SACRAMENTO, Calif. — Hours after Gov. Gavin Newsom crushed the effort to oust him from office, he said it was time to "get back to work."
California's left-leaning advocacy organizations are ready with a list of ideas. They want Newsom to refocus on health care, police accountability and climate change.
They waited to press the governor harder until the election was over, and now they say it's time to regroup. Their organizations helped deliver him a victory, after all.
Amar Shergill, chair of the California Democratic Party's Progressive Caucus, said the recall for too long was an excuse to delay controversial policies.
"I think what's fairly clear over the last few months is the progressive movement had to find a balance between pushing our issues and doing something that jeopardized the recall election," Shergill said. "A lot of voices were muted. That's no longer the case."
WHAT NEWSOM CAN DO NOW
Newsom doesn't have to wait until next year to appease his liberal naysayers.
The governor has until Oct. 10 to sign bills that would decertify cops accused of problematic behavior, expand access to police misconduct records and limit how officers control crowds during protests. Other proposals awaiting his approval would require ethnic studies in high schools, regulate quotas for Amazon warehouse workers and bolster paid family leave to an eventual 90% for some employees.
While conservative governors have signed legislation to limit access to the ballot box, Newsom could make mail ballots the norm in California via Assembly Bill 37.
Tenant activists asked Newsom to extend the eviction moratorium beyond its Sept. 30 sunset date, and shore up eviction protections by signing a bill that would ensure renters have legal representation.
"California tenants helped keep Gov. Newsom in his office, and now they are asking him to help keep them in their homes," the Alliance of Californians for Community Empowerment included in a press release. "We showed up for the governor and now he needs to show up for us."
April Verrett, president of SEIU 2015, which represents more than 400,000 home care and nursing home workers, said the union is "relieved" that its organizing helped Newsom defeat the recall. Verrett applauded Newsom's COVID policies and other budgetary investments to battle the state's most pressing issues.
She said she looked forward to investing more in the long-term health industry and "creating a path to a $20 an hour industry minimum wage for our caregivers."
"We look forward to continuing to work with him," Verrett said.
Newsom's track record already is undeniably liberal.
The governor in July signed a record $262 billion budget that sent $600 checks to regular California residents. He bolstered funding by the billions for schools, and expanded state-funded health care to older undocumented immigrants. The budget starts to finance transitional kindergarten and puts $12 billion dollars into addressing homelessness.
Before that, Newsom supported a measure to extend the eviction moratorium to the end of this month, and allocated billions in financial help for tenants who can't make their rent payments.
Top Democrats point to those accomplishments as proof that the recall had little effect on big, bold progress this year in California.
"What we've been able to accomplish has been incredible," Senate President Pro Tem Toni Atkins, D-San Diego, said during a press call on Sept. 10, the final night of the 2021 session. "It didn't stop the work we were doing."
Assemblyman Miguel Santiago, D-Los Angeles, agreed.
"We didn't table bills because there was a recall," Santiago said. "The bottom line is Gavin Newsom is unequivocally the most progressive governor California has had. Do we want more? Will we push for more? Do we see (Newsom) as an ally and partner in getting those things done? Absolutely."
Others see Newsom's victory as the end of political distraction that slowed down their agenda.
ENDING THE PRISON-TO-ICE PIPELINE
Assemblywoman Wendy Carrillo, D-Los Angeles, doesn't think the recall blocked her priority bill this year to make more immigrants eligible for protection under the so-called "sanctuary state" law.
Assembly Bill 937 would have prohibited local law enforcement agencies from participating in the deportation of certain inmates, but was made into a so-called "two-year bill" when the Senate failed to vote on it before adjourning for the year. The delay had more to do with moderate Democrats in the Legislature, Carrillo said, than with the then-looming recall.
"Despite recall efforts, progressive Democrats are still pushing very progressive policies moving forward," Carrillo said.
Connie Choi, the California Immigrant Policy Center's policy director, framed it differently. The recall didn't kill bills, she said, but it was a "distraction."
"The recall took up a lot of space starting in August, during an especially critical time where we were nearing the end of the legislative session and ensuring a lot of our priorities made it to the governor's desk," Choi said.
Law enforcement groups vehemently opposed AB 937, and helped crush momentum for the measure in the final days of the 2021 session. They argued that the bill would have dangerously banned local law enforcement agencies from helping Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents detain and deport immigrants convicted of a list of 800 crimes, ranging from misdemeanors to violent felonies.
