Trump takes credit for economic growth rooted in California. Why no love? | Opinion
Attorney General Rob Bonta and the California High Speed Rail Authority have given up trying to get $4 billion — or even a nickel — from the Trump administration. The official reason is that Trump “is not a reliable, constructive or trustworthy partner.”
If this were truly the new state approach to Trump, wouldn’t California stop asking Washington for anything?
The years-long saga of California high speed rail aside, something bigger and more troubling is afoot here that merits recognition as 2025 draws to a close.
It is beyond ironic how Trump’s cold heart toward California shows no signs of thawing while the Golden State is disproportionately propping up his presidency. California deserves credit for at least half of the nation’s economic growth in 2025 because the super-heated artificial intelligence industry is fueling high-paying jobs and an industrial boom of data centers throughout the nation, based on numerous economic estimates.
Yet California’s role in the national economy is being completely overlooked in Trump’s political whirlwind. The most recent best case in point is the recently-announced gross national product estimates, up 3.8% in the last quarter.
The explosive numbers “define President Donald J. Trump’s economic resurgence,” says The White House. Really? Doesn’t it define how important California is to the country, whether Trump likes it or not?
How California is Trump’s economic friend
A presidency less obsessed with partisan warfare would be throwing money at California to help keep the nation humming. Instead in his first year, Trump has shown far more interest in tearing California institutions down than building anything up.
High speed rail, if we manage to build this, would link the economies of Southern California, the Central Valley and the Bay Area in ways that cannot be achieved by freeways and planes. Falling further behind the rest of the world with modern public transportation does not serve the state or national economy.
A long-time economic engine behind the state’s high-tech economy, meanwhile, is its public university system, the University of California system. Instead of supporting higher education, Trump is seeking more than $1 billion in sanctions from a flagship campus in Los Angeles. The conflict instigated by the president remains unresolved, creating an economic cloud of uncertainty over the entire system.
And then there is the state’s largest city, Los Angeles. It is preparing to showcase the nation to the globe, first in next year’s World Cup competition and the Summer Olympics in 2028. Yet it is trying to do so while recovering from the worst urban wildfires in the region’s history, the January infernos that leveled much of Pacific Palisades and suburban communities below the San Gabriel Mountains.
Again, Trump and Congress are slow-walking $40 billion in aid to local businesses and governments requested by these communities and Gov. Gavin Newsom. Never before has the federal government provided so little help for a tragedy so big.
It is all too easy to be numbed by the hostilities against California from Trump that have become an all-to-common part of our civic life. But 2025 will go down in the books as the year when this state’s relationship with Washington, D.C. changed in a fundamental way — and not for the better.
The public isn’t buying spin on economy
There is a lot of consumer heartburn about how artificial intelligence is driving this economy, and understandably so. No expert can say with any certainty whether this dramatic rise in the stock market, fueled by AI, is a bubble that is about to burst or a foundation for a new economy. This moment in economic history is unfolding despite Trump, not because of him.
The anxiety is why every-day Americans aren’t buying any rosy depiction by politicians, left or right, about their pocketbooks. Consumer confidence has been steadily dropping. The entire Trump presidency has been marked by consumer dissatisfaction in numbers that normally are associated with a coming recession.
Our states are supposed to be united by the conduct of Congress and the executive branch in Washington. It’s downright patriotic for California to stick up for itself. For any branch of our government to give up on Washington is a sign of a very deep problem.
If we are lucky, 2025 will go down as the exception — not the norm — of what is to come.
This story was originally published December 30, 2025 at 5:00 AM with the headline "Trump takes credit for economic growth rooted in California. Why no love? | Opinion."