In the state of California, conservative activists are attempting to launch another recall election against Governor Gavin Newsom (D-Calif.), who survived a previous recall in 2021 by a decisive margin.
As reported by Politico, Newsom’s office was served with recall papers on Monday by the group Rescue California, which cited the state’s increasing budget deficit and Newsom’s potential White House ambitions as the primary reasons for doing so.
After a projection last week by the Legislative Analyst’s Office showed that the state of California is facing a $73 billion deficit, Rescue California and other conservative activists asserted that Newsom was too focused on a possible surprise campaign for the presidency, or otherwise serving as a top Democratic surrogate in the 2024 election, to do his duty as Governor of California.
“Gavin Newsom has abandoned the state to advance his presidential ambitions, leaving behind a $73 billion budget deficit and a public safety, immigration and education crisis,” said Anne Dunsmore, campaign director of Rescue California. “California needs a full-time governor who is fully focused on the serious problems the state and its citizens are facing. This may be our last opportunity to rescue and restore our state, while we highlight for the rest of the country the destruction Newsom has left in his wake.”
In response, Newsom spokesman Nathan Click dismissed the attempt by trying to connect it to popular former President Donald Trump, saying that “these Trump Republicans are targeting Gov. Newsom because he is out there defending democracy and fighting for the reelection of Joe Biden and Kamala Harris.”
“He’s not going to be distracted from that fight,” Click continued. “Democracy’s on the ballot, and he’s going to keep fighting.”
Any recall petition must have a certain amount of signatures, matching up to 12% of the voter turnout in the previous gubernatorial election. Based on the results of the 2022 election, where Newsom was re-elected in a landslide, that amount would come out to about 1.38 million signatures for the recall petition to be approved. Organizers thus expect to have to garner at least 1.6 million signatures to prepare for a number of names that may be deemed illegitimate by Secretary of State Shirley Weber (D-Calif.).
The 2021 recall election had been organized primarily due to the implementation of lockdowns in the state of California due to the Chinese Coronavirus, particularly after a scandal in which Newsom himself was seen violating his own lockdown rules by attending a large party, with no masks, at a high-end restaurant called the French Laundry. It was only the second gubernatorial recall election in California’s history, and the fourth overall in American history.
Conservatives had hoped to replicate the success of the 2003 recall, where Governor Gray Davis (D-Calif.) was recalled and replaced with Arnold Schwarzenegger (R-Calif.). But in the end, the recall against Newsom failed in a landslide, with 62% opposing it, and thus making Newsom the second governor in American history to survive a recall, after Scott Walker (R-Wisc.) in 2012. Had the recall been successful, conservative radio host Larry Elder would have been elected governor, as he won the replacement candidate ballot in a landslide with 48%; the next highest candidate won less than 10% of the vote.