Written by: Nathaniel Mannor
In the aftermath of the gubernatorial recall results, Democrats still aren’t satisfied and now wish to dismantle the recall process altogether. In addition, many democratic state senators and assembly members have voiced concerns over the latest recall process and the recall system completely. For example, Assembly member Marc Berman stated, “Californians are very frustrated that we just spent $276 million on this recall election that, from the looks of it, certified what voters said three years ago and what voters could have said next year.”
So what are the Democrats scheming here? For one, Senator Josh Newman proposed two amendments that would raise the threshold (from 12% of the last gubernatorial turnout to anywhere from 15%-40%) to trigger a special election. Additionally, rather than let the people decide their next governor, the lieutenant governor succeeds the recalled governor, adding a “reason for recall” requirement clause and eliminating the “yes or no” question. Or you could suspend the recall altogether.
But there are some problems. First, raising the percentage of voters to call in a recall election and giving the second in command the governor’s post is anti-democratic as the point of a recall election is to let the people decide who’s next and let the minority voice their grievances.
The notion that we should add a ‘cause’ mandate to the recall ballot also stifles the election process. Voters don’t have to provide a reason why they wish to vote out a congress member, senator, governor, or even president when they vote in November. Why can’t we decide to end lousy governance vs. charging an elected official with a crime? And eliminating the first question of yes or no on the recall allows the sitting governor to essentially run as his replacement and prevent a successor from emerging.
The truth is that the Democratic majority has the power to chip away at our Democracy and institute a new, perverted recall measure designed to keep them in control and further alienate dissenters, not just Republicans. They worry about abusing the recall option yet twisted the impeachment process when they tried unsuccessfully to oust President Trump twice in less than one year. The Left are the abusers, and like every other abuser, they gaslight their victims into submission.
Photo from: AP Photo/Rich Pedroncelli, file
