Swalwell ends governor campaign after Chronicle investigation into sexual assault allegations

Rep. Eric Swalwell ended his campaign for governor Sunday, two days after the Chronicle reported allegations he sexually assaulted a former staffer and CNN reported allegations of inappropriate behavior with several other women.

Swalwell has denied the allegations.

Swalwell, D-Castro Valley, was a leading candidate in the race to replace Gov. Gavin Newsom, neck-and-neck with the other four leading candidates in the race in recent polls: former Rep. Katie Porter and billionaire Tom Steyer, both Democrats, and former Fox News host Steve Hilton and Riverside County Sheriff Chad Bianco, both Republicans. He won endorsements from two dozen other members of Congress, including Sens. Adam Schiff, D-California, and Ruben Gallego, D-Arizona. Fourteen members of the state Legislature supported him. A host of powerful labor unions, including SEIU California and the California Teachers Association, also backed his candidacy.

That support quickly unraveled in the wake of a Chronicle report detailing accusations from a woman who said he sexually assaulted her when she was too intoxicated to consent, once when she was a 21-year-old working for his congressional office and again several years later after a gala in New York City.

"To my family, staff, friends, and supporters, I am deeply sorry for mistakes in judgment I've made in my past," he wrote in a post on social media on Sunday announcing he was ending his campaign. "I will fight the serious, false allegations that have been made - but that's my fight, not a campaign's."

A subsequent report by CNN detailed allegations from several more women. One said he kissed her and touched her leg at a bar and that hours later she found herself in his hotel room with no memory of how she got there. Two other women said he sent them unsolicited photos of his penis. Swalwell also denied those accusations.

Condemnations and calls for Swalwell to end his campaign flooded in, even from the congressman's staunchest supporters. Schiff and Gallego both rescinded their support, as did CTA and SEIU. Speaker Emerita Nancy Pelosi, who had been Swalwell's powerful longtime ally, called on him to drop out of the race.

Swalwell's name will still appear on the ballot, as his exit from the race comes after the deadline for candidates to formally withdraw. He did not say he would resign from Congress, as some have called on him to do. But he will not be able to keep his seat after next year, as he forewent filing for reelection to run for governor.

His departure dramatically reshuffles the race. California has an unusual primary system in which the top two vote-getters advance to the general election, regardless of party. Democrats had been facing the possibility that they could be shut out of the contest entirely because so many of them were running and dividing the liberal vote. Two Republicans, meanwhile, had been dividing the conservative vote about evenly, making it possible they could both emerge as the winners, even though liberal voters far outnumber conservative ones in California.

That possibility had already dimmed significantly before Swalwell exited the race, however, when President Donald Trump endorsed Hilton. Trump's endorsement paves the way for Hilton to shore up the conservative vote in the state, making it less likely that Bianco, his main Republican competitor, would advance from the primary.

California Democratic Party Chair Rusty Hicks said Swalwell had "finally" done the right thing by ending his campaign, but noted that he could still win votes.

"I ask all who care for the future of California to join me in ensuring all voters know he is unfit for public office and receives as little support as possible at the ballot bot," Hicks wrote in a statement.

Former state Controller Betty Yee, one of the other Democrats in the race, called for Swalwell to immediately return all unused donations and not to use any campaign funds for his legal defense.

"Campaign funds should never be weaponized to intimidate, threaten, or silence alleged victims," she wrote in a statement. "Swalwell should pay for his legal defense using personal funds."

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This story was originally published April 12, 2026 at 7:10 PM.