Live updates: Newsom survives recall challenge

AP has called the election for Newsom

Less than an hour after polls closed, Associated Press declared that California Gov. Gavin Newsom on Tuesday had become the second governor in U.S. history to defeat a recall aimed at kicking him out of office early, a contest the Democratic governor crafted as part of national battle for his party’s values in the face of the coronavirus pandemic and lingering threats from “Trumpism.”

8:36 update: Newsom leading with nearly 68%

A new round of statewide results released around 8:36 p.m. shows Gov. Gavin Newsom leading comfortably in the effort to remove him from office, with about 67.9% of voters opposing the recall.

CNN and NBC News both are projecting that the Democratic governor will remain in office and defeat the recall effort. 

8:15 update: Initial results show Newsom with a comfortable lead

An initial round of statewide results released shortly after polls closed at 8 p.m. shows Gov. Gavin Newsom leading comfortably in the effort to remove him from office, with about 72.2% of voters opposing the recall.

The first round of results included about 4.1 million ballots — a substantial share of the more than 9 million votes that had been returned as of Tuesday.

The results also showed Republican Larry Elder comfortably leading the group of replacement candidates, with 37.7% of the vote. Democrat Kevin Paffrath and former San Diego Mayor Kevin Faulconer were the closest trailing candidates, both with between 10% and 15% of the vote.

— Tom Coulter

8 p.m. update: Polls have closed statewide

Polls have now closed across California in the recall election of Gov. Gavin Newsom, with initial results expected to start trickling in over the next hour.

The initial batch of results will reflect the mail-in ballots that have been returned to county election officials in recent weeks. Those results are expected to lean in Newsom’s favor, because a larger share of Democrats have opted for that voting option.

The next rounds of ballots will include early and in-person voting, with a higher share of recall supporters expected to be included in those results.

Nearly 9.7 million ballots, or 44% of those sent to registered voters, had been returned as of Tuesday, according to the latest analysis from Political Data Inc.

The data also showed Democrats made up 51% of the electorate that had cast a ballot, despite making up just 47% of registered voters — likely an encouraging sign for Newsom. Republicans had also outperformed their share of the electorate, accounting for 27% of those who had voted but just 24% of registered voters.

Independent voters, meanwhile, have underperformed in proportion to their share of registered voters, making up 29% of registered voters but just 23% of those who had voted in the recall. 

The questions facing voters were: First, do you want to recall Gov. Gavin Newsom? And second, if the governor is recalled, who do you want to replace him? If more than 50% vote yes, the governor would be removed from office, and the person with the most votes would replace him. If 50% or more vote no, the governor would remain in office.

Anxiety may remain high in the coming days, as it may take weeks to get final results because of the state's voting rules. 

Unregistered voters could ask for a same-day voter registration form up to Election Day and cast ballots, potentially pushing back final results for days. In addition, all ballots postmarked on Election Day have until Sept. 21 to arrive and be counted at county elections offices.

Given the larger share of Democrats — who outnumber Republicans by about two to one in California — tends to vote by mail, the first round of results will likely bring some good news to Newsom and the anti-recall effort, said Thad Kousser, a voting expert and political science professor with the University of California at San Diego.

“Those (early results) are going to look as strongly anti-recall as the Democratic Party demographics have shown,” Kousser said. “Then, the next set of returns, what we see at 9 and 10 o’clock, those are going to reflect the people who voted in person, and what we saw in 2020 is Republicans were much more likely than Democrats to want to cast a ballot in person, so we’ll see this shift to the right that night.”

“By the end of the night, when we have a large number of these vote centers having reported, if the recall is still trailing, then I think Gavin Newsom will be able to sleep really well,” he added. “Two or three days later, we’ll have a much more firmer sense of where this election is going, but if Gavin is ahead at the end of Election Night, he’ll be in a strong position to win once all the ballots are counted.”

Early voting in the recall election began in mid-August when every registered voter in the state received a ballot from their county elections office. Since then, both Republican and Democratic party organizers have been working to boost turnout throughout California, which hasn’t had a statewide recall election since the ousting of Gov. Gray Davis in 2003.

Over the summer, there was some concern, backed up by polls, that voters were not engaged ahead of the recall election, but Democratic officials have organized an extensive voter outreach campaign, while Newsom has drawn support from prominent national Democrats, including former President Barack Obama.

Since then, several recent polls have shown Newsom as likely to defeat the recall, potentially by double digits.

“Unless we have a big polling error that’s been replicated poll after poll after poll, it looks like it’ll be an election that, after lots of variability in the polls, has come back to what you’d normally expect in a state with 5 million more Democratic voters (than Republicans),” Kousser said. “But we’ll see.”

This story will be updated as results are available.