San Francisco Chronicle - (Sunday)
Republicans’ outreach ignores moderate voters
Shyla Lane’s recall ballot is sitting there at her home, staring at her. Blank.
“It’s saying,‘Fill me out.’ ” Lane said. “And I’m saying, ‘I’m not ready yet.’ ”
Lane is a lifelong Californian sitting in novoters land as the Sept. 14 recall election day approaches: The middle. She feels like neither side is talking to her.
She’s a Democrat who is leaning toward firing Gov. Gavin Newsom — in part, she says, because he hasn’t done enough to lower the cost of housing or address homelessness. She’s a hair stylist who was
frustrated because her Contra Costa County workplace was shut down several times during the pandemic “along with other small businesses, while people could continue to go to Costco and Target.” She’s horrified and saddened by the homeless encampments near her Oakland apartment.
Yet the 33-year-old can’t bring herself to vote for the top GOP candidates because they oppose mask and vaccine mandates.
And so her ballot remains at her home. Just like those of 3 of every 4 California voters who have yet to cast their mail-in ballots, according to a running tally complied by the Sacramento firm Political Data.
“I don’t think that they’re speaking to moderates or people that are really undecided,” Lane said.
If there’s anything that has been reinforced during this 75-day campaign sprint, it’s that Californians are divided by unscalable partisan barriers. The recall candidates have reinforced that split by appealing to the most partisan voters in their own parties — and they’ve found receptive audiences.
Most Democratic likely voters say they oppose the recall (90%), and most GOP likely voters favor it (82%), according to a nonpartisan
Public Policy Institute of California survey released last week. About 44% of independent voters — who make up about one-quarter of the electorate — back recalling Newsom.
If the recall were a music festival, it would be called “Preach to the Choir Fest” — and part of the audience would be ignoring the festival’s mask mandate.
For Democrats, the partisan appeals are nakedly strategic. There are twice as many registered Democrats as Republicans in California — they just need to go out and vote. So Newsom has spent the past few months trying to wake up snoozing Democratic voters by warning of a “Republican takeover” of California by Donald Trump-loving candidates. The strategy appears to be working as the latest polls say the recall is headed for failure.
The Republicans’ strategy is a bit more baffling. Save for a few attempts to reach out to the middle by former San Diego mayor Kevin Faulconer, the GOP candidates have spent most of their time railing on Newsom and doing little to propose ideas that would expand their base beyond the 24% of Californians who are registered Republicans.
The result: The same number of likely voters support the recall now — around 40% — as in March, according to the Public Policy Institute of California. That is far short of the 50% it will take to dump Newsom.
At a time when Republicans could have provided appealing solutions to voters like Lane, Republicans zipped closed the flap on their promised big tent, making it harder for them to seize this generational opportunity to win their first statewide office since 2006.
Given that only a quarter of voters are registered Republicans, Mark Baldassare, the CEO and president of the
Public Policy Institute of California, told me that “you need to attract a substantial number of independent voters” and “you need to be a candidate whose views are considered more in the mainstream of what moderate” voters want.
Neither shows signs of happening.
One person who understands how lonely it can be living close to the middle in California is ex-San Luis Obispo state Sen. Sam Blakeslee, a former GOP Assembly leader whom the Sacramento Bee dubbed one of the Legislature’s “most bipartisan” decision-makers before he retired in 2012.
Blakeslee understands that some voters in the middle are frustrated with pace of progress under Newsom but aren’t crazy about the Republican options. So is he.
“I get it. Believe me, I sit close to those feelings,” said Blakeslee, who is vice chair of the advisory board to California Common Cause. “This has devolved into a kind of a silly debate about the far right and far left and protecting California values. What this really should be about is what’s happening to the middle class in California. We’re
Gov. Gavin Newsom speaks to members of the media at the Far East Cafe in San Francisco during a campaign stop last week as he fights the effort to recall him.
seeing crime, we’re seeing homelessness, we’re seeing soaring home prices, we’re seeing the middle class collapsing.”
Blakeslee said: “I know Gavin, I respect Gavin, I actually have a lot of affection for Gavin. But I’ve been deeply disappointed with his execution, because the state is facing increasing peril.”
I asked Newsom during his campaign stop last week in San Francisco’s Chinatown what he would say to voters in the middle who want to know what he’d do differently for the remaining yearplus of his term — if he survived the recall.
Instead of reflexively scaremongering about what could happen if conservative talk show host Larry Elder were elected — he saved that for the end — Newsom used the word “proud” nearly two dozen times in his threeminute, 37-second response to tout his accomplishments over a “challenging 18 months.”
Newsom replied that California has had “better health outcomes than Florida and Texas” — states led by Trump-friendly, mask-mandate shunning GOP governors — and “better economic outcome than those two states.” He looked back over 2½ years in office to say that he is “proud” that California had returned $12 billion in tax rebates from its budget surplus, added 200,000 child care slots, made community college free, and fostered a business climate that was home to nearly 100 companies that had initial public offerings.
As for the issues close to Lane’s heart — housing and homelessness — Newsom offered hope and implicitly asked for a bit more time. “We have plans, we have strategies, we have money, we have the political will and a $12 billion investment” to address those issues in an “unprecedented” way.
Blakeslee isn’t buying it, yet remains conflicted. He voted yes on the recall but isn’t fired up about the alternatives. He said he “decided to go ahead and support Faulconer. I’m not sure it’s with a huge enthusiasm. But I think he’s a responsible gentleman who has life experience, elected experience, and who can discharge the responsibilities” of the office.
So why isn’t there a Republican
“I don’t think that they’re speaking to moderates or people that are really undecided.”
Shyla Lane, moderate Democrat
Most GOP likely voters favor the recall
Less than half of independent voters — who make up about one-quarter of the electorate — back recalling Newsom
candidate that has excited more Californians? Elder is lapping the GOP field, yet only 26% of voters back him, according to the Public Policy Institute survey. Faulconer is drawing 5%.
“Republicans are still trying to find our footing in a post-Trump world,” Blakeslee said. He wished the GOP would avoid “social debates.”
“I think that if we as Republicans can consolidate around quality-of-life issues, we would have Democrats up and down the state flocking toward our banner,” he added.
Polls say they’re not. And when the voters ultimately weigh in with actual votes on Sept. 14, their answer could say a lot about where both parties are headed next — and whether their routes will include a detour through middle-of-the-road California.
There’s space on the recall ballot to write in a candidate whose name is not listed elsewhere, but the vote will count only if the candidate has already been approved.