Stamford Advocate

Democrats seek to make recalls more difficult

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Hours after California Gov. Gavin Newsom beat back a recall election that could have removed him, his fellow Democrats in the state Legislatur­e said Wednesday they will push for changes to make it more difficult to challenge a sitting governor.

Those reforms could include increasing the number of signatures needed to force a recall election, raising the standard to require wrongdoing on the part of the officehold­er and changing the process that could permit someone with a small percentage of votes to replace the state’s top elected official.

“We need to create a system where a small, small, small minority of California­ns can’t create, can’t initiate a recall that the California taxpayers spent almost $300 million on and that frankly distracts and really has an impact on our ability to govern for nine months,” Assemblyma­n Marc Berman said.

State Sen. Josh Newman, who himself was recalled in 2018 before regaining his seat two years later, separately said he will propose two constituti­onal amendments: One to raise the number of signatures needed to trigger a recall election and another to have the lieutenant governor finish the governor’s term if a recall succeeds.

Newsom on Tuesday became only the second governor in U.S. history to defeat a recall; the other was Wisconsin Republican Scott Walker. The decisive victory cements him as a prominent figure in national Democratic politics and ensures that the nation’s most populous state remains a laboratory for progressiv­e policies.

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