Unions Cheer Newsom's $1 Billion Film Credit, Eye His Successor

The outgoing governor wants the credit raised from $750 million a year and extended through 2040, if lawmakers agree.

On the eve of the vote for his successor, Gov. Gavin Newsom asked Monday for at least $1 billion a year to keep Hollywood shooting in California.

The people who work those shoots said thanks, then looked past him. Hollywood's union leaders welcomed the plan but won't treat it as a win until the next governor takes it on too, Deadline reported.

The proposal, laid out in the governor's own release, would lift the credit from its current $750 million. It would also let productions count pay for their leading talent, the above-the-line costs, and keep the program running through 2040 instead of 2030. Companies that commit to at least two California productions would get a 5% bump, and independent film money would rise to $100 million a year.

It's the second big raise in two years. Last year Newsom pushed the credit up from $330 million, and IndieWire reported that the state's film commission saw applications climb at first before productions began dropping again. FilmLA counted a 3.7% slide in third-quarter production in figures out last month.

Newsom's office tells a sunnier story. It says applications rose 82% in the expanded program's first year, and that more than 43,000 cast and crew jobs were created. "We're the capital of entertainment and we're going to keep it here," Newsom said in the release.

The competition isn't waiting. California still outspent New York over the past 12 months, $6.06 billion to $4.63 billion, but New York's spending jumped 87% in the latest quarter while California's grew 17%, The Hollywood Reporter wrote, citing the tracker ProdPro.

The Entertainment Union Coalition, which includes SAG-AFTRA, IATSE, the DGA, the WGA West and the Teamsters, thanked the governor. It said it's ready to help lawmakers and whoever succeeds Newsom shape a response sized to California's workforce. The Producers Guild of America told Deadline it strongly backs the plan and wants a bill that gets producers back to work in the state.

Teamsters Local 399 Secretary-Treasurer Dougherty was blunter. She told Deadline the governor's comments came "a day late and yet again, some dollars short," and argued the credit needs to be uncapped to compete with New York and production hubs abroad.

Newsom can propose, but he can't finish the job. The Hollywood Reporter says pushing the bigger credit through will fall to the next governor, likely Democrat Xavier Becerra if he beats Republican Steve Hilton on Tuesday.

Dougherty said Teamsters and the other unions are ready to do the work. "The question is whether our next Governor will match that commitment," she told Deadline.

Source: IndieWire, retrieved November 3, 2026. Other sources: Deadline, State of California, The Hollywood Reporter.