CA GOV 2021 - 2022 megathread

[Хahar 🤔]

Newsom was basically saved by no one challenging him on the Dem side.

Even if we assume that this was the case, it's just wrong to frame this as if he got lucky in some way that this happened. It was always obvious that he was going to make sure that that happened.

[Continential]

Maybe CA should make it harder to recall its governors.  It seems like you can just get really organized and get this on the ballot even if it's extremely unpopular.  Seems like a waste of time and money. 

The Republicans had to get 10% of the state to recall, its hard to increase the requirements without it effectively being impossible to recall. The Democrats might as well abolish the recalling system.

[Alben Barkley]

Elder actually half-conceded

Imagine thinking it's praiseworthy to "half-concede" an election in which you got blown out by at least 20 points.

Neither this nor the networks loitering for far too long in making obvious calls should be accepted as the new normal thanks to Trump.

[Adam Griffin]

Some loose estimates on what is outstanding:

1500k - Everywhere else
900k - Los Angeles
375k - San Diego
300k - Orange
270k - San Bernardino
250k - Alameda
240k - Sacramento
230k - Riverside
210k - Santa Clara
140k - Contra Costa
90k  - Fresno

Two-thirds of the remaining vote should be in these 10 counties (compared to around 72% of state's population).

[Alben Barkley]

Elder actually half-conceded

https://twitter.com/daveweigel/status/1438006393441689600?s=20

Damn, looks like Rose McGowan didn't even get a mention for shredding whatever remained of her credibility by getting behind this loser.

[Non Swing Voter]

Maybe CA should make it harder to recall its governors.  It seems like you can just get really organized and get this on the ballot even if it's extremely unpopular.  Seems like a waste of time and money. 

The Republicans had to get 10% of the state to recall, its hard to increase the requirements without it effectively being impossible to recall. The Democrats might as well abolish the recalling system.

I'm surprised they were able to get 10% of the state (which must be like 3 or 4 million people I'm assuming) yet did so poorly on this.  At any rate, maybe they should just up it to 20%.  If a governor is super unpopular to the point of the recall standing a chance then this should be possible to achieve.  Recalls should really only be used if someone does something egregious.  It shouldn't just be used by aggressive partisans to get rid of someone in an off year who pisses them off.  That's what regular election are for.

[Holmes]

In trying to recall Newsom, Republicans actually handed him the most political power he's ever had in the state. He has a mandate to do whatever he wants now. Not that he never had that option because Democrats have supermajorities in the state legislature, but after years of trying to tear him down and claiming how unpopular he is, the voters just affirmed him by a likely bigger landslide than his original election. That doesn't happen too often.

[Non Swing Voter]

Elder actually half-conceded

Imagine thinking it's praiseworthy to "half-concede" an election in which you got blown out by at least 20 points.

Neither this nor the networks loitering for far too long in making obvious calls should be accepted as the new normal thanks to Trump.

This.

It is truly pathetic that we praise Republicans who do basic things like denounce an insurrection and concede when they lose. 

[Gass3268]

Elder is still discussing the hard hitting issues of this campaign.

https://twitter.com/daveweigel/status/1438011680458305538?s=20

[kwabbit]

Does anyone know when the rest of the returns will come in? CA is never fast, but I think they could processed the ballots faster given that there's literally only two questions.

[Vosem]

I’ll say it ‘til I’m blue in the face: redistricting =/= free Republican gains.

It adds up nationally to a net of ~8-12 Republican gains, even after you account for losses in CA/IL/NY.

I don’t know why you think that when it’s still so up in the air. The IN map could have been 8R-1D, but it’s sticking at 7R-2D.

State-by-state estimates made by prominent pundits; Sabato predicted that IN would stick and has a net gain of 12, for instance. (When I counted it out in March I got 9, but then I did think IN would go 8R-1D. All of the tiny differences end up cancelling out; the CO commission, for instance, has a much more pro-Republican map than was expected, with Cory Gardner winning 4/8 seats).

It's all just conjecture at this point though.  We don't have maps.  And in some states redistricting is going to be fairly hard to gerrymander perfectly because of so much mail balloting in 2020.  For instance, in Virginia most people voted early and the ballots went to central precincts so we don't have good results by precinct.  

