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  • Gov. Gavin Newsom, Kamala Harris rally Californians to vote on Prop. 50

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    Gov. Gavin Newsom, former Vice President Kamala Harris and a slew of other national and California Democrats on Saturday rallied supporters to stay fired up in seeking passage of a ballot measure to redraw the state’s congressional districts ahead of the midterm elections.

    While polling suggests Proposition 50 is likely to pass Tuesday, volunteers must continue knocking on doors, phone banking and motivating voters through Election Day, they said. Newsom told volunteers they ought to follow the model of sprinters, leaving it all on the field.

    “We cannot afford to run the 90-yard dash. You Angelenos, you’ve got the Olympics coming in 2028. They do not run the 90-yard dash. They run the 110-yard dash. We have got to be at peak on Election Day,” Newsom told hundreds of supporters at the Convention Center in downtown Los Angeles. “We cannot take anything for granted.”

    Hours earlier, Republicans spoke out against the ballot measure at John Wayne Park in Newport Beach, before sending teams into neighborhoods to drum up votes for their side.

    “What Proposition 50 will do is disenfranchise, meaning, disregard all Republicans in the state of California,” state Assembly member Diane Dixon (R-Newport Beach) said. “Ninety percent of 6 million [Californian Republicans] will be disenfranchised.”

    Prop. 50 would redraw California’s congressional districts in an attempt to boost the number of Democrats in Congress. The effort was proposed by Newsom and other California Democrats in hope of blunting President Trump’s push in Texas and other GOP-led states to increase the number of Republicans elected to the U.S. House of Representatives in next year’s midterm elections. But even if voters approve the ballot measure that could flip five California districts currently represented by Republicans, it’s unclear whether that will be enough to shift control of the House unless there is a blue wave in the 2026 elections.

    The party that wins control of the House will shape Trump’s final two years in the White House and determine whether he is able to continue enacting his agenda or whether he faces a spate of investigations and possibly another impeachment attempt.

    The special election is among the costliest ballot measures in state history. More than $192 million has flowed into various campaign committees since state lawmakers voted in August to put the proposition on the ballot. Supporters of the redistricting effort raised exponentially more money than opponents, and polling shows the proposition is likely to pass.

    As of Friday, more than a quarter of the state’s 23 million registered voters had cast ballots, with Democrats outpacing Republicans.

    Newsom was joined Saturday by Harris, Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass, Sens. Adam Schiff and Alex Padilla of California and Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota, Rep. Jasmine Crockett of Texas, other Democrats and labor leaders.

    Harris, in a surprise appearance at the gathering, argued that the Trump administration is implementing long-sought GOP goals such as voter suppression.

    “This fight is not about sitting by and complaining, ‘Oh, they’re cheating,’” the former vice president said. “It’s about recognizing what they are up to. There is an agenda that we are witnessing which feels chaotic, I know, but in fact, we are witnessing a high-velocity event that is about the swift implementation of a plan that has been decades in the making.”

    Several speakers referred to the immigration raids that started in Los Angeles in June and deep cuts to federal safety nets, including the nutrition assistance program for low-income families and healthcare coverage for seniors and the disabled.

    “We know there’s so much on the line this Tuesday. And a reminder, Tuesday is not Election Day — it’s the last day to vote,” Padilla said. “Don’t wait till Tuesday. Get your ballots in, folks…. As good as the polls look, we need to run up the score on this because the eyes of the country are going to be on California on Tuesday. And we need to win and we need to win big.”

    Padilla, a typically staid legislator, then offered a modified riff of a lyric by rapper Ice Cube, who grew up in South Los Angeles.

    “Donald Trump — you better check yourself before you wreck America,” said Padilla, who is considering running for governor next year.

    Nearly 50 miles southeast, about 50 Republican canvassers fueled up on coffee and doughnuts, united over the brisk weather and annoyance about Newsom’s attempt to redraw California’s congressional districts.

    Will O’Neill, chairman of the Orange County Republican Party, equated this final push against Prop. 50 as the California GOP’s Game 7 — a nod to Friday night’s World Series battle between the Dodgers and Toronto Blue Jays.

    “Orange County right now is the only county in Southern California that has a shot of having more Republicans than Democrats voting,” O’Neill said. “We expect that over the next three days, around 70% of everyone who votes is gonna vote no on 50. But we need them to vote.”

