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** Gaslighter-in-Chief: Newsom’s Redistricting Power Grab
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Dear John,

California voters will have the final say on November 4th over Gov. Gavin Newsom’s latest power grab: a constitutional amendment that scraps the state’s independent redistricting commission and replaces it with gerrymandered maps drawn by Democratic politicians.

Newsom never tires of warning that President Donald Trump is a “threat to democracy” — even as the governor works overtime in Sacramento to dismantle it himself. This week’s fight over congressional maps confirms what many Californians already know: Gavin Newsom is the state’s Gaslighter-in-Chief.

“Newsom threw a grenade into California’s nonpartisan and independent redistricting process,” said Lance Christensen, Vice President of Government Affairs at California Policy Center. “The people of California should not be held for ransom for the governor’s White House ambitions.”

Spurred by Trump’s call for Texas Republicans to redraw their congressional maps before the 2026 midterm elections, Newsom launched a tit-for-tat scheme to gerrymander five Democratic seats here at home. The difference is stark: Texas law permits it. California’s constitution does not. In fact, it explicitly prohibits it in Article XXI ([link removed]∂=&chapter=&article=XXI) .

How does Newsom propose to get around these constitutional prohibitions? He’s called a quarter-billion-dollar special election for this November to change the state constitution at the same time he’s offering take-it-or-leave-it congressional maps he hopes to have in place by midterms next June.

But California voters aren’t eager to greenlight Newsom’s gerrymandering just to cancel out potential Republican gains in Texas. Polling shows Newsom’s proposed initiative is deeply unpopular with Californians. “By nearly a two-to-one margin, voters prefer keeping an independent line-drawing panel to determine the state’s House seats,” according to polling ([link removed]) by POLITICO-Citrin Center-Possibility Lab, with support among Republicans and Democrats “roughly equal.”

“Just 15 years ago, California voters passed Proposition 20 to put an independent commission in charge of the state’s congressional maps. Now Gov. Newsom is running roughshod over that mandate just to ‘own’ President Trump,” Christensen said.

In 2008, California voters passed Proposition 11 (the Voters FIRST Act), which created the independent Citizens Redistricting Commission to oversee maps for state legislative and Board of Equalization districts. In 2010, voters not only approved Prop 20, expanding the commission’s authority to oversee congressional districts as well, they also actively rejected Prop 27, an effort to eliminate the independent redistricting commission entirely. Fortunately, the people saw past the propaganda by unions and other big government interests and voted 59-41 to keep legislators far away from the maps.

The 14-member commission — which includes five Democrats, five Republicans, and four members affiliated with neither of the two top parties — first drew maps after the 2010 Census, then again after the Census in 2020. The commission’s process is transparent and offers opportunities for public input at the local level.

The voter-approved propositions make it clear that districts must be drawn under strict criteria ([link removed]∂=&chapter=&article=XXI) : they must have roughly equal populations, be contiguous and geographically compact, not discriminate on the basis of race or language, and respect “communities of interest.” That means keeping together people who share “common social or economic interests,” such as those shared in an urban, rural, industrial or agricultural area, rather than slicing them apart for partisan advantage.

The maps signed into law by Newsom this week do exactly the opposite, and Democrats are gleefully admitting they are gerrymandering. In their playbook, any abuse of power is justified if it targets Trump.

“California Democrats already have a supermajority of the congressional delegation and state legislature, so the idea that they are splitting up communities of interest and other groups just so they can squeeze out more political power is really pathetic,” Christensen said.

The Legal Challenge

To get the redistricting maps on November’s ballot, Democrats introduced a trio of bills this week — ACA 8 ([link removed]) , AB 604 ([link removed]) , and SB 280 ([link removed]) — using a trick called “gut and amend.” For those not familiar with the sausage making that goes on in Sacramento, that’s when lawmakers strip out everything in an existing bill and replace it with something entirely different.

That way the majority party conveniently skipped the 30-day waiting period before lawmakers can act on a new bill, which is mandated by Article IV, Section 8(a) of the California Constitution.

The delay exists for a simple reason: to give citizens time to read, debate and organize around proposed laws. As CPC’s California Justice Center explained in a legal primer released this week ([link removed]) , shortening that period requires a three-fourths supermajority vote in each chamber. In 1962, the Legislature even asked voters to cut the waiting period to 20 days. Voters rejected the idea decisively, 61 percent to 39 percent.

That safeguard makes sense. The people deserve the time and respect to thoroughly analyze legislation and consider all the impacts such changes in law will make without it being rushed through the process. For example, AB 604 is 256 pages of census block numbers in each county and congressional district. Without a computer and a demographic data analyst, there is no reasonable way for the average voter to understand what the bill actually does. And even if voters were handed maps that represent that data in pictorial form, they'd have no idea why cities like Lodi would be divided up into 3 congressional districts ([link removed]) .

