{"id":607,"date":"2021-04-20T19:56:05","date_gmt":"2021-04-20T19:56:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/garrysouthconsulting.com\/?p=607"},"modified":"2021-04-20T19:56:05","modified_gmt":"2021-04-20T19:56:05","slug":"why-no-democrat-should-run-in-the-newsom-recall","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/garrysouthconsulting.com\/why-no-democrat-should-run-in-the-newsom-recall\/","title":{"rendered":"Why no Democrat should run in the Newsom recall"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>With a recall against Gov. Gavin Newsom looming later this year, there\u2019s a fair bit of nonsense circulating about his strategy for beating the attempt to oust him from office \u2013 chiefly, people arguing that a prominent Democrat should jump into the race to replace him.<\/p>\n<aside class=\"scaip scaip-1    \"><\/aside>\n<p>A recall ballot consists of two questions: should the official be recalled \u2013 yes or no \u2013 and if so, who should replace him or her? The positively proper \u2013 nay, critical \u2013 Newsom goal is to try to keep a significant Democrat off the so-called \u201creplacement line\u201d on the ballot.<\/p>\n<p>But I recently saw a\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.politico.com\/news\/2021\/03\/23\/steyer-newsom-recall-alternative-477735\">Politico article<\/a>\u00a0quoting former San Francisco mayor Willie Brown where he definitively declared there \u201cabsolutely\u201d must be a Democrat running to replace Newsom.<\/p>\n<p>A columnist for the Los Angeles Times penned a piece with the ominous headline \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/www.latimes.com\/opinion\/story\/2021-04-01\/recall-newsom-democrats-unity\">Newsom\u2019s recall strategy could cost Democrats the state<\/a>,\u201d opining that having another Democrat on the ballot was just a \u201ccautious, risk-averse approach.\u201d \u201cJust in case,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.latimes.com\/california\/story\/2021-04-16\/will-former-la-mayor-antonio-villaraigosa-run-recall\">Another Los Angeles Times story<\/a>\u00a0quoted a prominent academic stating that Democrats \u201cneed\u201d a backup candidate, also \u201cjust in case.\u201d He even suggested that Newsom and that other Democratic candidate should campaign together. \u201cYou never know what\u2019s going to happen,\u201d he admonished.<\/p>\n<aside class=\"scaip scaip-2    \"><\/aside>\n<p>But we do know exactly what happened in the only experience we have ever had with a gubernatorial recall, the successful effort to remove\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/ballotpedia.org\/Gray_Davis_recall_(2003)\">Gov. Gray Davis in 2003<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>In that recall, Democratic Lt. Gov. Cruz Bustamante reneged on his iron-clad public pledge not to run and jumped into the recall race in August, with the slogan, oxymoronic to many voters, \u201cNo on Recall, Yes on Bustamante.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Too many high-ranking elected Democrats who should have known better bought into this confusing approach \u2013 and some of the more deluded ones actually urged Davis to adopt the same slogan, and even to campaign with Bustamante.<\/p>\n<p>It\u2019s axiomatic in campaigns that you can\u2019t deliver a mixed or muddled message to voters, who are for the most part not very attentive to the nuances and intricacies of elections.<\/p>\n<p>A \u201cno on recall, yes on replacement candidate\u201d messaging is roughly akin to a candidate for president, say a Pete Buttigieg or Eric Swalwell, adopting the slogan \u201cI\u2019m really strongly urging you to vote for Joe Biden, but if you don\u2019t, then please consider voting for me.\u201d Or, in a ballot measure campaign, if the proponents of one measure were to try the messaging strategy of saying \u201cVote no on Proposition 143, but if you vote yes, then vote no on Prop. 147.\u201d Really?<\/p>\n<p>Take it from someone who was there, Bustamante\u2019s entry into the race caused two significant problems for our strategy. (Listen up particularly academics, journalists and long-retired politicians who want to weigh in on this matter.)<\/p>\n<p>First, when we would try to convince focus group participants that the effort was, in fact, a \u201cRepublican recall\u201d or \u201cGOP power grab\u201d \u2013 which is the Newsom tack \u2013 people would ask, somewhat understandably, \u201cWell, how can it be Republican recall or power grab when Davis\u2019 own Democratic lieutenant governor is running to replace him?\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Second, his presence in the race provided a worrisome number of Democrats who had soured on Davis with what they thought was a win-win two-fer: they could vote to get rid of Davis, but still replace him with another Democrat. It didn\u2019t work out that way \u2013 Davis was recalled, and Bustamante received only 31.5% of the vote, losing badly to Arnold Schwarzenegger. It was in fact a lose-lose proposition for Democrats.<\/p>\n<p>If Republicans and their right-wing allies succeed in ripping two of the last three Democratic governors out of office prematurely, regardless of who would replace Newsom, there will be no end to their malevolent mischief in threatening and harassing governors with recall attempts. And since the state GOP can\u2019t win a statewide general election, they would no doubt try to recall Newsom\u2019s Democratic successor, too, if there was one. That\u2019s why it is absolutely imperative that California Democrats\u2019 No. 1, No. 2 and No. 3 priorities must be to beat the recall itself, pure and simple.<\/p>\n<p>For the reasons stated, having a Democrat running as a replacement candidate seriously complicates that goal of defeating the recall outright. Pure and simple.<\/p>\n<p class=\"has-text-align-center\">_____<\/p>\n<p><em>Garry South has also written about w<\/em><em>hat will happen in\u00a0<\/em><a href=\"https:\/\/calmatters.org\/commentary\/2020\/02\/what-will-happen-in-californias-democratic-presidential-primary\/\"><em>California\u2019s Democratic primary<\/em><\/a><em>\u00a0and that Gov. Newsom was right to insist\u00a0<\/em><a href=\"https:\/\/calmatters.org\/commentary\/whats-trump-hiding-newsom-was-right-to-insist-presidential-candidates-release-their-tax-returns\/\"><em>presidential candidates release their tax returns<\/em><\/a><em>.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>With a recall against Gov. Gavin Newsom looming later this year, there\u2019s a fair bit of nonsense circulating about his strategy for beating the attempt to oust him from office \u2013 chiefly, people arguing that a prominent Democrat should jump into the race to replace him. A recall ballot consists of two questions: should the [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/garrysouthconsulting.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/607"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/garrysouthconsulting.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/garrysouthconsulting.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/garrysouthconsulting.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/garrysouthconsulting.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=607"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/garrysouthconsulting.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/607\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":608,"href":"https:\/\/garrysouthconsulting.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/607\/revisions\/608"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/garrysouthconsulting.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=607"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/garrysouthconsulting.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=607"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/garrysouthconsulting.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=607"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}