Toni Atkins Drops Out Of The California Governor’s Race

Toni Atkins, the former legislative leader who sought to leverage her Sacramento experience into a history-making bid for California governor, is ending her campaign.

In a letter to supporters on Monday, Atkins said she is leaving the race because she has “no viable path to victory.”

“With Donald Trump and his allies threatening everything we’ve worked for — gutting health care, cratering our economy, and stripping away fundamental rights and freedoms — we’ve got to make sure California has a Democratic governor leading the fight, and that means uniting as Democrats,” she wrote.

She is not seeking another statewide office, according to a campaign spokesperson.

Atkins is well-regarded among Capitol insiders after her boundary-breaking stints as the first out lesbian to serve as Assembly speaker and the first woman and openly LGBTQ+ Senate President Pro Tem. She launched in January 2024 with early support from the influential carpenters union and had more than $4 million in the bank as of the end of June, a respectable haul given the overall fundraising chill that has hovered over the race.

But she struggled to raise her profile beyond the immediate environs of downtown Sacramento and San Diego, where she has been a longtime political fixture. She hovered in the low single-digits in public polling, including just 1 percent of voters choosing her as their first choice in last month’s Berkeley IGS survey.

Atkins is the second major Democratic candidate to drop out of the race thus far. Lt. Gov. Eleni Kounalakis left the crowded field in August to run for state treasurer instead, a week after Kamala Harris announced she would not seek the governorship.