But Democrats ignored the rules, leading to a legal challenge by GOP legislators, who made the case to the California Supreme Court that the gut-and-amend approach violated the 30-day requirement. On Aug. 20, six justices — all appointed by Democrat governors Gavin Newsom or Jerry Brown — denied the petition, saying lawmakers “failed to meet their burden of establishing a basis for relief at this time.” The lone Republican appointee, Justice Carol Corrigan, did not participate.

Now that the governor has signed the bills into law, expect more court battles.

Who Drew the Maps?

Beyond the legal challenge, the big question at the Capitol this week was straightforward: Who drew the maps? And no, we’re not talking about Paul Mitchell, the partisan map maker who everyone acknowledges did the technical work. Who drew the actual lines? Who influenced the specific district boundaries?

Democrats on both the Assembly and Senate elections committees say it wasn’t them. Other lawmakers mumbled something about “the legislature” and made their way quickly off camera when pushed by the press.

“When I go to a restaurant, I don’t need to meet the chef,” said Assembly Elections Chair Gail Pellerin.

Christensen called the process “a complete travesty” in a story by the Daily Caller ([link removed]) .

“If it’s this difficult for legislators, including members of the election committee, to answer about who actually influences these maps, imagine how difficult it’s going to be for the average voter,” Christensen said.

The Price Tag

So how much will Newsom’s special election cost?

Preliminary county estimates confirm the statewide cost at over $200 million, explained CPC visiting fellow Marc Joffe on X this week. Based on the costs of the last statewide special election — the failed 2021 attempt to recall Newsom that cost just over $200 million — Joffe's own analysis ([link removed]) shows the true bill could exceed $250 million when adjusted for inflation. Even the governor’s Department of Finance at the time estimated a $276 million price tag ([link removed]) for the recall.

Knowing how often our state overspends (high-speed rail, anyone?), we can expect the cost to climb dramatically in the compact timeline to print and mail voter information to all 23 million registered voters in the state.

Why, then, is the majority party willing to dump a quarter-billion dollars (or more) into a vanity election while California faces years of budget deficits? And why should counties be forced to absorb millions in added costs when many are already drowning in unfunded pension liabilities?

Not to mention California’s long list of real crises — wildfires, homelessness, crime, failing schools, jammed freeways, and the state’s skyrocketing cost of living. Maybe the legislature should put that money toward making California a place businesses want to stay — especially after the CEO of Bed Bath & Beyond announced this week that the company will leave the Golden State because of its hostile business climate.

What’s Next

Barring any more legal challenges, Californians will vote on Newsom’s maps in a November 4 special election. That leaves just 74 days to scrutinize districts that were rushed through the legislature in a haze of gut-and-amend tactics and backroom deals.

The scramble was so hasty that lawmakers have already queued up another gut-and-amend bill for next week to patch mistakes in the law Newsom just signed. Meanwhile, the 16,000 public comments submitted this week to the legislature on the three bills were left unread.

Newsom has also set in motion a redistricting battle that is already spreading to other states.

“This whole thing has been about petty politics and power,” said Christensen. “It doesn’t serve Californians — it only serves Gavin’s ego.”

New Podcast ()
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** Radio Free California #403: Political Theater
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On this week's podcast with CPC president Will Swaim and CPC board member David Bahnsen: Gavin Newsom asks state lawmakers to dismantle the California constitution. Asm. Carl DeMaio has a plan to kill redistricting. Playboy quits California for a new home in Miami. Bonus! CPC visiting fellow Marc Joffe on the failure of public transit in California — and the near-term possibility of flying cars by 2028. Listen now. ([link removed])

More from CPC ()


** King Newsom Draws His Districts
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Gov. Gavin Newsom’s gerrymandering scheme not only disenfranchises independent and conservative voters in California, but all citizens of the state. Read the legal primer from CPC's California Justice Center explaining why the "gut and amend" trick used by Democrats to jam Newsom's redistricting maps through the legislature violates the California constitution and tramples on the will of the voters. Read the legal primer. ([link removed])


** ICYMI: Logging Saves Species and Increases our Water Supply
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When you suppress wildfires for over a century, then overregulate and suppress any other means to thin California's forests, you get overcrowded and unhealthy forests. CPC's Edward Ring explains why reviving the timber industry in the Golden State would improve the health of our forests, reduce the risk of “superfires,” increase water supplies, create jobs — and even help wildlife thrive. Read the article. ([link removed])
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