CA GOV 2021 - 2022 megathread

[Roll Roons]

Faulconer is pretty clearly telegraphing a run. Going to be satisfying to watch CAGOP's golden boy get absolutely clobbered

Just like fellow Mayor & "rising star" Ashley Swearengin.

Ran for Controller and lost by slightly more than Poizner despite piss-poor Democrat turnout

Eh, it's still California. A Republican losing statewide by 8 is respectable.

[Roll Roons]

I could see Newsom being in trouble in a Biden midterm if his approval ratings get too low. I've seen people pointing out 2010 and 2018 as examples and I would caution against that. In 2010, while it was a Republican wave year nationwide, you have to remember that California had an extremely unpopular two-term Republican governor dragging Whitman (and the GOP as a whole) down. Also, Fiorina was plagued by scandal. In 2018, anyone that was even closely associated with the GOP (like Poizner) had the taint of Trump had no chance of winning in California.

While any Democrat is going to start out extremely favored in any statewide race, I do thing an "Independent" Republican could thread the needle and win if the Democrat in question has low approvals. First things first, however, Trump has to be gone. No Republican stands a chance here as long as Trump is the standard bearer of the Republican Party.

I don't know. I feel like the Democratic base in California is just so huge and inelastic, and the Republican brand has become so toxic there, more so than in Maryland or Massachusetts. I agree that the best shot would be a Poizner scenario where a de facto Republican runs as an independent. He did have the best performance of any statewide Republican in 2018, but he was a known quantity and running against a particularly weak Democrat. So who knows.

[Roll Roons]

Obviously safe D, but I don't think he would do worse than Cox did in 2018. It would probably end up about 58-42 Newsom.

Agree. It's likely to be a much less favorable environment for Democrats, and Faulconer is probably the strongest possible candidate that the GOP can field, although California's Democratic base is very inelastic.

[Roll Roons]

I've heard people compare Newsom's dinner party to the infamous picture of Chris Christie on the beach during a state government shutdown.

[Roll Roons]

I've heard people compare Newsom's dinner party to the infamous picture of Chris Christie on the beach during a state government shutdown.

Difference is that Newsom is not in a very hostile state for his party. If he loses re-election, we're probably talking about a wave worse than 2010, and maybe even worse than 1994

I know. Just thought it was a kind of funny (and accurate) comparison.

[Roll Roons]

Not sure if this has been brought up, but it's possibly worth noting. The California State Senate Republican caucus replaced their staunchly pro-Trump minority leader Shannon Grove with the more moderate Scott Wilk.

https://www.politico.com/states/california/story/2021/01/20/trump-backing-california-legislator-ousted-as-gop-caucus-leader-1357484

[Roll Roons]

This is a truly incredible level of lack of self awareness.

https://twitter.com/jeanguerre/status/1429585527259369478?s=19

Also look at how she initially got ratioed and then restricted replies like a coward.

This has got to be a parody, right?

[Roll Roons]

Given California's infamously slow ballot counting, is it possible that we might not know if it succeeded on the 14th?

[Roll Roons]

Larry Elder is the best thing that could've ever happened to the Newsom campaign.

Yeah, I think whatever chance the recall had of succeeding went out the window when he emerged as the leading alternative.

[Roll Roons]

Why or how exactly did a state race like this get nationalized? Why is this so much more nationalized  that the NJ or VA race?

It was the Republicans. They literally shot themselves in the foot. Not that they ever had a chance, but The whole thing’s been pretty funny.

Can you explain how republicans nationalized this? It seems to me that Newsom team consisntely had non California politicians all over the news.

Also you realize anyone the GOP would have had as the front runner would have been tabled all the same things they did to elder right?

What were the things they did to Elder? Point to his past history of extreme statements and demonstrate that his views were entirely unlike the median California voter? You seem very aggrieved by this whole election process and I can't understand what about this you think was unfair to Republicans.

Oh I don’t think anything about this in unfair. I just disagree and don’t understand how republicans nationalized this. To me it was totally nationalized by the democrats with bringing in big names who weren’t even California politicians and referencing things going on in different states and talking about future senate appointees.

Also I firmly believe elder or no elder that the democrats would have painted any GOP nominee as far right no matter how moderate they would have been.

The median voter in California is a Democrat who leans towards the left of the national party. The onus is not on Newsom and the CA Dems to avoid nationalizing, because that is exactly what makes turnout spike. The median voter in California wants Dianne Feinstein replaced by a liberal Democrat, vaccines mandated across the entire state, and is repulsed by Trumpism.

Republicans have completely failed at putting up any remotely palatable candidate statewide in the last 10 years, precisely because they have completely ignored the importance of catering your politics towards the people of your state. For a Republican to win, they need to completely disavow the national GOP because that name is radioactive toxic waste in the state of California. The CAGOP nationalized itself in 2010 and continues to nationalize itself, which is why it hasn't won diddly squat.

