California Democrats control the governor’s mansion, every statewide elected office, both U.S. Senate seats, 42 of 53 congressional districts and hold a supermajority in both houses of the state Legislature. You’d think such electoral dominance would remove any need to further stack the process in their favor – but you thought wrong.

Perhaps the political class is paranoid because most California voters are not as far to the left as they are. Politicians know this and it’s borne out in most election cycles. In November, attempts to gut Proposition 13, reimpose affirmative action, allow 17-year-olds to vote, allow rent control and abolish cash bail went down in flames.

Now what we’re seeing is a pattern of trying to keep democracy out of the hands of the voters.

The most stunning example is Gov. Gavin Newsom’s apparently unconstitutional appointment of a U.S. Senator, when the U.S. Constitution’s Seventeenth Amendment states that vacancies “shall” be filled by an election unless the legislature empowers the governor “to make temporary appointments until the people fill the vacancies by election as the legislature may direct.”

Assemblyman Kevin Kiley, R-Granite Bay, immediately questioned the constitutionality of Newsom’s appointment of then-Secretary of State Alex Padilla to fill the vacancy created when Sen. Kamala Harris resigned to become vice president. Evidence that he was right comes with the introduction of Assembly Bill 1495, which finally creates the required special election, but not until November 2022.

“We’ll be electing someone to serve for a month,” Kiley observed. “Here’s the truly crazy part: Padilla will at the same time be running for reelection. So, on your November 2022 ballot you’ll see what looks like a printing error: a race for the same Senate seat will appear twice.”

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