax climate did not begin in 2025. Years of state-level choices on regulation, zoning, and spending shaped the squeeze families feel now. Hilton is betting voters will connect those dots before they accept a federal blame-shift.
Oversight questions from the Becerra HHS years add to the accountability theme. Critics have argued Biden-era leadership weakened fraud enforcement and left billions exposed, a record that fits the “machine politician” charge Hilton is making in the governor’s race.
Even at 5.6 points, Hilton trails in a state that has not elected a Republican governor since Arnold Schwarzenegger. The forced-choice result shows why. Soft voters still lean Democrat when pressed.
Yet the month-to-month move inside the Hilton tracking is the largest signal Republicans have seen in this cycle. A double-digit deficit became a single-digit one after voters saw the candidates side by side. Fourteen percent remain up for grabs if the campaign can define Becerra by results instead of party label.
Becerra’s team will dismiss an opponent’s poll. Hilton’s team will call it proof the race is alive. The public averages still favor the Democrat by a wide margin. The debate stage and the next round of independent surveys will test which picture is closer to the truth.
California families living with high costs, strained services, and open-border consequences do not need another smooth insider. They need a governor who treats failure as failure, and finally puts the California Dream ahead of the political machine.
