Elections

Since 1911, when Progressive crusaders introduced the judicial recall, just four California judges had been booted from the bench by angry voters—until today. Santa Clara County voters favored ousting Aaron Persky, the judge who prompted widespread outrage in 2016 when he handed down a lenient sentence to a former Stanford University swimmer for sexual assault.  […]

The Democratic gubernatorial campaign of Antonio Villaraigosa is reeling from the news of a widespread problem at about a third of polling places in L.A. County.

Updated June 6 Lt. Gov. Gavin Newsom, a Democrat who gained national prominence with his early embrace of same-sex marriage and his unabashed support for marijuana legalization, easily won the top slot in the race to replace Gov. Jerry Brown. San Diego-area businessman John Cox, a Republican, won the second spot, defeating former Los Angeles […]

It’s Election Day, and social media will be flooded with all sorts of commentary as the results come in for local and statewide races. We want to make your experience less of a firehose, so the staff at CALmatters will be curating the best tweeted insights, reactions and updates from influencers on the right and […]

Gavin Newsom, who wrote the book on "how to take the town square digital," is holding his election night campaign party in San Francisco, metropolis to the tech world. So why is his campaign telling guests the event will have "no wifi"?

It’s election day—and a crucial test for five California counties experimenting with a new election method designed to boost anemic turnout: replacing local polling places with mega-voting centers and widely dispersed dropboxes.

There’s a lot to keep track of on the California ballot. Here are seven questions to keep in mind as you cast your vote and wait for the results to trickle in.

It finally happened. For years Republicans in California has been steadily falling as a share of registered voters. At the same time, “no party preference” voters—those who don’t align themselves with any political party—has been ticking up and up. This morning, the California Secretary of State’s office made the announcement: Those two lines finally crossed. […]

At stake in a California recall race is more than the short tenure of a state lawmaker. The fate of Sen. Josh Newman will provide an object lesson to politicians of all stripes on what happens to vulnerable politicians who take controversial votes—and how well parties and other interest groups can (or can’t) protect them from ticked off voters.

With California’s primary just days away, here’s a sampling of some of the players spending big to influence your vote.