    Ariana Assenmacher, of California Young Republicans, center, organizes during a gathering of Republican Party members pressing to vote no on Proposition 50 in the upcoming California Statewide Special Election at John Wayne Park in Newport Beach on Saturday, November 1, 2025.

    (Christina House / Los Angeles Times)

    O’Neill labeled the measure a “hyper-partisan power grab.” If Prop. 50 passes, it will dilute Republican power in Orange County by splitting communities and roping some residents into districts represented by Los Angeles County politicians.

    Dixon also rallied volunteers — which included a handful of college students from across the state: “Be polite. Just say thank you very much. Just like Charlie Kirk would. Don’t [stimulate] an argument. Just be friendly.”

    “They’re squeezing out what very little representation Republicans have in the state,” said Kristen Nicole Valle, president of the Orange County Young Republicans.

    “We will not be hearing from 40% of Californians if Prop. 50 passes.”

    Randall Avila, executive director of the Orange County GOP, said the measure disenfranchises Latino GOP voters like himself.

    Nationally, Trump managed to gain 48% of the Latino vote, a Pew Research study showed, which proved crucial to his second presidential victory.

    “Obviously our community has kind of shown we’re willing to switch parties and go another direction if that elected official or that party isn’t serving us,” Avila said. “So it’s unfortunate that some of those voices are now gonna be silenced with a predetermined winner in their district.”

    Not all hope is lost for Republicans if Prop. 50 is approved, Avila said. A handful of seats could be snagged by Republicans, including the districts held by Reps. Dave Min (D-Irvine) and Derek Tran (D-Orange).

    “If the lines do change, that doesn’t mean we pack up and go home,” he said. “Just means we reorganize, we reconfigure things, and then we keep fighting.”

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    Seema Mehta, Andrea Flores

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  • Democrats face high stakes in New Jersey and Virginia

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    The two premier statewide elections this fall are Democrats’ to lose, but they have a lot to prove.

    Many Democrats won’t be satisfied with simply eking out a win — they are banking on resounding victories from Rep. Mikie Sherrill of New Jersey and former Rep. Abigail Spanberger of Virginia. The gubernatorial nominees, who are leaning into their national security pedigrees, are carrying the weight of a party’s expectations.

    The party is looking to them to springboard Democrats into next year’s midterms, with control of Congress up for grabs. They’re eager to show that 2024’s drubbing was an anomaly.

    “Democrats should be optimistic about these two races, but you know, the lesson from 2024 is we can’t take anything for granted,” said veteran Democratic strategist Simon Rosenberg, who added that President Donald Trump’s mastery of dominating news coverage runs the risk of drowning out his rivals’ economic messaging.

    After Democratic overperformances in local elections across the country this year, the party is bullish on their prospects. Recent polling has Sherrill and Spanberger leading their Republican opponents, Jack Ciattarelli and Virginia Lt. Gov. Winsome Earle-Sears, respectively.

    When pushed, operatives express more confidence about Virginia, and acknowledge maintaining their grip on the governor’s mansion in New Jersey for the third consecutive cycle presents a tougher challenge.

    National Democrats have committed what they called some of their largest initial investments in these states — $1.5 million each in New Jersey and Virginia — to boost Sherrill and Spanberger. A group backed by the Democratic Governors Association also placed $20 million in advertisements in New Jersey, around twice as much as the DGA-backed group did in 2021.

    The political climate in Virginia and New Jersey is far better than what they’re facing in some battleground races next November. But the fear of being toppled by Republican nominees in states where Trump gained ground is adding pressure to the Sherrill and Spanberger campaigns, as are looming questions of whether they can unify their fractured coalition that cost Kamala Harris the election.

    With two months before voters head to the polls in New Jersey and Virginia — and just weeks before early voting starts — here are some issues to watch.

    Economy

    Democrats are blaming Trump for rising costs as they emphasize affordability — an issue that catapulted him to the White House last year. If successful, that messaging is likely to serve as a blueprint for next year’s midterms.

    Rep. Rob Menendez (D-N.J.) argued that Sherrill’s focus on affordability will appeal to those who backed the president because he has “lied about every major campaign promise” regarding cutting costs.

    Democrats see this as a way to recapture Black and Hispanic voters, who drifted toward Trump in part because they viewed him as stronger than Harris on the economy.