Angela Chan, policy director of Asian Americans Advancing Justice — Asian Law Caucus, which supported the bill, said she was sick of Democrats blaming an election for their lack of support on controversial legislation. Next year, Chan said she expects Newsom to show up more aggressively for organizations like hers.
"There's always an excuse, and I really don't buy it," Chan said. "The issues we have isn't the minority party. It's a majority party that needs to be more courageous in making reform that improves the lives of immigrants and communities of color."
POLICE ACCOUNTABILITY AND CRIMINAL JUSTICE
Democrats spent much of 2020 and early 2021 promising bills to change how police do their jobs in California. But James King, campaign manager for the Ella Baker Center for Human Rights, said the costly recall election served as a $275 million interruption of that effort.
"Instead of a genuine conversation about what actually keeps communities safe, we had a referendum on one person in their role," King said. "And that referendum or recall process really undermined our ability to have an honest conversation about what our society could look like going forward, given the pandemic and inequity in this state."
King also said the recall dissuaded families with loved ones on death row at San Quentin from protesting COVID conditions in the prison. The governor's office never asked coalition members to stop speaking out against prison outbreaks, King added, but families felt "somewhat muted by the recall process."
"They were afraid that if any criticism they had was co-opted by the recall campaign then it could threaten the moratorium on death row, on the death penalty," King said. "Instantly the thought they came to was what if he loses? The moratorium lifts and their loved ones are executed."
SINGLE-PAYER HEALTH CARE
Newsom delighted immigrant and health care advocates when he signed a budget this year to provide undocumented Californians over 50 with coverage.
Assemblyman Ash Kalra, a San Jose Democrat and chair of the Legislative Progressive Caucus, is hopeful that effort is one of many steps that will eventually earn his "Guaranteed Health Care for All" bill Newsom's signature. The measure stalled this year, but Kalra said he is excited to bring Assembly Bill 1400 back in January "so we can finally push the promise of single-payer health care in our state."
A Senate committee estimated in 2017 that it would take $200 billion more to pay for the effort.
Jodi Hicks, president and CEO of Planned Parenthood Affiliates of California, also said the Golden State stood out as a strong reproductive rights ally in a year where red states were passing some of the toughest anti-abortion legislation.
"While it was a distraction in many ways, the recall did provide an opportunity for Planned Parenthood to talk about the importance of sexual and reproductive health care and connect it to why elections matter in protecting access," Hicks said in a statement. "And of course, it helps Planned Parenthood push a bolder agenda if Governor Newsom is in office as opposed to one of the Republican extremists who do not support sexual and reproductive health care, including access to abortion, birth control, or sex education."
Others were less impressed.
"I think the recall environment had a pretty strong chilling effect on progressive policies," said Ron Coleman, managing director of policy for the California Pan-Ethnic Health Network. "It's undeniable there were investments in health equity, but we think the governor could've gone a lot further if there wasn't this looming threat of being kicked out of office."
Coleman said Newsom could've invested in health care for all undocumented Californians, especially given the state's historic surplus, and should have set aside $100 million into a Health Equity and Racial Justice Fund this year.
"We think this recall prevented a lot of advocates from calling the governor out for doing the things he said he was going to do," Coleman said. "We like his progressive leadership. However, we want to see things he says and commits to actually implemented for communities of color and all Californians."
CLIMATE CHANGE
California League of Conservation Voters CEO Mary Creasman said her team was exhausted by Election Day. They organized against the recall, texting and calling voters, while simultaneously lobbying bills.
The Legislature ended up rejecting one of the league's priority measures, a fate Creasman said was avoidable.
"I think (the recall) pulled away resources and attention," Creasman said.
The recall distracted members, the media and Newsom from focusing on ambitious climate legislation, Creasman argued. That included the failed and controversial Assembly Bill 1395, which would have declared it California's goal to drastically reduce or completely eliminate greenhouse gas emissions by 2045.
"The lack of leadership of the state Legislature on climate issues this year should've been more visible in the state and in the news," Creasman said. "And a big reason why it wasn't is because there was a really scary recall that needed to be covered, too."
Bills the league supported that stalled this year also included a plan to convert California buildings to zero-emission status and requiring wealthier U.S. companies who do business in California to annually report their greenhouse gas emissions. More was needed to help transition a fossil fuel workforce toward union jobs in the clean energy sector and to address climate-related weather extremes, Creasman said.
Newsom has always been an environmental ally, Creasman added, pointing to a series of executive orders the governor has issued during his tenure to address the crisis. But the league could have used his help working with a Legislature lukewarm on some of those same ambitions.
"At the end of the day," Creasman said, "we need his focus and prioritization and his vision to make this stuff happen."
