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IIt was anger at Gavin Newsom’s pandemic restrictions that ultimately put a recall vote on the ballot. But the California governor doubled down, putting his coronavirus policies at the heart of his campaign and making his main opponent – right-wing anti-mask and anti-vaccine radio host Larry Elder – a dangerous proxy for Trump.
This winning strategy could have national implications for Democrats and Republicans who are already considering the 2022 midterm.
“Democrats showing up in other parts of the country next year would do well to study Newsom’s playbook very carefully,” said Dan Schnur, a professor of politics at several universities. “Newsom was able to take the Covid problem, which could have been a fatal weakness for him, and was able to turn it into a considerable force.”
The anti-mask and anti-vaccine stance of the Republican-led booster has been compromised by the rise of the Delta variant and a wave of infections that have engulfed hospitals in California and the United States, said James Lance Taylor, political scientist at the University of San. Francois.
“At least in some states, especially the blue states and some purple states, Newsom’s strategy has offered a model for Democratic candidates,” Taylor added.
The fact that Newsom triumphed over the recall by such a large margin also placed him in an ideal position to run for national office in the years to come, Taylor said. The state saw a huge Covid surge last winter, and Newsom had to overcome major missteps, including an initially slow vaccine rollout – but overall the governor could argue at scale national leadership that his pandemic leadership has saved lives.
The recall also exposed the potential limits of Trumpian politics in a post-Trump era, says Mindy Romero, founder of the Center for Inclusive Democracy, a non-partisan research organization. A more moderate candidate could have appealed to Democrats willing to try something new, a strategy that helped Republican Arnold Schwarzenegger defeat Democrat Gray Davis in the last California recall election in 2003.
“A lot of people voted against the recall because they feared a Larry Elder would become governor,” she said. “That doesn’t mean they were happy with Newsom.”
Indeed, several voters the Guardian spoke to ahead of the election said they feared California, under Elder’s leadership, would follow Florida and Texas’ lead. “I’m with a lot of people who might like to remember Gavin, but who aren’t necessarily sympathetic to Larry Elder being there,” John Friedrich, a retiree living in Stockton, Calif., Said about an hour away. south of the capital. , Sacramento.
Yet that might not weaken the Republican Party’s ties to Trumpism. Elder, who did not win the governor’s seat, nevertheless won the highest proportion of votes among Newsom’s challengers, saying that while lacking in appeal, he energized the vocal and right-wing minority of the ‘State. Elder, who alluded to a 2022 race in his concession speech on Tuesday, recycled the former president’s “big lie” conspiracy theory that the Republicans’ lost election was rigged against them.
“What we learned from the recall is that Republicans are not ready for a post-Trump era. They are overtaking Trump,” said Schnur, who advised the conservative candidates. “If they want to win back the majority in Congress next year, that could become a very big deal. “
Yet the idiosyncrasies of California’s recall process and the state’s unique political structure confuse attempts to see it as a broad barometer of national politics. Tories who opposed Newsom – a hugely popular governor who won office in 2018 by a historic margin – were able to trigger a recall election by collecting just 1.7 million signatures in a state with 22 million voters registered. Democrats outnumber Republicans almost twice here, which means that any Democratic candidate already has a significant mathematical advantage, regardless of their strategy.
But the fact that the race even appeared a few weeks before election day could be a lesson for Democrats in California, and nationally, that they will have to work hard to rally apathetic voters – especially minority voters. who have long felt abandoned by their elected leaders.
When the August polls found distracted and disengaged Democratic voters – particularly Latino voters, who make up around 32% of eligible voters – could cost the governor his seat, Newsom’s campaign scrambled. “There was a mad race to the end to speak to as many Latino voters as possible,” said Christian Arana, vice president of the Latino Community Foundation. “But what this election has really shown is that outreach to Latino voters needs to happen early and often.”
Votes are still being tallied in California, and neither the final tally nor demographic breakdowns are yet available. But according to calculations by Political Data Inc, only about 30% of ballots mailed to Latino voters were returned early, while ballots mailed to white voters had a 50% return rate. Fewer people tend to vote in special elections than in presidential or midterm elections, but in any case “turnout in elections is not representative of the population,” Romero said.
“Voters of color helped make California such a solidly blue state and they were clearly the key to Newsom’s victory,” she added. “Now I think Democrats can make this an opportunity to get to know voters better and build a better relationship with voters of color.”
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