A California Silver Linings Playbook

Tuesday’s election results were ugly. But they may remind old folks and history nuts of 1964, when Barry Goldwater suffered one of the worst defeats in American presidential history. Lyndon Johnson carried California by nearly 1.3 million votes, Democrats controlled Sacramento, and conservatism looked like a political dead end.

Two years later, Ronald Reagan – a former actor who had never held public office – ran for governor of California and defeated by 15 points the popular incumbent, Governor Pat Brown, a  Democrat. Ronald Reagan’s gubernatorial victory – followed by his presidency – helped transform American and global politics.

The point: The same Californians who buried Goldwater helped elect Reagan just two years later.

California’s obstacles today are formidable: overwhelming Democratic registration, powerful government unions, decades of one-party rule, and no obvious Reagan waiting in the wings. Add in sprawling government spending, campus violence and street chaos, and it feels like the 1960s all over again.

But Reagan’s gubernatorial win reminds us that political change begins long before Election Day, with people willing to challenge the prevailing consensus. That’s the work of the California Policy Center. Our donors make it possible, our allies carry it across the state, and ordinary Californians who refuse to give up on their state give it purpose.

Tuesday’s results were a setback for sound governance, but the work of a California Comeback continues. And we’re delighted to be building it with you.

You can read Tuesday’s bad news everywhere else. Let’s take note here of the wins, a kind of Silver Linings Playbook:

The Blue Tsunami Ebbs

If you read anything about Tuesday, you will “know” that a blue tsunami – a wave of Democrat wins from coast to coast – rolled across the nation. In fact, that wave weakened considerably by the time it came to three California propositions. California voters trash-canned propositions 40 (the wealth tax) and 44 (a shakedown of the healthcare industry); and those same voters doubled-down on their disdain for the wealth tax by voting yes on Proposition 42 – a measure that makes it more difficult (though not impossible) for unions to try the wealth tax again.

And not just in California: Nationally, lefties saw our Prop. 40 as a test-case. If it worked here, they figured, it would be rolled out across the country. They’ve likely learned a lesson. In killing Prop. 40, California voters did a patriotic service to all Americans.

SEIU’S Very Bad Night – and the Meaning of the Janus Decision

The Supreme Court’s 2018 Janus decision (the one that says governments can’t require employees to join a union) dealt a serious blow to California’s government unions, and especially the Service Employees International Union. SEIU is still feeling it – right in the babymakers. Nearly 50 percent of SEIU Local 1000 members have dropped out since 2018, with a commensurate drop in inflation-adjusted dues collections. That’s what your Wall Street guys and average citizens would call a “financial crisis.”

SEIU’s troubles now include its inability to control Dave Regan, boss of its healthcare affiliate. It was Regan who took two failed schemes to the ballot on Tuesday. His Proposition 44 would have imposed punishing financial penalties on nonprofit health clinics; his Proposition 40 would have taxed billionaires to pump billions into healthcare programs employing union workers. On Tuesday, California voters rejected both – Prop. 40 trails by about 10 points today; Prop. 44 is losing by a remarkable 82-to-18 percent margin.

Regan’s terrible 2026 isn’t over: A federal racketeering lawsuit alleges that he offered to drop Prop. 44 if health clinics helped him organize 25,000 workers, potentially worth $28 million a year in union dues. (Regan denies the allegations.) So, Regan spent some $40 million of his members’ money pursuing ill-advised ballot measures. He will now likely spend millions more defending himself in a federal court.

The Fable, Not the Rapper

A year ago, CPC policy analysts met over lunch with Silicon Valley billionaires eager to hear our thoughts on Prop. 40. What bothered the billionaires most, it turned out, what they simply could not grasp was “the betrayal”: over decades they had been so generous to some of the same progressives behind the wealth tax.

“I personally gave progressive candidates hundreds of thousands of dollars every year. How could they do this to us?” one of them asked.

“We get your pain,” we responded, “but you know the Aesop fable about the frog and scorpion.”

