Eric Ting

He made that promise during his 2021 anti-recall campaign, and a new article from the Associated Press' Michael R. Blood conveys the extent to which the governor may have boxed himself in. While many Black Democrats expect the governor to follow through on his pledge, the two candidates who seemed the most likely at the time of the pledge — Reps. Barbara Lee and Karen Bass — may no longer be options. Lee is running against Rep. Adam Schiff to succeed Feinstein, so Newsom may want to avoid tilting the scales in that race. Meanwhile, Bass just began her tenure as mayor of Los Angeles.

That leaves the "caretaker" route, in which Newsom appoints someone who doesn't enter the Senate race, and the Associated Press story provided just one name that has been "floated in California circles" as a caretaker pick: celebrity talk show host Oprah Winfrey.