    “Many of the voters, the Latino and Black community, were looking for possible change. They thought Trump would be that change,” said Rep. Nellie Pou (D-N.J.), who represents a diverse district that Trump won last year. “Sadly, he has not delivered on any of the promises he has made. He has not changed the economy, he has not lowered the costs. … I think the Latino and Black community will see him for what he is.”

    Democrats are hoping the Trump administration’s recent moves on tariffs and the One Big Beautiful Bill Act will sway voters in November. Republicans, meanwhile, are toying with how to market the megabill to voters ahead of next year’s elections.

    This election will put Democrats’ Trump messaging to the test. But while they try to convince voters higher costs are the president’s fault, Ciattarelli and his fellow Republicans say outgoing Democratic Gov. Phil Murphy and Trenton Democrats are to blame.

    In Virginia, Democrats are leaning into similar messages on affordability, arguing Trump has broken campaign promises on lowering costs since his return to the White House. The DOGE cuts, which are acutely felt in Northern Virginia suburbs outside of Washington, D.C., are paramount in the campaign as Democrats look to cast Earle-Sears as a cheerleader for Trump’s gutting of the federal workforce.

    The Trump Factor

    The GOP is hoping they can replicate the party’s success when Trump is not on the ballot — something that helped lift Virginia Republican Glenn Youngkin to the governor’s mansion four years ago. That red wave, however, was short-lived as Democrats successfully flipped control of the lower chamber of the Virginia legislature in 2023. Now Democrats are looking to expand their control of both chambers as well as usher in a clean sweep of all three statewide offices this year by leaning into anti-Trump sentiments.

    But the president’s impact is an unknown factor in Virginia. Earle-Sears has yet to receive Trump’s endorsement, which some Republicans are bullish would help her make up ground.

    An endorsement “would be a plus,” said Fairfax County GOP chair Katie Gorka. “I know that there are people, especially in Northern Virginia, who are not Trump fans. … But the bottom line is, Trump did really well for a Republican in Northern Virginia.”

    In the meantime, Earle-Sears is borrowing from his 2024 culture-war playbook. In a campaign ad released Wednesday, she labeled her Democratic opponent a “woke Washington radical” who “wants boys to play sports and share locker rooms with little girls” and will allow kids to change genders “without telling their parents.”

    The Spanberger campaign wants to remind Virginia voters that the Republican nominee, who advocated the Republican Party “move on” from the president just a few years ago, is now fully embracing Trumpism.

    In New Jersey, Trump endorsed Ciattarelli in the Republican primary. But it’s unclear if the president’s support will provide a boost among the general electorate, in which Ciattarelli needs to earn the backing of unaffiliated and Democratic voters to chip away at Democrats’ large voter registration advantage. Recent surveys show Trump unpopular with New Jerseyans, and Democrats are confident he will drag Ciattarelli at the polls.

    Ciattarelli recently told reporters he appreciates “that the White House isn’t taking a heavy-handed approach” with his race, but offered to “do anything” that Ciattarelli thinks “can help the campaign.”

    Ciattarelli criticized the president years ago, and Trump did not endorse the New Jersey Republican in 2021. But Trump now proclaims Ciattarelli as “100 percent MAGA” — something Democrats are eager to remind voters of. Ciattarelli argues that Democrats are more focused on talking about Trump than New Jersey.

    Who will boost Democratic enthusiasm?

    While Republicans can rally the base around Trump this November, Democrats lack that clear leader.

    When asked about whether a campaign appearance from Harris would benefit Sherrill, New Jersey Democratic Party Chair LeRoy Jones said he is focused on “utilizing the celebrity base in New Jersey that we have,” and cited Sen. Cory Booker and Newark Mayor Ras Baraka, the latter of whom came in second place during the June Democratic primary for governor.

    “We have a number of individuals that give that turnout prowess,” he said.

    Former President Barack Obama held rallies for Murphy and former New Jersey Gov. Jon Corzine, as well as Virginia nominees Ralph Northam and Terry McAuliffe. Though he hasn’t announced plans in either state yet, he participated in a fundraiser earlier this summer for Sherrill.

    At least one potential 2028 Democratic White House candidate, Maryland Gov. Wes Moore, is planning to campaign for Sherrill and Spanberger in the closing stretch of the campaign.

