The California Recall Election
For the second time in twenty years, California is holding a recall election for its governor. Like Gray Davis in 2003, the at-risk chief executive is a Democrat, Gavin Newsom, less than two years into his first term, former mayor of San Francisco. Unlike the successful challenge mounted by Arnold Schwarzenegger in 2003, there is no high-profile Republican candidate running to unseat Newsom in 2021. Rather, upwards of 40 little-known candidates have ponied-up to the electoral bar, from across the political spectrum, but Newsom is not among them, as the current governor is not allowed to run to replace himself.