While I have always stressed that the chance that the recall of California Gov. Gavin Newsom was much higher than the elite media suppose, I may have missed the mark.
It may be much worse than I had even considered.
One of the clues that the situation may be dire is that Newsom is now trying to attract the attention of the national party, saying his election may be a mid-term bellwether.
California Gov. Gavin Newsom asserted on Thursday that his fellow Democrats underestimate the importance of what his recall election means for them.Newsom said his fate and his party’s are one, offering a warning about the consequences Democrats could face for “many, many years” at the hands of Republicans in the event that he loses in September.“I don’t think the national Democratic Party’s asking themselves that question,” Newsom told a group of journalists with California’s McClatchy-owned newspapers. “If this was a successful recall, I think it would have profound consequences nationwide and go to not just politics, but to policy and policymaking.”
Another hint is that 538, hardly a conservative-supporting site, outright says Newsom has reason to worry. As I noted in my previous posts, Newsom’s pandemic handling isn’t the only target for voter ire.
…Newsom’s handling of the pandemic might not be his biggest liability. A slightly greater share of likely voters in the Berkeley poll agreed with the statement that Newsom should be recalled “because he has failed to adequately address many of the state’s longstanding problems,” such as homelessness, income inequality and wildfires (48 percent), than agreed with the statement that he should be recalled “because he greatly overstepped his authority as governor when responding to the COVID-19 pandemic” (44 percent).1In other words, California voters may be displeased with conditions related to COVID-19, but other problems in the state are troubling them, too. Thus, the pandemic may not be solely responsible for what we’ve seen in the polls.
Finally, Evan V. Symon, the Senior Editor for the California Globe, notes that Newsom is losing constituencies that are usually die-hard Democrats.
“If you asked me ten years ago if I’d vote Republican I would have laughed in your face,” said Johnny “Treemaine” Thompson, a cannabis farmer in Humboldt County who represents several nearby farms, in a Globe interview on Thursday. “Now me and other farmers, we’re starting to think that we need to recall this guy. The feeling is is that he doesn’t care about farmers.”“We know he’s not to blame for COVID or for the wildfires and other natural things like that. But when a government he leads releases water into the ocean instead of giving it to farms that grow food or economically valuable crops like cannabis, or even to folks in cities and towns, then he becomes a problem.”
Truly, it seems that Newsom is having a bad patch. In addition to all the new recall challenges, Newsom’s San Francisco wine shop has been robbed . . . once again.
San Francisco police responded to an alarm on the 3200 block of Fillmore Street early Tuesday morning to find a broken window, the police department said.While police did not identify what shop was broken into, a spokesperson confirmed to the San Francisco Chronicle on Tuesday that PlumpJack Wine and Spirits, the wine shop owned by California Gov. Gavin Newsom, was the target…Gavin Newsom’s wine shop in the Cow Hollow neighborhood has been subject to multiple break-ins over the course of the pandemic, including three other attempts this year alone, SFPD spokesman Adam Lobsinger told the Chronicle.
Maybe Newsom is beginning to understand why some Californians are beginning to look seriously at taking the red pill.
For those of you interested, please give a listen to the Canto Talk episode in which I review the current recall news with Dawn Wildman, Director of the Coalition for Policy Reform and California citizen activist.
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