That person said that Becerra’s stewardship of HHS — a sprawling agency that at the time had about 80,000 employees — is particularly relevant to his gubernatorial campaign, given that he would oversee an even broader government bureaucracy if elected. California currently has around 250,000 state civil service employees.
“California is a huge state with very complex bureaucracies, very complex, sweeping agencies that all fall within the governor’s purview,” the person said. “His experience leading such complex entities, his track record on that is not great.”
“I’m not sure his experience there has, you know, set the stage for him to be governor of one of the world’s largest economies — I just think that’s not his skill set,” the person added.
Last week, Xochitl Hinojosa, who led the Justice Department’s public affairs office for two years during the Biden administration, also sharply criticized Becerra on CNN.
“He was not effective in government, and I think that a lot of people in the Biden administration are talking about this because they realize that he was not an effective HHS secretary,” she said. “And if you ask any Cabinet secretary, they will tell you the same thing.”