Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom of California won Sept. 14’s recall election, securing a solid majority to remain in office through January 2023, a loss for most conservatives and moderates who wanted a new governor.  

Nearly 4.7 million California residents casted their ballots, according to the Los Angeles Times. Democrats represented 2.5 million of the ballots compared to more than 1.1 million Republicans.

“I think it’s probably a blip in the radar,” world history and passion civics teacher Daniel Hunter said. “I think that overall, the governing party of California is probably pretty safe. Even if a Republican does become governor for a short period of time, I don’t see that causing a permanent shift in California politics.”

Recall backers initiated the recall election after garnering about 1.6 million signatures, primarily from Republicans, according to the Los Angeles Times. The source points out that Californians were frustrated with Newsom’s continuous stay-at-home orders, the violation of his own Coronavirus guidelines during his dinner at French Laundry and the rising homeless crisis. 

“Integrity is a huge thing that needs to happen, and more clarity. When Newsom enforced the stay-at-home orders and went out to French Laundry, he completely went against his own order,” senior Jaske Szerenyi said. “Second of all, in 2018 one of his biggest campaign promises was cleaning up the homeless population, but since 2018 that’s actually risen 24% even before the COVID economic crisis. He definitely needs to tackle that more.”

If it were successful, the recall would have potentially shifted California’s liberal ideology, as a Republican takeover would have made the state more red since the early 1990s, according to Mercury News.

“I think politics are always changing,” senior Christopher Stocks, whose mother voted in the recall election, said. “In California, there’s people that are becoming more reactionary due to the fact that they’re just not satisfied with how the system is so strict.”