Landslide Win for Prop. 50 Caps Huge Night for Pro-Democracy Coalition Pushing Back against Trumpism

Following big Democratic victories in Virginia, New Jersey, and NYC, passage of the measure to redraw congressional maps sent a strong message of national opposition to the authoritarian regime.

(Editor’s note: In the first chance voters had to make their voices heard since Donald Trump’s inauguration, Tuesday’s election amounted to a referendum on the first year of his presidency. Long before the polls closed in California, two moderate Democratic members of congress triumphed by capturing the governorships of Virginia and New Jersey, a few hours before a young Democratic Socialist prevailed against gutter politics to be elected the next mayor of New York City. When the Golden State’s strong approval of the anti-Trump Proposition 50 was called a few minutes after the polls closed at 8 p.m. PDT, it demonstrated a broad, ideologically diverse, coast-to-coast repudiation of Trump’s authoritarian project. /jr).

By Maya C. Miller and Jeanne Kuang /CalMatters

California voters on Tuesday passed a ballot measure to redraw the state’s congressional map to favor Democrats, a major victory for the party in a high-stakes national redistricting fight that could determine who controls the House of Representatives next year.

The Associated Press called the race shortly after polls closed at 8 p.m. Early returns showed the measure leading with nearly 58% of votes counted.

The maps voters approved with Proposition 50 make it likely that five of California’s GOP-held congressional seats could be won by Democrats in next year’s midterm elections. They also bolster the re-election chances of three Democrats currently holding office in now-competitive districts.

The passage is a triumph for Gov. Gavin Newsom, an early proponent of the gerrymandering plan whose backing set off a whirlwind summer map-drawing effort and quick passage through the Democratic-dominated state Legislature.

Nationally, the gains would effectively cancel out the five seats the GOP sought to gain in Texas by passing a new congressional map earlier this year at President Donald Trump’s urging, and weakens Trump’s efforts to solidify the GOP’s slim majority in the House.

If Democrats win those seats, they would have more power to challenge Trump’s administration and policies. However, it has also set off an escalating tit-for-tat around the country as more states move to gerrymander in response to, or against, the president.

But no other states have the population or congressional seats of Texas or California, making Prop. 50’s passage especially significant for control of the House.

How the West was won. Newsom’s campaign drew upon an army of community groups and volunteers that had last mobilized in an off-year election to support him in the failed Republican effort to recall him from office four years ago; polling close to Election Day showed nearly the same share of voters supporting the measure as supporting Newsom during the 2021 recall.

Along the way, the governor has made a name for himself nationally as one of the few Democrats willing to try unconventional approaches to oppose Trump after suffering bruising losses last fall.

The measure was bemoaned by some good government advocates who supported then-Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger’s ballot initiative to get California voters to approve an independent, nonpartisan redistricting system that has since become a standard for good governance nationwide. Prop. 50 sets aside the independent commission that drew the current congressional map for the next six years; California will return to using the commission after the 2030 Census.

But despite the commission’s popularity, most Democrats, who outnumber Republicans nearly two-to-one in voter registration, agreed with Newsom’s argument that they needed to “fight fire with fire” in response to Trump’s unprecedented push for mid-decade gerrymandering in Texas and other red states.

By the numbers. More than 6.6 million ballots — about 29% of those who received mail-in ballots — were already returned before Election Day, according to Political Data Inc., which tracks ballots in each county.

Final polling showed strong support for Prop. 50, with 56% of likely voters telling the Public Policy Institute of California they’re in favor, and 60% of likely voters supporting in a Berkeley Institute of Governmental Studies survey.

The new maps will dramatically alter next year’s midterm elections, which were predicted to feature several highly competitive races in California.

Some disparate parts of the state will get lumped together, such as a wacky shaped district in the North State that combines rural and conservative Modoc County with the ultra-liberal Bay Area in Marin County. The city of Huntington Beach, a conservative stronghold in Orange County that banned the LGBTQ pride flag on city property, would be represented by a progressive, gay Peruvian immigrant, the top Democrat on the U.S. House’s primary investigative committee.

And a game of musical chairs in San Diego and Riverside counties could pit longtime Republican members of Congress against one another as the number of winnable GOP seats shrinks. Several salivating Democrats have already declared they will run in the newly formed, Democratic-friendly 48th Congressional District, which Republican Rep. Darrell Issa currently represents.

High voter interest. In the weeks leading up to Election Day, voters in the typically low-turnout Central Valley proved that even though many Californians hadn’t heard of Prop. 50 by name, the redistricting issue was familiar enough that they could quickly form an opinion after learning about the measure.

The Yes side blanketed the airwaves with $55.4 million in ads featuring high-profile Democrats and had a significant fundraising advantage — more than double their opponents. The No campaign spent just $8.9 million in broadcast and video advertising, according to the ad tracking AdImpact.

Maya C. Miller and Jeanne Kuang cover politics and accountability for the non-partisan, non-profit newsroom CalMatters. Subscribe here.