    Black and Hispanic voters

    Across the country, Republicans are looking to replicate Trump’s inroads with Black and Hispanic voters. New Jersey and Virginia will be the first post-2024 test of whether they are able to achieve that.

    In the primary, Sherrill had a lower share of the vote in areas with large Black and Hispanic populations, and some have warned that Democrats are at risk of continuing to lose those voters. Ciattarelli and Sherrill are working to engage those communities, and Sherrill recently got a notable boost with an endorsement from Baraka, who performed well in areas with large Black and Hispanic populations in the primary.

    In Virginia, Republicans tout their diverse slate of candidates, with a Black woman running atop the ticket, an openly gay lieutenant governor candidate in John Reid and incumbent attorney general Jason Miyares, who is of Cuban descent.

    Earle-Sears’ campaign also points to a recent $500,000 donation from Bob Johnson, the co-founder of Black Entertainment Television, as evidence she is making inroads with minority voters while picking up fundraising in the campaign’s final stretch. Spanberger enjoys a hefty 3-to-1 cash advantage, according to recent state campaign finance reports.

    Spanberger was forced to play defense after a woman held a racially divisive sign last month at a campaign rally targeting the lieutenant governor. “Hey Winsome, if trans can’t share your bathroom, then blacks can’t share my water fountain,” the sign read. Spanberger said in a social media post the sign was “racist and abhorrent.”

    Democrats counter that their own diverse ticket, which includes an Indian-born woman as lieutenant governor nominee and a Black man running for attorney general, better represent the values of voters of the state than their GOP counterparts. The party also vows their ticket will, unlike the Republicans, work to protect residents from the federal government overreach.

    “Folks aren’t fooled in this campaign,” said Lamont Bagby, a state senator and chair of Virginia’s Democratic Party. “When we needed them to push back on the Trump administration … they did not.”

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  • Can Biden Win a Primary He Ignored?

    Can Biden Win a Primary He Ignored?

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    As he stood on a frigid New Hampshire street corner on Saturday morning, Jim Demers was trying to persuade me that the fate of the republic hinges on today’s presidential primary—specifically, whether more people write “Joe Biden” on their ballot than fill in the bubble next to the names of his Democratic challengers. “This is an election like we’ve never seen before. This is one where democracy is on the ballot,” Demers, a lobbyist and former state representative, told me. “This is bigger than New Hampshire. This is about the future of America.”

    It all sounded a bit overwrought. The Democratic Party has declared New Hampshire’s primary “meaningless,” and no delegates will be awarded based on the outcome. Democracy might be on the ballot, but the sitting president and the party’s all-but-certain nominee is not. Biden declined to file for the election or campaign in the state because of last year’s decision by the Democratic National Committee to ditch Iowa and New Hampshire as the earliest-voting states in favor of South Carolina. New Hampshire insisted on holding its first-in-the-nation primary anyway.

    To Demers and a small but energetic group of party activists, the fight over the primary calendar is beside the point. As they see it, the results of today’s vote carry outsize significance—both to Biden’s viability in the fall and to the future of New Hampshire’s century-old tradition as a presidential proving ground. They are the organizers of the “Write-In Biden” campaign, a statewide grassroots effort aimed at offering the president a show of support—even if symbolic—to help him avoid an embarrassing result that could deepen Democratic worries about his electoral standing.

    Read: How Biden might recover

    Given the unusual nature of the primary, the line between victory and humiliation remains murky. But Biden’s backers want to see him easily hold off Representative Dean Phillips and Marianne Williamson. “We want to make sure that headlines the day after the election are ‘He Wasn’t Even on the Ballot, and He Won. That’s Amazing!’” Donna McCay, a volunteer who was holding a Write-In Biden sign in Hampton, New Hampshire, told me.

    Spending $70,000 over the past three months, Demers and a small group of operatives have mailed postcards, taken out ads, and issued yard signs instructing Democratic and independent voters how to cast a ballot for Biden. (It’s pretty simple: Fill in the oval next to “Write-In” and scrawl in “Joe Biden,” or even just “Biden.”) They’ve received help from a parade of local and national Democrats seeking to boost their own profiles in New Hampshire, but none officially from the Biden campaign.