You can't point at Newsom pulling in the people who appeal to 60% of Californians and go 'wah wah how come they get to nationalize the race' because that's not how it works. That's not how any of this works.

Everything you said is accurate but do you really think even if the CAGOP changes course and nominates socially moderate to liberal republicans and avoids following the national GOP it would make any difference more than maybe a point or two?
I believe that no matter what the letter “R” next to the name will do them in no matter who they run or how well of a campaign they run. It seems like literally no matter who the candidate is even if it’s the CA GOP version of Charlie Baker dems in CA will just call that person a Trump candidate which is annoying since you can be a Republican and not have anything to do with Trump. That’s the most annoying part of this is how much they make this about Trump when he isn’t even on the ballot and isn’t president

That's basically what happened to Steve Poizner in 2018. And he didn't even have the Republican label on his ballot.

[Roll Roons]

The Gop blew away a winnable election big time.

I don't think it was ever really winnable.

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Who are the Trump voters who voted against the recall?

I don't know who they are exactly, but the fact that they're there doesn't surprise me.

Trump will not be rock bottom for Republicans in blue and blue-trending states, just as Hillary (and Biden) wasn't rock bottom for Democrats in Republican-trending states. 

Well, I do think Hillary's performance was rock bottom for Democrats in KY, TN, MO and WV. Though of course, that does not mean any will go blue anytime soon.

[Roll Roons]

Not sure if this was brought up, but Elder told his supporters to be "gracious in defeat": https://www.sacbee.com/news/politics-government/capitol-alert/article254249308.html

It's something, I guess.

[Roll Roons]

It would be absolutely insulting to your supporters and your staff to drop out of a Virginia Governor race because of what happened in a state on the other side of the country that is around 21 points more Democratic

Let’s not get carried away lol

That’s like saying obama should have suspended campaign after 2012 Wisconsin recall

The Virginia Gubernatorial Election will be extremely close and it is anyone's game..

but I am afraid Youngkin will be governor either way.. his supporters are scary and will do anything to win.. even if it is via a coup

It's preposterous to suggest Youngkin could take power in that manner. If his supporters attempted another Republican insurrection, state and federal forces would intervene to remove them immediately.

Also I really don't think Youngkin's supporters are nearly as cultish as Trump's.

[Roll Roons]

Just wondering, what was the result in Beverly Hills?

[Roll Roons]

For example, consider how Anne Marie Schubert left the GOP before running statewide or Poizner in 2018. They knew (and ascertained correctly, in Poizner's case) they would be stronger *without* the GOP. That's why Bonta is in serious peril, but Newsom is probably fine... unless he gets an organized challenge from his left. Because it is so diverse and its white population is relatively educated, conservatism is culturally irrelevant here. California's two centers of political gravity are establishment liberalism and grassroots progressivism. For a GOP candidate to win, they have to be able to ally with one of these two forces. That's really difficult to do when your politics is literally anti-diversity, pro cultural homogeneity, and anti-worker lol. That alienates pretty much everyone here except rednecks in the central valley and the most depraved of the wealthy and white in the suburbs.

I don't know about "demographics are destiny" arguments. They are unconvincing to me. But as someone who pays a lot of attention to popular culture, from which politics is always downstream, a political program focused on enriching the wealthy and powerful, being bellicose to other nations, and hostile to social progress of any kind is a terrible product for millennial and Gen Z audiences. The GOP doubles down on it because it turns out their Gen X and Boomer base, but these voters are literally committing mass suicide by unvaccination. They don't seem to be organized, don't have much time on this Earth, and are on what has been in the grand scheme of history the losing side: things not changing. Can the GOP get out of this. Absolutely, but California demonstrates it's not a Sophie's choice at all. Center-right politicians, e.g. Feinstein, and ballot initiatives, e.g. Prop 22, win all the time in California. I'd even say they are slightly more favored than progressives, although Bonta will be a real test of that. So longterm, as the country becomes more culturally like California (and it always does, sorry conservatives, but this is why you should never alienate Hollywood lol), the GOP is gonna have to figure out how to moderate plain and simple or they will become less and less competitive.

What is this, Nov. 7, 2012? The bolded reads like a parody of "emerging Democratic majority" talking points and sounds like something Steve Schmidt and Kyle Kulinski would both (unironically) subscribe to.

Also really hard to take any analysis seriously that labels Dianne Feinstein a "center-right politician." Some people really need to get out of their bubble and actually pay attention to recent political/coalition-related trends rather than having wishful thinking and their personal preferences for what the two parties' coalitions should look like cloud their judgment.

This is largely about California, not the country. California is not even really comparable to Virginia or New Jersey. It's far more Democratic and partisan than either.

The only kind of Republican who could possibly have a chance of winning statewide in California is someone who would have to completely divorce themself from the national GOP because the brand is just so toxic in most of the state. And that may well include dropping the Republican label and running as an Independent in all but name, like Poizner did and Schubert is doing.