Wins on 30/32 and legislative races. I’ll be on KALW Your Call radio to discuss the results of the election at 10AM.
by Brian Leubitz
Sen. Leland Yee may just deserve as much credit as anybody for the big tunrout yesterday, turnout that may have yielded some key Democratic victories. His bill to move forward with online registration saw nearly a million new voters into the system, and record turnout resulted. Over the past few years, it has become crystal clear that higher turnout is a good thing for progressive causes.
On the national front, obviously President Obama’s re-election and the victory for marriage equality in four states was huge. But, the results in California were not to be exceeded. Prop 32, the deceptive anti-labor Special Exemptions Act, was handily defeated and is now slightly below 44%. And in something of a surprise, Prop 30, additional revenue for schools, is on course for a relatively smooth passage. It is now sitting just below 54%. You can get the full ballot measure results here.
In other measures, the loss on Prop 34, the death penalty measure is a big disappointment. However, without much of a campaign budget, the anti-death penalty measure exceeded 47%. This is a good sign for the future to be sure. Wins on Prop 36, 3 strikes reform, and Prop 39, closing the out-of-state tax loophole, were also big wins for progressives.
The more surprising news is that it looks like California Democrats will have 2/3 supermajorities in both houses of the Legislature next year. There are a few close contests remaining that look good enough now that Speaker Perez has claimed a 2/3 majority in the Assembly. And in the Senate, all of the close races, save Cathleen Galgiani’s race(SD-5), are leaning slightly towards Democrats. However, with 27 seats required for the 2/3 line, Republicans seem in danger of losing their relevance there too.
The big question is where the Dems go from here in what is rapidly becoming a one-party state.
Join me on KALW Your Call radio this morning at 10 to talk about the state (and national) races.
It was a GREAT Election all around
Expecially if it’s true about the 2/3rd Democratic majorities in Sacramento
Too bad about Prop 37
But, without money, it was expected
Maybe Molly Munger can put her money into a follow up to Prop 37
Sorry, Mitt …. YOU LOSE !!!
We have the potential for a 2/3 majority because redistricting (something the Democratic Party and Calitics opposed) gave us a fighting chance in the inland counties. I’ve been saying all along that if we have fair districts, we win, but those arguments were dismissed as “goo-goo” politics by people in the party, and on Calitics, who supposedly know what’s best.
Well, because of redistricting, I now have a Democratic Assemblyman, Democratic State Senator, and Democratic Congressman – 3 things I would not have if the party had gotten their way.
The inability at times for the party and pundits to see win-win opportunities continues to astound me.
So can we stop beating up on redistricting and the top-two system now? It has given us what we have been wanting for so long. Maybe we can now put our energies into solving California’s problems instead of esoteric and arcane discussions about election rules.
2/3 majorities was a big, and welcome, surprise. I hope we can use this opportunity to show the state that with a functional legislature, we can make life better.
Online voter registration might’ve been huge – I’m looking forward to seeing some final numbers on the 18-29 turnout. The NYT exit polling last night indicated that this age range went from 20% of the electorate in 2008 to 28% in 2012, perhaps an unrivaled increase in an election where most states saw a decrease in youth voting.
I’m even less convinced about jungle primaries after this election. My ballot looked bare without places for third party or write-in candidates. I would’ve appreciated the opportunity to cast a symbolic third party vote for Senator.
Time to start talking prop 13 reform again? Or at least removing the corporate property loophole?
If we REALLY hjave 2/3rds majorities…….
We should GET SOMETHING DONE !!
and ACT RESPONSIBLY
I hope the Legislative Democrats can get Something GOOD Accomplished
NO MORE EXCUSES !!
And NO MORE SPENDING BINGES
2/3 majorities is interesting but we’ll have to see if its 2/3 majority of protax progressives or the democrats only broadened their label and now have social moderate republicans wearing blue.
Its not a crazy thought for pro-business social moderates to realize that the southern-friend GOP label doesnt help much. I guess we’ll see how the speaker and pro temp discipline their members.
This was a really great, impressive night. I am so excited to have Tammy Baldwin in the Senate. All the election results felt really positive. I’m not sure I even mind that we didn’t win back the House, because even though not having the House will be a huge problem we at least did such a good job of containing any damage. I think this is the first election since I was 17 that I just went to bed at the end of the evening, instead of staying up until 2 AM reloading cnn result pages either nervously or miserably.
The one source of worry for me is prop. 35. A bunch of people I know are legitimately terrified this passed. I know some people who work in or around sex work and there is a near-universal belief in that crowd that the new definition of “pimping” prop. 35 puts in place is so wildly overbroad it is essentially guaranteed to result in the sex workers themselves being prosecuted as pimps– which also under prop. 35 means they will now be registered sex offenders– even though as prop. 35 was pitched the sex workers comprise a large proportion of the “victims” that the law was intended to put in place to protect in the first place. If we had been asked “do you want to prosecute prostitutes as sex offenders and then force them to give the government a list of all their internet handles for life?” I don’t think that proposition would have passed. Yet that appears to be part of the effect of prop. 35, and for no other reason than it was sloppily written.
I really hate the CA ballot proposition system more and more every election. If this had been a normal law and before it passed there started to be concerns that there would be unintended side-effects of the law then the law text could have been amended to avert that, or if the law passed and then unintended side-effects popped up we could just fix it with a second bill the next year. But no, it’s a ballot proposition, so now we are stuck with every detail as written, one assumes permanently. Unless we can get another Facebook executive to buy us a new ballot prop to patch it, I guess.
If we can enact substantial reforms and bring this state out of the abyss, it may encourage the national party to go for the gold and retake the House in 2014.
Republicans have made one thing very clear: nothing of substance can be achieved while they control any part of the legislative process. The GOP is going to have to undergo a major transformation before they can be relied upon to act responsibly.
Splitting the property tax rolls between commercial and single family homes would be GREAT
But, I’m not holding my breath
Do the basic things and no Spending Sprees