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      High Hopes Dashed at Larry Elder's Party After Recall Defeat

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      COSTA MESA, Calif. — About 10 minutes before the polls closed, supporters of Larry Elder, the leading Republican candidate, began streaming into a hotel ballroom in Orange County, sipping wine and whiskey sours. The band played “The Girl From Ipanema” and the stage was ringed by red-white-and-blue bunting, as attendees waited for Mr. Elder.Just after polls closed at 8 p.m., Fred Whitaker, the chairman of the Orange County Republican Party, warned the crowd — inaccurately, it turned out — that it was likely to be a long night, because early results were likely to favor the Democrats. “Enjoy the food,” he said. “Enjoy the drink.”And then they prayed.Pastor Jack Hibbs of Calvary Chapel in Chino Hills thanked God for creating California. “We pray, we ask of you, to grant victory,” he said.Later, after The Associated Press called the race for Gov. Gavin Newsom, Mr. Elder spoke to the crowd and conceded.“Let’s be gracious in defeat,” he said, adding, “We may have lost the battle, but we are going to win the war.”The packed ballroom cheered.Throughout the campaign, Mr. Elder made baseless claims about election fraud, echoing former President Donald J. Trump. He had previously suggested he would challenge the results if he lost and Mr. Newsom kept his job. But on Tuesday night, he did not say whether he planned to contest the results.At the event, which the candidate billed as a “victory party,” some of Mr. Elder’s supporters said they would accept defeat if it arrived. “Of course,” said Cheryl Rosenberg, an educator in the Inland Empire. “I’m not going to call cheating.”Ms. Rosenberg, 57, raced to the Costa Mesa hotel straight from work with her friend and colleague, Susan Sawyer, both wearing American-flag-themed attire. Ms. Sawyer also said she would also accept the election’s outcome if it didn’t favor Mr. Elder.But Ms. Sawyer, 58, said that in any case, she had already decided to leave California because of its cost of living. A lifelong Californian, she said she wished she could stay. But she and her husband are close to retirement, and believe they can’t afford to spend their golden years in the state. So they recently sold their house for $720,000 and will move to Arizona.“We’re just going to take the money and run,” she said.The two friends were ecstatic when the recall effort qualified for the ballot, both believing that Mr. Newsom has been “a horrible governor.” They decided to support Mr. Elder, a conservative radio host, because he was not a career politician and had what they said were common-sense solutions to problems such as wildfires and the homelessness crisis.“He wants a California that we want back,” Ms. Rosenberg said. More

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      California Recall Election Results: Live Map

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      If Governor Newsom is recalled, how long will the new governor be in office? The new governor, if one is elected, would take the oath of office as soon as the vote was certified and would assume the position for the remainder of the term, which runs through January 2, 2023. California has a regularly scheduled election for governor next year. More

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      Early Recall Voters Are as Democratic as in 2020. Here’s What it Means for Newsom.