We already have maps from some states, we know what the legal requirements and responsible bodies are in every state, and we know what's possible and what isn't because enthusiasts from both parties have spent the past decade making dozens of draft maps for every state. Details like the shape of IN-1 or MD-6 are hard to foresee, but the overall result is quite clear.

It really is not.  Dems could force a talking filibuster tomorrow and make partisan gerrymandering illegal.  Courts could intervene in certain states.  There are a ton of unknowns.  Do you not recall 2018 and the PA Supreme Court delivering like 4 or 5 seats to Dems.  What you are describing is literally best case scenario for Republicans.

We know in which states courts could intervene; there are a limited number of states where the courts don't share the political persuasions of the state legislature. In many of these states the courts are conservative to a liberal state legislature. "Courts" are not meteorites striking without warning; the identities of people sitting on them are known.

"Dems could force a talking filibuster tomorrow and make partisan gerrymandering illegal." No, for a large variety of reasons they could not, not least that the Democratic Party organizations in safe states and the Congressional Black Caucus would never stand for it. This is not something that needs to be worried about.

Of course I remember PA in 2018. I also remember that it became obvious that this would happen months in advance. I also know that ruby-red central PA needs to lose a seat this cycle, and as a result suburban seats all over PA need to expand into rural areas. This is really hard to avoid -- try drawing a map if you'd like. PA is one of the states where Republican gains in 2022 are virtually certain.

[Vosem]

Does anyone know when the rest of the returns will come in? CA is never fast, but I think they could processed the ballots faster given that there's literally only two questions.

We should have a pretty accurate picture over the next few days, but final results may not be for a month and a half or so, since ballots postmarked today will still be counted and there'll be occasional slowdowns when there are COVID outbreaks at various county boards of elections.

[Devout Centrist]

Some loose estimates on what is outstanding:

1500k - Everywhere else
900k - Los Angeles
375k - San Diego
300k - Orange
270k - San Bernardino
250k - Alameda
240k - Sacramento
230k - Riverside
210k - Santa Clara
140k - Contra Costa
90k  - Fresno

Two-thirds of the remaining vote should be in these 10 counties (compared to around 72% of state's population).

How much of this is VBM?

[Alben Barkley]

What's the over/under on how likely it is Newsom beats his own margin from 2018? Still looks plausible to me though I haven't worked out the math. Seems like it will likely be close.

[Vosem]

What's the over/under on how likely it is Newsom beats his own margin from 2018? Still looks plausible to me though I haven't worked out the math. Seems like it will likely be close.

Maybe 60% odds he beats it, given how big improvements for the GOP were in 2020.

(My argument is that CA is so far gone that this represents a decent result for the GOP anyway, but it doesn't seem like people here agree with me )

[Adam Griffin]

Some loose estimates on what is outstanding:

1500k - Everywhere else
900k - Los Angeles
375k - San Diego
300k - Orange
270k - San Bernardino
250k - Alameda
240k - Sacramento
230k - Riverside
210k - Santa Clara
140k - Contra Costa
90k  - Fresno

Two-thirds of the remaining vote should be in these 10 counties (compared to around 72% of state's population).

How much of this is VBM?

I'm not going to try to guess by county, but I've heard 80/20 batted about as the mail/ED split overall.

I don't even know if any in-person ballots have been counted yet? If not, then it'd be somewhere around 55% ED, 45% VBM.

If some have been counted, then the VBM share could be half or more. Maybe somebody else knows how many ED votes have/have not been counted thus far. If no ED votes have been counted yet, then roughly 80% of mail ballots have already been counted.

[Alben Barkley]

What's the over/under on how likely it is Newsom beats his own margin from 2018? Still looks plausible to me though I haven't worked out the math. Seems like it will likely be close.

Maybe 60% odds he beats it, given how big improvements for the GOP were in 2020.

(My argument is that CA is so far gone that this represents a decent result for the GOP anyway, but it doesn't seem like people here agree with me )

Well GOP generally did better in 2020 than 2018, and historically Democrats aren't exactly known for turning out in droves in off-year recall elections (even specifically in CA), so hard to imagine how this would NOT be seen as a regression, underperformance, and just further evidence of severe decline.

[Holmes]

Election results in California are certified 3 weeks after the Election Day. Results will trickle in as the counties report them. I definitely think more than 66% of the vote or whatever number the media is reporting is in though.

[Da2017]

Newsom might exceed his 2018 margin.

