Ian Calderon’s Bold Bid for California Governor: Vows to Make State Bitcoin’s ’Undisputed Leader’
California's political landscape just got a crypto shakeup.
Former Assembly Majority Leader Ian Calderon throws his hat in the gubernatorial ring with a radical proposition—transforming the Golden State into Bitcoin's global epicenter.
The Crypto Campaign Trail
Calderon's platform bypasses traditional economic talking points, instead positioning Bitcoin adoption as California's next competitive advantage. He argues that embracing digital currency could revitalize the state's tech dominance while attracting blockchain innovation currently fleeing to crypto-friendly jurisdictions.
Wall Street's potential reaction? Probably another round of emergency meetings behind mahogany doors.
This isn't just political posturing—Calderon's track record includes chairing California's Blockchain Working Group, giving him rare legislative crypto credentials. His campaign promises concrete policy shifts: Bitcoin-friendly regulatory frameworks, state treasury diversification into digital assets, and positioning California as the definitive North American crypto hub.
The move challenges both political establishments and traditional financial institutions simultaneously. While other candidates debate tax reforms, Calderon bets big on blockchain fundamentally reshaping California's economic future.
Because when your state budget rivals national economies, sometimes you need to think in Satoshis instead of pennies.
"Ambitious and daring"
Calderon’s statements are not without weight or work behind it.
Having left the Assembly in 2020 after three terms, he remained active in the policy space, including work with the Satoshi Action Fund in 2022 that explored legislation to consider Bitcoin as legal tender in the state. Calderon is also cited as a contributor in a 2020 roadmap developed by California’s Blockchain Working Group, a forum that produced policy recommendations on digital assets.
Much earlier in 2018, Calderon authored AB 2658, which created California’s Blockchain Working Group to evaluate the technology’s uses, risks, benefits, and legal implications for state government and businesses, define blockchain in statute, and develop policy recommendations including possible amendments to state law.
Calderon’s stance “shows that crypto has entered the mainstream, because candidates are now openly running on pro-crypto platforms and competing with one another,” Robert Boris Mofrad, co-founder of blockchain data storage firm Serenity, told Decrypt.
Yet whether the position is adopted or received “by the masses” WOULD remain unclear, Mofrad noted. “But what we can understand is that crypto is now a serious part of the political conversation, one that began at the federal level with the idea of creating a reserve.”
“California putting Bitcoin on its balance sheet is quite an ambitious and daring position,” Mofrad said. “When it comes to a state such as California, the world’s fifth-largest economy, the situation is different.”
Because governments “usually treat Bitcoin as an intangible asset,” and must “record every loss in value but cannot really record gains,” such proposals make it “hard for a state treasury to manage responsibly," he added.
California and crypto
Calderon’s campaign comes as California weighs incremental crypto legislation through two key legal frameworks.
AB 1180 would allow certain state agencies to pilot stablecoin payments for fees beginning in 2026, while AB 1052 brings crypto under the state’s unclaimed property law by requiring inactive custodial accounts to be transferred to the state and held in their original form.
Neither measure, however, would authorize California to purchase or hold Bitcoin directly, marking a clear distinction from Calderon's proposal.