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      Already, more people have returned ballots than cast votes in the last California recall election in 2003. More than nine million votes have already been received in the California recall election, suggesting a relatively high turnout more reminiscent not of a low-wattage special election but of a high-profile midterm.These nine million votes will probably account for most of the ballots cast in the election. They were overwhelmingly cast by mail or through early in-person voting. And they offer an emerging picture of an electorate that is somewhat older, whiter and more highly educated than those who had returned ballots at this time in last November’s presidential election.Overall in the recall, registered Democrats outnumber Republicans by a 25-point margin in ballots recorded so far, 51 to 26 percent, according to figures from Political Data, a California-based data vendor. That Democratic advantage is nearly identical to the 50 percent to 25 percent edge that California Democrats enjoyed among the ballots returned by this point in 2020.Like last November’s election, registered Democrats have been slightly likelier to cast advance ballots than Republicans, likely reflecting the new Democratic enthusiasm for mail voting during the pandemic — or Republican skepticism of mail voting during the Trump era.President Biden went on to win California by 29 percentage points.Despite the similar partisan makeup of the advance vote, the state has received fewer ballots than at this point in the general election, when 13 million ballots had already been returned to election officials.Over all, 16 percent of the returns are from 18- to 34-year-old voters and 18 percent are thought to be Latinos, based on their surnames or neighborhoods. At this point in 2020, 21 percent were ages 18 to 34 and 21 percent were Latinos.Typically, young and Latino voters are likelier to vote closer to the election and will likely represent a larger share of all voters, as they did in 2020.Even so, the recall turnout appears high by nearly any other standard besides the 2020 election. Already, more people have returned ballots than cast votes in the last California recall election in 2003, when the Democratic governor Gray Davis was recalled and replaced by Arnold Schwarzenegger, a Republican. It is also higher than the total turnout in the 2014 midterm election.The relatively high and Democratic turnout so far has further narrowed the already daunting path to recall Mr. Newsom. The possibility that Republicans might benefit from an unusual turnout advantage was thought to be one of the likeliest ways that the recall effort might succeed in an overwhelmingly Democratic state. More

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      What Does the California Recall Mean for the U.S.?

