Why Gavin Newsom is in Trouble

Gov. Gavin Newsom (D-CA)

I'll be honest here-I have largely ignored the California gubernatorial recall on this blog because it felt like a gigantic waste-of-money where the end result was a foregone conclusion.  I'm going to date myself here, but I remember the 2003 election, and there were a lot of differences between then and now (which we'll get into in a second) that made it feel like this was simply an exercise in futility, Republicans throwing chaos onto the flames, potentially trying to harm the progressive governor of America's largest state.  To some degree I still think that's the case-I still think that Gavin Newsom is going to avoid getting recalled.  However, polling shows that Newsom is in trouble-this is not a foregone conclusion, and as a result I want to give some time to this topic on the blog.

For those unfamiliar, Gov. Gavin Newsom is being recalled in California.  California has a somewhat low (one would argue too low) bar to recall their public officials, and Republicans have organized the recall as a "Hail Mary" stunt to see if they can get Newsom out-of-office.  Newsom is not exactly unpopular, but he isn't a beloved politician.  Handsome & wealthy, the straight, white, male Newsom represents a different era of Democratic politicians, and he's not a natural retail campaigner in a state that has elected some colorful & very skilled politicians to the national stage.  This makes him an easy target for the recall, because while he would beat any Republican (this is ocean blue California), in normal circumstances, with a recall the way the question is framed up is he's competing against himself.  If you're someone who wouldn't pick Newsom over a Republican, but wish the Democrats would have a different governor for the next four years, this might be a way to throw Newsom to the wolves without having to mount a primary challenge.

I mentioned above that I didn't initially anticipate Newsom having too much trouble, and that's because California did have a recall, one that was successful, in 2003.  In 2003, Gov. Grey Davis was challenged during his second term for his seat during a recall, and ended up losing that race rather handily, in the process letting Republican Arnold Schwarzenegger take over the state as governor, a role which he'd serve in for the remainder of the decade.

Comparing 2003 to 2021 doesn't really add up, though, which is why I thought Newsom was safe.  For starters, Davis was much more unpopular than Newsom, disliked by both Republicans & Democrats alike-Davis is more inline with how popular Joe Biden is in Alabama than Newsom, who is like "Biden in Wisconsin" popular.  More crucially, in 2003 it was very clear that there were two choices to make in the recall.  Schwarzenegger, through his movie stardom, was universally known and much more moderate than any of the Republicans running in the primary (California also wasn't as blue as it it is now)-he was showing up on late night shows & everyone in the country was following the race because they wanted to see if he'd become the "Governator."  Perhaps more crucially, the Democrats also had a serious candidate running to replace Davis; Lt. Gov. Cruz Bustamante initially ran as a safety net but eventually it became clear that Bustamante had his eye on actually winning the race & succeeding Davis, which left a bad taste in Davis' strategy (since loyal Democrats had a serious option if they wanted to get rid of the governor).  That's not the case in 2021-though Democrats floated the idea of people like former LA Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa or 2020 presidential candidate Tom Steyer running, no major candidate got in, making it "Newsom or Bust" for the Democrats.

It's likely at this point that if Newsom is recalled, a few things will happen.  For starters, the Democrats will eviscerate Newsom for pressuring major Democrats for not getting into the race as an insurance policy (regardless of where this lands, it seems foolish to not have had Villaraigosa or Steyer running just so that there was no worry about the Democrats losing the office).  Secondly, the Republicans will win the governorship, more than likely talk radio host Larry Elder.  While the Democrats will almost certainly mount a recall of Elder (pointing out the futility of this endeavor), one that would likely be successful, or they might even try to impeach him since Lt. Governor Eleni Kounalakis is a Democrat (though it's not obvious on what grounds), Elder could create serious damage even in a short amount of time.  Elder would surely lift many of the Covid restrictions that the state has in-place, potentially upending recovery in a state with almost 40 million people (California's Covid infection rates have stayed considerably lower than Texas or Florida's largely because of Newsom's more cautious approach to the disease).  It's possible that Covid could ravage the state if Newsom is recalled.  Additionally, Sen. Dianne Feinstein is 88-years-old, and has stubbornly refused to resign despite worries that if she were to pass away while Elder was governor, he would replace her with a Republican, handing the Senate majority to the Republicans in the middle of one of the most important infrastructure negotiations in sixty years.

There are other concerns about Elder being in charge of the state (though the state's Democratic state legislature would keep Elder in check to some degree), but Covid & Feinstein's age are enough to put a lot of worry in Democrats.  It's obvious at this point that Newsom has run a poor campaign, making a safe seat a tossup, but the Democrats are not in a position to be able to point fingers-the health of 40 million people (and the Senate majority) is on-the-line in one of the bluest states in the union, a state where Larry Elder couldn't win under normal circumstances...but these aren't normal circumstances.