Big effort in Marin to fight the recall
Democrats pushing support for Newsom
If the effort to recall Gov. Gavin Newsom succeeds next week, it won’t be because Marin Democrats were caught napping.
By midweek last week, 83,559 completed ballots had reached Marin County’s Registrar of Voters, 56,563 of which came from registered Democrats. No party preference voters accounted for 14,903 of the ballots, and 9,448 came from Republicans.
“You never count the grassroots out,” said Pat Johnstone, who has coordinated Marin’s get out the vote effort for Democrats. “When the grassroots start getting the word out to people, then things start to shift.”
Johnstone has enlisted the aid of various Democratic activist groups such as Indivisible Sausalito, Indivisible Marin, Swing Left and the Mill Valley Community Action Network. She said Marin Democrats are also helping to get the Democratic vote out in other parts of the state.
“We meet our goals in Marin County pretty quickly,” Johnstone said, “so we then pivot to other areas of the state.”
Paul Cohen, chairman of the Marin Democratic Party, said the local defeat-the-recall campaign has
mailed 10,000 postcards to registered voters, made some 100,000 phone calls, knocked on 12,000 doors in Marin and sent 30,000 emails.
“The race has really changed,” said David McCuan, a political science professor at Sonoma State University. “Four or five weeks ago this was an even-money contest, and the governor was under water.”
McCuan said over the last couple of weeks Democrats have turned the tables either by “ratcheting up enthusiasm” for the governor or “scaring the heck out” of their voter base.
Cohen said, “A month ago we were seeing polling that said the Republicans are all going to show up and the Democrats are going to stay home. Now it seems to have shifted to look more like a regular election.”
Johnstone said, “I think the initial polls probably moved people out of complacency.”
Cohen said, “As the election got closer, people started paying attention. And the campaign has done a good job making sure that Democrats know that this is not just a joke; it’s a real threat.”
If turnout for the recall election resembles a normal election, then Democrats figure to do well. When Newsom was elected governor in 2018, his 61.9% share of the vote was larger than any Democratic candidate for governor in state history. In Marin, Newsom won over 79% of the vote.
Nearly 62% of Marin’s 172,273 registered voters are Democrats compared with just under 13% who are Republicans. No party preference voters account for about 21% of the county’s registered voters.
“It’s just a question of who shows up to vote,” Cohen said.
Marin Republicans nevertheless remain hopeful that the recall effort will succeed.
“The anxiety level of trying to guess which way the public is going to go isn’t worth it,” said Jack Wilkinson, chairman of the Marin Republican party. “You don’t know what people are going to do.”
Wilkinson said counts of ballots returned to registrar offices may be deceptive.
“I’ve got an awful lot of calls from people who are very afraid to mail their ballots,” Wilkinson said.
McCuan said, “It looks like Republicans are waiting to cast their ballots.”
He said Republicans have dropped off twice as many ballots at voting centers as Democrats.
“But overall that is only 10% to 15% of the vote,” McCuan said. “Most of the vote is being mailed and coming in 2-1 Democratic.”
Is it safe to assume that every ballot cast by a Democrat will be a vote against the recall? Wilkinson isn’t so sure.
He said when the Marin Republican party opened its office to help gather signatures for the recall, “out of every 20 people there was at least one Democratic saying I’m just so fed up. I’ve had Democrats say I can’t stand this guy.”
Wilkinson recites a litany of complaints that includes the size of the state’s homeless population, its high taxes, deteriorating roads, declining education system and unfunded pension obligations for public employees.
“What has happened to our state?” he asks. “It has gone south.”
In a posting on the party’s website, central committee member Sarah Nagle noted that the local party had chosen not to endorse a replacement candidate adding, “We are on record as saying we think a stuffed deer head would make a better Governor than Gavin Newsom.”
Cohen said, “I think he (Newsom) had a couple lapses of judgment. There is the well-publicized dinner he went to.”
Cohen was referring to a birthday party for a wealthy lobbyist friend that Newsom attended in November at the French Laundry, an exclusive restaurant in Napa’s wine country. Attendees were maskless and the event violated the state’s policy restricting indoor gatherings.
“At this point, I think that has been blown out of proportion,” Cohen said. He believes much of the criticism Newsom has received has been unfair.
“I don’t honestly know how you blame the governor for a global pandemic,” Cohen said, “or a historic drought, or historic wildfires that are the result of climate change that has been coming for years despite people’s denial. Given how California has come through the pandemic, the state has done very well overall.”
Johnstone said the $276 million being spent on the recall, including $1.6 million in Marin County, “is money that could have been much better spent on the people of California.”