[Gass3268]

ED Vote is almost finished in Orange County:

https://twitter.com/umichvoter/status/1438015161818914820?s=21

[Vosem]

What's the over/under on how likely it is Newsom beats his own margin from 2018? Still looks plausible to me though I haven't worked out the math. Seems like it will likely be close.

Maybe 60% odds he beats it, given how big improvements for the GOP were in 2020.

(My argument is that CA is so far gone that this represents a decent result for the GOP anyway, but it doesn't seem like people here agree with me )

Well GOP generally did better in 2020 than 2018, and historically Democrats aren't exactly known for turning out in droves in off-year recall elections (even specifically in CA), so hard to imagine how this would NOT be seen as a regression, underperformance, and just further evidence of severe decline.

It's a good result relative to either POTUS or congressional results in 2020, and the GOP doesn't even need to do very much better than 2020 to take the House and Senate. (Arguably it can even do a little worse and still succeed.) The 2018 Newsom/Cox race seems like it wasn't very nationalized (Cox did a lot better than the Republican candidates for House, and he wasn't a 2016 Trump supporter and so managed to have some of his own patterns), so I don't think the 2018 CA-Gov race is necessarily a great comparison to this one.

Dems aren't known for turning out in droves in off-year elections, but this is a VBM race where ballot harvesting is legal, so "everyone turns out in droves" is going to be the norm for CA going forward. (Also, CA is pretty inelastic). Given those things, I think this result assuming a similar difference between mail-ins and E-Day votes as 2020 is a decent result for the GOP. People here are writing analyses based on 67-33 No being the final result, which would be pretty bad but it doesn't seem like that's actually what the outcome was here.

COMMENT: Relative to Trump-2020, Yes has picked up at least 3 counties (Butte, Stanislaus, Fresno), and is clearly on track to pick up 2 more where No is currently up very little and the E-Day vote isn't in yet (Merced, Inyo). Riverside also seems likelier than not (if it has the same shift as Orange just did, that'll flip it); if that goes too, the county map looks better than Newsom/Cox 2018 even if the final margin is worse.

[Adam Griffin]

Election results in California are certified 3 weeks after the Election Day. Results will trickle in as the counties report them. I definitely think more than 66% of the vote or whatever number the media is reporting is in though.

I've been operating under the assumption that turnout would be somewhere in the 12.5-13.0m range: do you think it's substantially lower?

[Alben Barkley]

What's the over/under on how likely it is Newsom beats his own margin from 2018? Still looks plausible to me though I haven't worked out the math. Seems like it will likely be close.

Maybe 60% odds he beats it, given how big improvements for the GOP were in 2020.

(My argument is that CA is so far gone that this represents a decent result for the GOP anyway, but it doesn't seem like people here agree with me )

Well GOP generally did better in 2020 than 2018, and historically Democrats aren't exactly known for turning out in droves in off-year recall elections (even specifically in CA), so hard to imagine how this would NOT be seen as a regression, underperformance, and just further evidence of severe decline.

It's a good result relative to either POTUS or congressional results in 2020, and the GOP doesn't even need to do very much better than 2020 to take the House and Senate. (Arguably it can even do a little worse and still succeed.) The 2018 Newsom/Cox race seems like it wasn't very nationalized (Cox did a lot better than the Republican candidates for House, and he wasn't a 2016 Trump supporter and so managed to have some of his own patterns), so I don't think the 2018 CA-Gov race is necessarily a great comparison to this one.

Dems aren't known for turning out in droves in off-year elections, but this is a VBM race where ballot harvesting is legal, so "everyone turns out in droves" is going to be the norm for CA going forward. (Also, CA is pretty inelastic). Given those things, I think this result assuming a similar difference between mail-ins and E-Day votes as 2020 is a decent result for the GOP. People here are writing analyses based on 67-33 No being the final result, which would be pretty bad but it doesn't seem like that's actually what the outcome was here.

1. I would slow your roll on that until we get the final result. Still possible it's actually worse for the CA GOP than 2018 or 2020 overall. Even just looking at the cold hard numbers without any analysis of the situation.
 
2. Saying the last gubernatorial election in the state between the incumbent governor himself and a Republican in the midst of a national blue wave is not the best comparison point is absurd. If anything, this race might have actually been less "nationalized." Not like the whole country is turning out to vote as a referendum on the president today as in 2018. CA's recall system is pretty weird and unique to the state; it's as much of a pure "California" election as there has ever been.