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      Gov. Gavin Newsom and the Democrats argued that he was running not on his record or against a particular candidate, but against Trumpism.Sign up here to get On Politics in your inbox every weekday.Let’s start with the obvious caveat: California is different. That’s true for many, many reasons, but this week all eyes are on its bizarre — some say unconstitutional — recall process, in which a small minority of Californians have forced today’s no-confidence vote on Gov. Gavin Newsom, despite a vast majority’s support for him.The latest polls show that Californians overwhelmingly want him to stay, and are especially wary of his leading opponent, the conservative talk-show host Larry Elder. But this being politics in 2021, let’s also concede that there is always a chance that the polls are disastrously wrong. By tomorrow, could we all be talking about Mr. Elder’s brilliant campaign and bright future?With those two huge caveats in mind, let’s take up the opposite question: What does Mr. Newsom’s likely cruise to victory say about American politics over the coming years?Again, this being 2021, we can’t talk about politics, national or local, without talking about Donald J. Trump and, by extension, Trumpism. The man and the phenomenon (or is it a movement? or an ideology?) played into the race in two ways, both of which we’re going to see repeated in coming races.First, Mr. Newsom and the Democrats seem to have persuasively argued that he was running not on his record or against a particular candidate, but against Trumpism — that the alternative to Mr. Newsom was, as this paper put in a headline, “the abyss.”“We defeated Trump last year, and thank you, but we haven’t defeated Trumpism,” Mr. Newsom has told anyone who would listen.Such scaremongering is a time-honored tactic, but it’s an especially salient and effective one today. Mr. Trump is always in the news, always taking the extreme position, and as long as he lays claim to being the head of the Republican Party, Democrats will try to tie their opponents to him.And it works. Because Trumpism is so vague, opponents can make it anything they want it to be. Incipient fascism? Rampant libertarianism? White supremacy? Check, check and check. It can also mean specific things, like eviscerating climate policy or canceling mask and vaccine mandates. California has a lot of problems, but Californians generally approve of Sacramento’s pro-government, pro-regulatory approach. Rather than be forced to defend their specific policies, the Democrats can simply paint their opponents as Trump manqués bent on destruction.Another caveat: This is California, where Democrats outnumber Republicans by two to one, forcing the Republican Party into a corner, where it has become captive to its base. That means it’s going to behave in ways that the Republican Party of Texas or Florida, for example, might not.“Compare it with, let’s say, the Democratic Party in Mississippi,” said Chris Stirewalt, the former digital politics editor at Fox News. “It’s probably a very weird space.”Will the Democrats’ strategy work in purple states, or even a state like Virginia, where Republicans are more numerous and better organized — and where Terry McAuliffe is already deploying it against his Republican opponent, Glenn Youngkin, in their race for governor?Traditional political analysis would say no. But again, this is 2021. Following their base, many Republicans have largely (but not entirely) abandoned the political middle, where most Americans say they abide. Democrats have spent months painting their opponents as anti-democratic and anti-reality, a message that has played well among independents and moderates, starting with the Senate runoffs in Georgia, and with Mr. Trump ringing in with false claims about election fraud, expertly timed to prove their point.Not every race is going to play out that way. Most Republicans will read the room, so to speak, and adjust their campaigns accordingly. Look at Kevin Faulconer, the former mayor of San Diego who’s also running to replace Mr. Newsom. Yes, he has the requisite photo of himself standing beside Mr. Trump. But his message has been about pragmatic solutions to state problems, exactly the sort of campaign you’d expect from someone trying to put space between himself and his national party.Then again, Mr. Faulconer is running a distant second behind Mr. Elder and barely registers in the national conversation. One reason is the uniqueness of the race. It’s a battle royal, not a primary; the candidates had little time to prepare; and as a result, name recognition, which Mr. Elder has and Mr. Faulconer doesn’t, is critical.But another is the new dynamics of right-wing politics — and the second way in which the recall illustrates the lasting impact of Mr. Trump and Trumpism.Mr. Newsom has been running with his “me vs. the abyss” strategy since the recall began. But it didn’t stick at first, because the recall was focused on Mr. Newsom and his performance during the pandemic — including an embarrassing maskless dinner at the French Laundry, one of California’s most exclusive restaurants, during the state’s shutdown.“In a vacuum, there was a lot of discontentment with Newsom and ambivalence with him among Democrats,” said Rob Stutzman, a Republican political consultant in California.That started to change once “the abyss” got a name.Mr. Elder isn’t the Trumpiest candidate imaginable, but he’s close. A novice campaigner with a background in conservative talk radio, Mr. Elder has a treasure chest full of embarrassing comments in his past — about women, about Black people — and a penchant for making more of them on the stump.“Larry Elder has been the gift that keeps on giving,” said Steven Maviglio, a Democratic political consultant in California.Again, Mr. Elder has been effective because this race is so much more about celebrity than policy. But he’s also effective because he, more than anyone else, is attuned to the Trumpist base, and is willing to tack accordingly.After he drew fire from the right for telling the editorial board of The Sacramento Bee that Joe Biden won the 2020 election, he reversed himself. He has repeatedly and falsely claimed that the recall race is rife with fraud. He is crushing it among the “guys with an Uncle Sam costume in their closet” demographic, but not much else.Arguably, Mr. Elder isn’t a serious politician; he’s running not to win, but to raise his media profile. But that very fact says something about today’s Republican Party. Many of its highest-profile figures blur the line between politician and celebrity, and act accordingly, even if their success as the latter undermines what we expect out of the former. Marjorie Taylor Greene and Madison Cawthorn — and, yes, Larry Elder — are only nominally politicians. In substance, they’re entertainers.True, they’re entertainers who say scary things about guns, political violence, the pandemic and anyone to their political left. And true, some of them do win elections, usually in deep-red districts. And true, many people in the Republican Party are much smarter, or at least more thoughtful about elected office, than they are.Still, Mr. Elder and Co. highlight a lasting, possibly permanent dynamic on the right: the rejection of politics as anything other than smash-mouth spectacle, in which the most outrageous and insincere figures draw the biggest crowds — and force their colleagues to play constant defense against their own party.That’s not an insurmountable challenge. Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida seems, at least for now, to have figured out a way past it. But many won’t — and many Republicans won’t even try. Remember when the party could dismiss as side shows the occasional extremist figures like Todd Akin, who made comments about “legitimate rape,” and Christine “I’m Not a Witch” O’Donnell? In 2021, that’s become much, much harder to do.On Politics is also available as a newsletter. Sign up here to get it delivered to your inbox.Is there anything you think we’re missing? Anything you want to see more of? We’d love to hear from you. Email us at onpolitics@nytimes.com. More

