Lessons to Learn from California's failed Recall
In what once seemed like a winnable race for recall supporters, Governor Newsom won by a very similar margin as his victory in the 2018 gubernatorial election
Boy, that escalated quickly.
On August 15th, only a month before the California recall election, a YouGov poll showed this race to be within the margin of error. As it stands today, with 97% of the vote counted, the result is 62.2% to 37.8%.
You might be thinking, so what? It’s California, a deep blue state that has only successfully recalled 1 governor in its history. Well that may be true, but I still believe that this race could’ve gone much differently.
The goal of this article is to examine 1. What actually happened 2. Short term trends from 2020 that appear to be sticking around and 3. The lessons that can be learned for those who supported the recall.
So what did happen?
The short answer? Democrats came out to vote. Clearly any scenario that involves a Democrat losing a statewide race in California would have to include at least 1 of 2 things— low turnout among the Democratic base, or a uniquely popular Republican candidate who can appeal to large portions of the Democratic electorate. The latter seems to be getting more and more rare in today’s hyper-polarized political society, so the former is the more common strategy.
But why Democrats came out to vote is the more interesting question. Voter turnout is not something that the U.S. does well in general, as just 66% of the voter-eligible population came out to vote in 2020, and that was the highest recorded mark in our history! Midterms tend to draw even fewer voters, usually around 10% fewer than the previous presidential election. So for an off-year election that wasn’t originally supposed to be on the calendar, the turnout was quite impressive. Votes for “No” on the recall should surpass 8 million when the final tallies are certified.
Since 2016, Democrats have essentially had 1 steadfast goal, which was to defeat Donald Trump and everything and everyone associated with him. Many would agree that this was an important task, but the mania that Trump created caused Democrats to become incredibly single-minded. Every issue boiled down to “does Trump support it or not?” rather than debating the validity of the issue of itself. This is an incredibly simplistic and problematic approach, and I believe it was on full display in this recall race. Back when this race was close, nearly all of the public focus was on Governor Newsom and his policies, with special attention paid to Covid-19 restrictions and his past issues with hypocrisy on the issue. When the spotlight flipped to Larry Elder, the conservative radio host who was the leading candidate to replace Newsom, Newsom’s lead in the polls grew significantly. But the focus wasn’t really on Elder himself, it was the comparison of Elder to Trump that Newsom (and other prominent Democrats who campaigned for him) drew very clearly.
What this speaks to is a greater trend in campaigning that has become a major issue in our politics. Notice that Newsom, Biden and others didn’t make a serious attempt to make a positive case in favor of Newsom’s platform. Instead, they used fear to drive out votes. Fear that Donald Trump lite (Elder) would ruin their state. Fear of the big orange man who is supposedly a unique evil in American politics. This is hardly a partisan tactic, as Republicans have their own ways of using fear to drive out the vote, but it’s disheartening to see this strategy work so successfully.
Demographic Shifts from 2020 are here to stay
In the 2020 election we saw some clear demographic changes that told us a lot about how different types of voters are shifting. Democrats gained significantly among suburban voters, and college educated voters in particular. Republicans gained among working class voters of all races, but particularly with Latinos. The chart below is from data collected when roughly 75% of the vote was in, so these numbers may have changed slightly, but it provides a clear difference between results from 2018 and 2021.
The split in voters based on education level is really sharp, and it seems to only be expanding. Republicans would likely attribute this to the liberal university system, but it seems to be more of a response to Trump. Many affluent college educated voters who were previously registered Republicans became disaffected by Trump because of his lack of Presidential decorum, not because of conservative policies.
It also seems as if working class Black and Latino voters will continue to shift to the GOP, even if it’s in small numbers. Obviously Democrats still have a large advantage among Black voters nationwide, but the gap with Latinos has shrunk significantly, and that shift played a major role in Trump holding onto the states of Florida and Texas. For Democrats, there is an understandable goal of trying to win over swing voters in the suburbs, but this clear shift in focus has clearly led some Black and Latino voters feel like they’re being taken for granted. Theoretically the gains among suburban swing voters would offset the losses among minority voters for Dems, but I’m not convinced that those votes are now solidly in the D column. If Black and Latino voters continue to either stay home (like in 2016) or shift to the GOP (like in 2020) that could spell disaster for Democrats in 2022 and beyond.
So how would you win a race like this?
I am personally a fan of all elected officials facing justice for their decisions at the hands of voters. For this reason alone, I was happy to see a recall effort brought forth against Gavin Newsom. Newsom mandated strict restrictions in his state to help curb the Covid-19 pandemic, but decided the rules didn’t apply to him (see my other article on the topic here). But, as most voters in California would agree, Larry Elder is not a candidate who inspires much confidence in me either. The simplest answer to this question would’ve been to run another Democrat, but someone who could outflank Newsom to his left. A couple of Democrats did submit their names as potential alternatives, but mostly attempted to be even more centrist than Newsom already is. Newsom himself is not particularly popular, so I believe a progressive could have ousted him with the right campaign strategy.
If you’re somebody on the right, that solution probably doesn’t work so well for you. In this case, you would have needed a less volatile candidate on the Republican side. Larry Elder is the type of candidate who could win in swing states across the Midwest but typically struggles in California. For a Republican to win statewide in California, they need to be at least somewhat liberal culturally, which Elder was certainly not. Economic conservatism has always had a healthy following in the state, so a candidate who shares those values would not automatically be doomed. Elder though, centered his campaign focus around Covid restrictions and other cultural trigger points like the use of the term “illegal aliens”, and California voters made him pay the price. I guess he’s no Terminator.
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