3. First of all, "ballot harvesting" lol. In other words, "Hey man I have to run to work in the morning, can you drop off my ballot for me?" Love how the GOP makes it out to be some sinister thing. It's just democracy in action, universal suffrage in fact. Second of all, nobody forced anyone to send back their mailed ballots; I know I get mail all the time I ignore. It goes straight to the trash if I don't care about it. Third of all, even the election day vote for the GOP looks pretty underwhelming based on what we've seen so far.

4. I think the final margin is more likely to be in the 20s rather than 30s, yeah, but statistically not that far removed from the 2018 result OR even the 2020 presidential result under these circumstances? It's just pathetic for the GOP, end of story. Move the goalposts and change the narrative all you want. Inhale all the copium you want. This is just bad for your party. Even I thought Newsom's ceiling would be maybe 15 or so points, not 20-30 as it seems like it's gonna be. Not that long ago you had polls showing Yes ahead or it statistically virtually tied. That just downright evaporated and came to nothing. It's like the opposite of those polls showing Dems could maybe compete in red states in 2020.

Also just look at Orange County: YIKES. That was like your one bright spot in terms of even just keeping the House members who narrowly won around there. It's not looking good at all. Regardless of the reasons -- blame mail-in votes and "ballot harvesting" and "inelasticity" all you want, accurate or not (and it wasn't that long ago the Governator was able to win two terms, so not sure I buy it) -- but whatever the reason, it just seems like the GOP is beyond dead in CA and there is no realistic way to spin this as a positive result.

[Devout Centrist]

Some loose estimates on what is outstanding:

1500k - Everywhere else
900k - Los Angeles
375k - San Diego
300k - Orange
270k - San Bernardino
250k - Alameda
240k - Sacramento
230k - Riverside
210k - Santa Clara
140k - Contra Costa
90k  - Fresno

Two-thirds of the remaining vote should be in these 10 counties (compared to around 72% of state's population).

How much of this is VBM?

I'm not going to try to guess by county, but I've heard 80/20 batted about as the mail/ED split overall.

I don't even know if any in-person ballots have been counted yet? If not, then it'd be somewhere around 55% ED, 45% VBM.

If some have been counted, then the VBM share could be half or more. Maybe somebody else knows how many ED votes have/have not been counted thus far. If no ED votes have been counted yet, then roughly 80% of mail ballots have already been counted.

I think in-person EDay is being counted now. Numbers from OC seem to corroborate this: https://ocvote.com/results/current-election-results

Ballots Cast 834,406
Vote Center Ballots 79,108
Vote by Mail Ballots 755,298

Also, based on this early vote tracker, there's something like 1.1 million outstanding mail-in ballots

[NOVA Green]

Regarding OC & CA GOV Results in General:

*HOT TAKE *

Latino swings in CA and elsewhere as a % of voters btwn Trump '16 and Trump '20 was overrated.

Can't recall my exact quote I made sometime around the 2020 GE, but something to the effect that: "I would happily exchange raw vote margins for % vote margins".

Marginal gains among occasional voters in a large TO election (2020 GE PRES) do not translate to an overall net gain of RAW VOTES.

https://results.lavote.net/#year=2021&election=4278

Also:

https://talkelections.org/FORUM/index.php?topic=391670.msg8250605#msg8250605

Orange County is at 58% No?

Must be a wave of conservative same day Conservative Asian-Americans and Latinos votes still to be counted....

Sure once all of the ballots are counted YES might and will likely improve overall, but it really does look like PUBs dream of taking out Newsome with Elder and activating a SoCal Anglo Base plus building on the % margins of Trump '20 in more heavily Latino & Black communities of SoCal appears to have been a mirage.

"Angel Dust"--- "Pipe Dreams"--- "Trial Balloons".

Reality is that the Cali PUB Party has become so "Cray Cray", and "Purity Oriented" that they can't even attempt a decent replay of the Gray recall in the '00s when Schwarzenegger won as an "Independent", despite his prior affiliation with the Republican Party.

I mean what is not to like about Schwarzenegger way back in '03/'04 in California?

Here's a picture from a Wrestling Match back in '67 and YouTube Link further down and below:



https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fmVq9UKeOiI