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      As California Votes, It Rethinks Its Tradition of Direct Democracy

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      Any proposed changes to a century-old recall law are likely to be met with stiff opposition from Republicans, who see it as one of the last avenues of influence in a Democratic-led state.SACRAMENTO — As Californians went to the polls on Tuesday to determine whether Gov. Gavin Newsom would be removed from office, the recall election had already spawned another campaign: to recall the recall.In a state famous for its acts of direct democracy, whether banning affirmative action or legalizing cannabis, detractors of this year’s special election say the recall process is democracy gone off the rails, a distraction from crises that require the government’s attention, and a waste of hundreds of millions of dollars.California’s forests are on fire, with wildfire smoke sending thousands of residents fleeing. Towns are running out of water from severe drought. And some rural hospitals are packed with coronavirus patients.Many voters who went to the polls on Tuesday said the election was an unwelcome distraction that preoccupied Mr. Newsom and, some critics said, might have prevented him from taking on tough decisions.“This recall is so dumb,” said Frankie Santos, a 43-year-old artist who voted in Hollywood on Tuesday. “It’s so not a good use of resources.” She said that if she could have scrawled “absolutely no” to recalling Mr. Newsom without invalidating her ballot, she would have.Anthony Rendon, the speaker of the State Assembly, and other legislative leaders have already said discussions were underway to place a constitutional amendment regarding recalls before voters in 2022.Voters waited to enter a polling site at a library in Huntington Beach.Allison Zaucha for The New York TimesAn election worker collected mail-in ballots at Westminster Presbyterian Church in Pasadena.Ryan Young for The New York Times“This is a system that was put in place 100 years ago,” said Mr. Rendon, referring to the current recall rules. “We’ll be asking if this is what’s best for the state.”The election, which is costing the state $276 million to administer, has at times had a circus atmosphere to it, not least when one of the 46 candidates on the ballot brought a large bear to a campaign rally.No one in the state’s Democratic leadership is suggesting the elimination of recalls, which are baked into the State Constitution. But many are vowing to make it more difficult for them to qualify for the ballot, or to change the rules on how a successor is chosen.Currently, opponents of a governor — or any other elected official in California — can trigger a recall election by submitting signatures equal to 12 percent of the turnout in the most recent election for that office.In a sharp piece of political irony, it will take a referendum to decide whether to change this particular referendum.Democrats will be working over howls of opposition from Republicans, who see the recall process as one of the few resorts left to them in a state where Democrats control every statewide office and have supermajorities in the Legislature.“The last thing we need is legal changes that make it even harder for Californians to access their government,” said Kevin Kiley, a Republican assemblyman who ran in the recall election.Mr. Kiley said Democrats had already tried to delegitimize the process by calling it a democratic coup.“If they are trying to make it harder or impossible to hold your public officials accountable, that is absolutely something that I would oppose,” Mr. Kiley said.Critics of the recall process say it is fundamentally antidemocratic. With a simple majority, voters could recall Mr. Newsom, who was well ahead in the polls in the final days of campaigning. But his replacement would be chosen by plurality.Gov. Gavin Newsom thanked members of the IBEW Local 6 union for their support in San Francisco.Jim Wilson/The New York TimesLarry Elder, the leading Republican candidate, in Whittier last week.Alex Welsh for The New York TimesPolling showed that the front-runner to replace Mr. Newsom, the conservative talk show host Larry Elder, had nowhere near a majority of support, and many Democrats left that section of the ballot blank.Among Newsom supporters, there were strong feelings about the recall.Jose Orbeta, an employee of San Francisco’s Department of Public Health, was blunt in describing the recall election as he voted on Tuesday.