Gavin Newsom’s Recall Win Encourages California Lawmakers To Change Removal From Office Rules

Even though California Gov. Gavin Newsom managed to defeat the recall against him, lawmakers have become worried about the process of removing a state official from office.

California lawmakers are reportedly concerned about the expense of recalls and how easy it is to make one happen.

“A $276 million waste just to reaffirm 2018’s results with an election coming in 2022,” Kevin Mullin, the California Assembly speaker pro tempore, tweeted following Newsom’s victory over the recall.

Secretary of State Shirley Weber claimed Newsom’s defeat of the recall will force lawmakers to take a deeper look into the flaws within the process.

If more than half of the voters in California would have voted in favor of recalling Newsom, whoever was the frontrunner out of the opposing candidates would have been elected in his place.

“It is somewhat quirky in that sense that Gavin Newsom could actually lose and then we’d end up with a person who didn’t have more than 20% of the vote,” Weber told ABC 7 News. “Which means the vast majority of California would be rejecting that person. What can we do to really make it a system that we believe in? We’re going to do some work on that.”

The recall against Newsom was sparked following his strict COVID-19 restrictions, which included mask mandates and lockdowns. The idea gained more traction after photos of the governor attending a dinner party maskless were leaked.

The recall was able to get close to almost 1.5 million signatures required to make the ballot. However, Democratic voter turnout allowed the governor to keep his position.

Newsom’s win means he will remain in office until 2022 when he is expected to run for re-election.