Quote (Black XistenZ @ Sep 16 2021 06:48pm)
Newsom was outspending the recall proponents by a 5:1 margin. Not really a miracle to turn out some parts of your base with that kind of effort - and turning just parts of his base out was all he needed to win in Commiefornia.
The recall was essentially over as soon as Newsom successfully strongarmed all noteworthy Democrats into staying out of this race. With voters not having an option to replace him with a more progressive or moderate Democrat, the race turned into generic D vs R, which ensured his victory in a state like CA.
If we're trying to get cues from local races about the national political environment heading into midterms season, the Virginia gubernatorial election will be much more informative.
I agree that you shouldn't look at this race and extrapolate much.
https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/2021-recall-elections/california-governor-resultsSo far, we have ~77% in which indicates that we have roughly 12.5 million expected votes. That's more than both the 2014 and 2018 gubernatorial elections and is roughly on par with the 2012 PRESIDENTIAL election in California. What can we learn from that?
Can we look at the Congressional map and see if there are any surprises?
https://www.politico.com/2020-election/results/california/house/