“Waste of time,” he said. “It’s a power grab by the G.O.P.”Mr. Newsom had done a “decent job” leading California through the pandemic, he said.Recalls in California date back more than a century, to a suite of reforms passed from 1910 to 1913 under Gov. Hiram Johnson, a Republican and progressive crusader. They were the capstone of a yearslong effort to curb the political power of the Southern Pacific railroad, which all but owned the state’s government and economy, controlling politicians, judges and regulators.Mr. Johnson’s reforms broke the hold, overhauling the state’s election system and, through a constitutional amendment passed by voters in 1911, instituting the system of referendums, ballot initiatives and the recall. Kevin Starr, a California historian who died in 2017, called this “the very re-creation of the political and social order of California.”It is often pointed out that Mr. Johnson’s reforms — tools that were explicitly created to curb the influence of big business on California’s politics — have now become a major corporate weapon. This is particularly true of initiatives, which can be put on the ballot with a few million dollars’ worth of clipboard-holding workers gathering signatures from registered voters.One recent example was Proposition 22, a $200 million initiative by the ride-sharing companies Uber and Lyft to prevent their drivers from being classified as employees.“That is the bigger problem here,” said Jim Newton, a historian and lecturer on public policy at the University of California, Los Angeles, who has written biographies of the governors Earl Warren and Jerry Brown.“It’s not whether Gavin Newsom gets 51 percent or we have Gov. Larry Elder. That’s important, but the general premise that the initiative, referendum and recall are intended to curb the influence of powerful special interests has been tipped entirely on its head and it has now become the tool of special interests.”Erwin Chemerinsky, a constitutional law expert and the dean of the School of Law at the University of California, Berkeley, argued that the state’s recall process is unconstitutional because the two-step nature of the process — with voters deciding whether to recall the sitting governor and then, separately, choosing a replacement — makes it possible for a new governor to take office with less popular support than the old one.If 49 percent of voters supported Mr. Newsom, 25 percent supported Mr. Elder, and fewer than that supported any other candidate, Mr. Elder would become governor with about half as many votes as Mr. Newsom. In that scenario, the vote of one Elder supporter would effectively have twice as much power as the vote of a Newsom supporter, said Professor Chemerinsky — and that would violate the “one person, one vote” principle affirmed in two Supreme Court decisions in 1964, Reynolds v. Sims and Wesberry v. Sanders.Californians were not forced to confront that problem in the 2003 recall, in which Arnold Schwarzenegger replaced Gov. Gray Davis, because Mr. Schwarzenegger received more votes on the second question than Mr. Davis did on the first.Voters cast their ballots at Redwood Playhouse in Garberville.Alexandra Hootnick for The New York TimesLeaving a voting site at Jesse Owens Park in Los Angeles on Monday.Allison Zaucha for The New York TimesMr. Davis, the first California governor to lose a recall election, said in an interview that the ability to recall officials was part of California’s “unique direct democracy approach to voting,” but that he supported changes to the specifics of the process.“For 110 years, anyone running for governor knew there was a possibility of being subject to a recall,” he said. “It comes with the territory — and life isn’t always fair.”But he argued that the threshold for getting a recall on the ballot — signatures from 12 percent of the voters in the previous election for governor — was insufficient in an era that allows interest groups to gain supporters with the click of a button on Facebook.“We should go from a 12 percent to a 25 percent threshold,” Mr. Davis said, and ask voters only one question: “Who should serve out the balance of the governor’s term?”State Senator Josh Newman, who experienced the state’s recall rules firsthand when he was recalled in 2018 and replaced by a candidate who received fewer votes than him in the recall election, said he planned to propose a constitutional amendment early next year that would remove the replacement race on the ballot. Voters would decide whether a governor should be recalled, and if so, the lieutenant governor would automatically take the job. Mr. Newman ran against his replacement and won back his seat in 2020.Yet amid the plans and proposals to tweak the recall rules, there were voters who wanted them to stay just as they are.Jim Mastrosimone, a voter in Irvine, groused that the list of replacement candidates was too long after casting his vote for Mr. Elder.But ultimately, Mr. Mastrosimone said, he is happy Californians have recall elections.“It gives the power to the little guy,” he said.Thomas Fuller More