    Over the weekend, dozens of New Hampshire Democrats packed house parties and braved near-zero wind chills to stand outside and hold up signs alerting drivers to the write-in option. Many of those standing in the cold were almost as old as the two candidates likely to face off in the general election.

    Polls in New Hampshire have shown a big advantage for Biden over Phillips and Williamson, but few people know what to make of them—incumbent presidents generally don’t rely on supporters to wage a write-in campaign on their behalf. One Democrat involved with the effort told me they wanted to see Biden crack 50 percent, which would match Donald Trump’s showing in Iowa, where the former president spent millions of dollars campaigning.

    New Hampshire is fertile ground for a campaign like this. Its population is among the nation’s most highly educated and civically engaged—candidates in New Hampshire like to joke that “politics is the state sport.” It also helps that Biden is not a particularly hard name to spell.

    Yet the write-in campaign is battling a number of obstacles in addition to Biden’s challengers. Anti-Trump independent voters, who can participate in either primary, must decide whether to back Biden or cast their ballot for Nikki Haley in the GOP contest. Biden allies argue that Haley’s chances of overtaking Trump are already shot. “You can try to game this process, but Biden is the only person who can beat Donald Trump,” John Carty, a Biden backer, told me. “A vote for Haley here might improve her showing in New Hampshire, but will it improve her chances of being the nominee? Most of us tend to think not.”

    Then there is the lingering anger over Biden’s abandonment of the state. When the DNC told the state’s party chair that its primary would be “non-binding,” “meaningless,” and “detrimental,” New Hampshire’s Republican attorney general sent the national party a cease-and-desist letter.

    Biden’s decision to stand by the DNC and skip the primary risks alienating constituents in a swing state whose four electoral votes could matter in a close presidential race. “It was a stupid political decision, equivalent to shooting yourself in the foot,” Colin Van Ostern, the Democratic nominee for governor in 2016, told me. “But I also vote for people I don’t agree with 100 percent plenty of times. And to me, it’s not complicated: Our democracy is at risk, and he is the one who can beat Trump.” (Both the Biden campaign and the DNC declined to comment.)

    Phillips has tried to capitalize on Biden’s absence, occasionally to the point of hyperbole. “What was done to all of you is one of the most egregious affronts to democracy I’ve ever known in my lifetime,” Phillips told a packed audience at a restaurant in Hampton on Sunday, drawing applause. “A write-in vote for Joe Biden is a vote for Donald Trump, because he will lose to him.” As he spoke, a family in the front row held up posters distributed by Phillips’s campaign with an image of Biden on one side under the word MISSING. The other side read, Joe wrote you off. Why write him in?

    Read: Dean Phillips has a warning for Democrats

    The showing for Phillips—more than 100 people crowded in, shoulder to shoulder—suggests that his campaign has some momentum. But the turnout might reflect as much political tourism as electoral support: Of the first dozen or so people I encountered, I found residents of Massachusetts and Connecticut, visitors from Denmark, and a student group from Macon, Georgia, but not a single registered New Hampshire voter.

    If nothing else, the Biden write-in campaign has succeeded in generating publicity for its cause; plenty of reporters and cameras trailed its volunteers and surrogates throughout the weekend. The risk, of course, is that a strong result for Phillips—a close second, say, or more than 40 percent of the vote—would seem more meaningful than it might have otherwise, making his candidacy more of a genuine threat to Biden.

    But the president’s backers were growing more confident as the election neared. Despite his snub of New Hampshire, general-election polling in the state has shown Biden ahead of Trump and in far better shape than in other battlegrounds. Some Democrats are hoping that a decisive win for the presidential non-candidate will put New Hampshire back in the national party’s good graces and perhaps even restore its first-in-the-nation position for 2028. “If Joe Biden has a good win on a write-in effort, that gives New Hampshire a whole new story to tell,” Demers said.

    As we spoke, more than 30 volunteers were holding up signs by the road. Some drivers honked in solidarity; others jeered in opposition. Representative Ro Khanna of California, a Biden surrogate, came over with donuts and kibitzed with the volunteers and reporters. Compared with the grand tradition of New Hampshire primaries, the display was enthusiastic but tiny.

    If New Hampshire’s show of support was so crucial, I asked Demers, shouldn’t Biden be here? “I just want the president to be here next fall,” he replied.

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    Russell Berman

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