Well, now we’ve got Trump on the right imposing new regressive taxes:

https://www.hbs.edu/bigs/robert-lawrence-qa-trade-tariffs

And since tariffs are only levied on goods, and since it’s poorer Americans who spend a greater share of their consumption on goods than rich Americans, this is a highly regressive tax.

And Newsom on the left:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sales_tax

Because the rate of a sales tax does not change based on a person’s income or wealth, sales taxes are generally considered regressive…Investopedia defines a regressive tax as “[a] tax that takes a larger percentage from low-income people than from high-income people. A regressive tax is generally a tax that is applied uniformly. This means that it hits lower-income individuals harder”.

EDIT: As of 2025, California has the eighth-highest average combined state-local sales tax rate in the US, at 8.802%:

https://taxfoundation.org/data/all/state/sales-tax-rates-2025/