JULY 13, 2020

There is currently an impressively organized effort to recall Governor Gavin Newsom, led by Orrin Heatlie. Signature-gathering began on June 10, and the deadline to qualify the Recall is November 17.

Let’s first look at the last such effort, which ended earlier this year.

The Cruz Recall

In February, a Newsom Recall attempt spearheaded by Erin Cruz submitted 281,917 valid signatures to the Secretary of State.

On the one hand, this is only about a fifth of the needed number.

On the other hand, it’s 281,917 signatures. That’s not nothing. I’d be surprised if any previous Governor has inspired so many recall signatures so soon into his tenure.

But here’s the important part: the campaign spent $91,000, which is a respectable amount, but a small fraction of the $2.5 million spent successfully recalling Gov. Gray Davis in 2003.

In the Davis recall, 1,356,408 valid signatures were submitted – that comes out to $1.84 spent per signature. The other successful recall in recent history, of State Senator Josh Newsman in 2018, spent $1.86 per signature.

But Cruz’s Newsom recall attempt only spent $0.32 per signature. In other words, signatures were collected with six times greater efficiency than the last two successful recalls.  

This reflects strong grassroots support. It’s likely that if Cruz had anywhere near the resources of the Davis recall campaign, we’d be voting to remove Gavin Newsom from office this year.  

The New Newsom Recall

So that raises the question: will the new Newsom Recall, led by Heatlie, either (a) come up with those resources or (b) tap into a level of grassroots support even more powerful than the Cruz attempt?

(a) remains to be seen. But all it takes is one wealthy individual to write one check, and the campaign would have the funding it needs. That’s exactly what happened with the Gray Davis recall, when Darrell Issa elevated a grassroots effort.

Given how many enemies Gavin Newsom has made, I wouldn’t be shocked if one such deep-pocketed individual stepped forward. It’s also possible that the needed resources could be raised through grassroots fundraising.

As to (b), we’re in a very different world than in February, the deadline for the Cruz Recall. Rather than carrying just the baggage of a poorly-rated first year in office, Gov. Newsom has alienated broad swaths of California by botching our pandemic response, amassing unprecedented power, and ignoring the Constitution.

This heightened grassroots opposition to the Governor is reflected in the recall campaign’s impressive organization: it has a board of directors with deep political experience, a well-designed website, a very strong social media presence, and a field operation with 17 Regional Directors, 117 “Approved Persons” charged with submitting petitions to county registrars, and countless signature-gatherers.

And this work is paying off: I’m told 61,000 signatures will be submitted for the First Report – compared to 17,000 for the First Report in the Cruz Recall.

Potential Obstacles

What challenges does the Recall face?

The most obvious is that collecting signatures is harder given the current restrictions imposed by Newsom himself. This is also a challenge for Propositions, such as my initiative to repeal AB 5.

But judging from the 61,000 signatures already collected, proponents are finding ways to operate in the current environment.

A second challenge is that the Legislature has made recalls more difficult. After all, there’s nothing a politician fears more than being removed from office.

In one of the most corrupt bills ever passed, the Legislature intervened in the Josh Newman recall in 2017. As proponents neared the signature threshold, the Legislature changed the rules with SB 96, dragging out the timeline and creating over 2 months of additional delays.

To get a sense of what an affront this was to the rule of law, here’s a clip from my opposition speech on the Assembly Floor during my first year in office.

One can be confident that were the Newsom Recall close to qualifying, the Legislature would try to throw even more obstacles in its path.

(Or perhaps not? Gov. Newsom is not popular among Legislators. The Assembly’s leaders endorsed long-shot candidate John Chiang for Governor in 2018).

The Recall Election

If the Recall were to qualify, would Gov. Newsom be removed?

A skeptic might point out he was elected with 61.9 percent of the vote in 2018, so why would over 50 percent of voters suddenly vote to remove him?

But 2018 was a year with unprecedented Democrat turnout. Half of California’s Republican Members of Congress lost their seats in that election. So 61.9 percent is an inflated baseline.

In a more normal year, his total probably would have been closer to the 60 percent share of the vote Jerry Brown won in his 2014 reelection. By normalizing the baseline, only a 10-point swing is required.

That’s comparable to what happened in the last two successful recalls. Josh Newman was elected in 2016 with 50.4, and recalled in 2018 with only 41.9 percent of his constituents voting to keep him. That’s a 8.5 percent swing. Gray Davis saw a similar swing against him between his 2002 reelection and 2003 recall.

Furthermore, were a recall to qualify, it would likely happen as a special election in 2021, which would be a much more favorable electorate. The Josh Newman recall, by contrast, was consolidated with the 2018 primary thanks to the Legislature’s corrupt bill.

The Replacement Vote

Finally, if a recall were to succeed, what are the chances of a Republican successor?

Based on recent precedents, the chances are good.

In the Josh Newman recall, the percent of the vote received by Republican replacement candidates exactly lined up with the percent who voted in favor of the recall – 58.1 percent. In the Gray Davis recall, the Republican replacement vote was actually 7-points greater than the pro-recall vote.

In that election, incidentally, Lt. Governor Cruz Bustamante tried a “No on the Recall, Yes on Bustamante” slogan, which was so thoroughly mocked that Bustamante not only finished 17 points behind Arnold Schwarzenegger, but lost a bid to become the state’s Insurance Commissioner in the next election – the last time a Democrat lost to a Republican in a statewide race.

The key for Republicans would be not to split the vote among too many candidates. But it seems likely that would be more of an issue for the Democrats, who have several statewide officer holders who would be eager to throw their hat in the ring.

In short, the recall should be taken seriously – not only because it might succeed, but also because it’s building a base of patriotic Californians who are fighting to save our state. That will matter in 2020, 2022, and beyond.

*Sign up below for my latest updates from inside the State Capitol