“Aesop Fable the rapper?” the billionaire asked. “No,” we said. “That’s ASAP Rocky.” We told him the story – a scorpion asks a frog to carry him across a river. The frog fears being stung, but the scorpion points out that doing so would drown them both – and that would be crazy. So the frog agrees to carry the scorpion across the river. Halfway to the other side, the scorpion predictably stings the frog. As they sink, the frog asks why: “Now we’re both going to die!” The scorpion replies, “It’s in my nature.”

“Wait,” the billionaire said, a new idea forming. “So, the progressives are the scorpion. And we’re the frog. F— that.”

Now, that lesson has been learned – and learned by some of the wealthiest people in the world.

A New California Coalition

Along with actual billionaires, the California Policy Center joined the fight to educate Californians on Proposition 40, drawing on critical research from Stanford’s Hoover Institution. We cannot say enough good things about Hoover economists Joshua Rauh and Benjamin Jaros. They challenged the union’s calculation that taxing billionaires would generate $100 billion in new state revenue; Rauh and Jaros concluded that the tax would actually lose California nearly $39 billion over time as wealthy taxpayers fled the state — and took their future income-tax payments with them. These groups had little else in common, but they agreed that California couldn’t tax its way to prosperity by driving away the people who help create it. Regan managed to unite people who might otherwise never agree on lunch.

Karen Bass Gets Mugged by the Reality of Government Unions

Socialist Nithya Raman beat incumbent Karen Bass to win the Los Angeles mayor’s job on Tuesday. That part is understandable: L.A. voters are a remarkably left-wing bunch, and given the choice of a competent Republican primary candidate, an incompetent incumbent, and a socialist, Raman’s win was widely predicted. What wasn’t predictable is Bass’s explanation for her four years of chaos: she blamed government unions. Wall Street Journal reporter Paul Kiernan says he asked Bass “what she wished she had known four years ago about how to manage the city as mayor.” Bass “cited the recalcitrance of the city bureaucracy.”

“We have 25 unions,” the mayor told Kiernan. “The bureaucracy looks at elected officials like, ‘I was here before you got here, and I’ll be here long after you leave.’”

Welcome to Conservatism 101, Ms. Bass. We hope you’ll stay for the rest of the course. 

A Fascinating Data Point that Emerged from this Campaign Cycle

The next time friendly liberals decry the impact of “corporations” or “the rich” on democracy, remind them of the role of California’s government unions. CPC’s Andrew Davenport tracks government union spending, and he concludes that – in this cycle alone – government unions wrote checks for an eye-popping $193,587,670 to political candidates, ballot measures, election PACs, the California Democratic Party and other Democratic-affiliated groups. (Because we’re conservatives, this is a conservative estimate. Actual spending will be considerably higher as Andrew studies the reports.) If your friendly neighborhood liberal is particularly hard-headed – if he or she resists the obvious implication of this fact – you could charitably observe, “Apparently, money corrupts democracy only when it comes from someone who earned it.” Somewhere, George Soros is wondering why he ever bothered to get rich.

THREE OTHER LESSONS FROM TUESDAY

Readers of a certain vintage will recall the 1980s battle cry of the left, “Think Globally, Act Locally.” The most important work you can do is to (a) think globally about the unimprovable/universal values embodied in the American founding, and (b) act locally by applying those principles to your local government agencies. Many of you already do.

It’s fun – even thrilling – to focus on the federal government, to follow the horse-race of nationally prominent races in Georgia, Kansas or Texas, for instance, or to be pulled into the vortex of war and rumors of war.

But let’s work where we live, shall we? And that’s a second lesson: if you hope to deal with the problem of a very liberal state government, it’s good to know that fully two-thirds of California’s state lawmakers got their start in local government – in county, city, schools or other districts. Working at the local level – attending public meetings, following news of your governments’ work, supporting or opposing candidates – is one way to make sure that bad candidates never get a foothold and that good ones are launched onto that path that leads to years of public service. Feel unprepared? Looking for good ideas? Consider joining our Parent Union (open to anybody who cares about California schools) and California Local Elected Officials. While CLEO primarily serves candidates and current local officials, it’s open to anyone who hopes to become a student of local government.

California Policy Center is here to help men and women just like you. And you can help us. Consider an end-of-year gift by donating here. Meanwhile, keep the faith.

Will Swaim is CEO of California Policy Center and co-host with David Bahnsen of National Review’s “Radio Free California” podcast.