{"id":10871,"date":"2026-05-30T14:01:29","date_gmt":"2026-05-30T14:01:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/siliconvalleymovingpost.com\/?p=10871"},"modified":"2026-05-30T14:01:29","modified_gmt":"2026-05-30T14:01:29","slug":"what-low-voter-turnout-in-california-means-or-not-for-june-2-primary","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/siliconvalleymovingpost.com\/?p=10871","title":{"rendered":"What low voter turnout in California means, or not, for June 2 primary"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

Primary elections, particularly during non-presidential years, don\u2019t generally drive oodles of folks to vote.<\/p>\n

Read more Election 2026: Orange County voters now have more options to cast their ballots in person<\/a><\/p>\n

This year is no exception. And even with a competitive race for governor, California is seeing lower turnout than would generally be expected heading into the week of June 2 Election Day.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s in part because of the Republicans\u2019 tendency to vote in person, on Election Day, particularly in the Trump era of GOP politics. Other voters may also be holding onto their ballots, deciding to put them in a drop box or cast them at a vote center because of uncertainty about when the U.S. Postal Service would postmark them.<\/p>\n

There\u2019s yet another factor driving down this year\u2019s early turnout \u2014 a tactical move on the part of some Democrats, said Louis DeSipio, an expert in electoral politics who teaches at UC Irvine.<\/p>\n

Among Democrats, the 2026 race for governor has been fluid. And, overall, the race has lacked a clear frontrunner; recent polling shows former Biden Cabinet official Xavier Becerra, a Democrat, with a slight lead, and two other candidates, Republican Steve Hilton and billionaire Democrat environmentalist Tom Steyer, battling it out for the No. 2 spot. But earlier, there was widespread belief that the two Republican candidates might lock the entire crowded field of Democrats out of the runoff in the fall.<\/p>\n

Couple that with the downfall of Eric Swalwell\u2019s campaign \u2014 he was viewed as a strong candidate until April, when he was accused of sexual assault\u00a0(allegations he denies), dropped out of the race and resigned from Congress \u2014 and Democrats may be waiting to see which candidate has the best chance to be in the race come Election Day.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat said, I think other voters may have sort of just slowed their decision to vote generally because they were underwhelmed with the field,\u201d DeSipio said. \u201cCertainly some people have had some interesting ideas, but there wasn\u2019t a clear frontrunner who was an easy person to get behind.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n<\/div>\n

Diving into the data<\/h4>\n

Out of the more than 23.3 million 2026 primary ballots sent to California\u2019s registered voters, only 3 million had been cast as of Friday afternoon, an early turnout rate of nearly 13%, according to the latest available .<\/p>\n

Locally, the early turnout numbers were mixed: about 9% (530,000) in Los Angeles County; about 16% (307,000) in Orange County; about 15% (217,000) in Riverside County, and about 11.5% (138,000) in San Bernardino County.<\/p>\n

\u201cStatewide, in a primary, turnout is going to be really important,\u201d said Christian Grose, an expert on electoral behavior who teaches at USC. \u201cAnd what\u2019s interesting to me about this one is turnout is relatively low so far, based on the votes that have already been tabulated.\u201d<\/p>\n

And aside from the political reasons why voters may be clutching their ballots longer, Grose pointed to the sheer length of the ballots in this primary. Orange County printed its longest ballot ever, at 17 inches. The county\u2019s Registrar of Voters, Bob Page, said it was needed in order to get all 61 gubernatorial candidates on one page.<\/p>\n

\n<\/div>\n

But it\u2019s not just the number of people running for that job. There are open seats for a slate of other statewide executive offices, including lieutenant governor, insurance commissioner and state superintendent of public instruction, to name a few, and the lack of incumbents has driven up the number of candidates.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s a ton of down ballot elections that people just don\u2019t know who the candidates are,\u201d Grose said.<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd then the congressional districts, too, having been redrawn, some voters probably have new people they\u2019re thinking about.\u201d<\/p>\n

Grose added that, in some elections, when people don\u2019t have what they view as enough information, \u201cthey don\u2019t end up showing up.\u201d<\/p>\n

A jungle\u2019s future<\/h4>\n

Aside from choosing candidates, this primary might be paving the way for voters to decide if California\u2019s way of, well, voting, should stay.<\/p>\n

Read more Temecula\u2019s \u2018smart freeway\u2019 project launches to attack 15 Freeway traffic<\/a><\/p>\n

This month, a bipartisan pair of political strategists launched an effort to reform California\u2019s \u201cjungle primary\u201d system, in which the top two vote-getters in the primary advance to the November general election, regardless of party affiliation. The move came in the wake of Democrats\u2019 concerns that the system might shut out their side \u2014 which has had as many as eight seemingly well-financed candidates versus the GOP\u2019s big two, Hilton and Riverside County Sheriff Chad Bianco \u2014 in November.<\/p>\n

California\u2019s way of determining which two candidates move from a primary to a general election \u2014 the result of Proposition 14 in 2010 \u2014 is uncommon. Voters approved the jungle primary, which was pushed by then-Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, after it was billed as a way to give moderate candidates in each party a greater chance of advancing.<\/p>\n

But backers of the new initiative say the jungle primary concept has not panned out as intended, and instead often creates political situations they describe as \u201cunfair.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cOver the years, I\u2019ve seen the consequences of it (the top-two primary system), legislative districts with two Democrats running in a district that\u2019s overwhelmingly Republican, and vice versa,\u201d said veteran Sacramento-based Democratic strategist Steven Maviglio.<\/p>\n

Grose, at USC, doesn\u2019t expect the effort to succeed, particularly if a Republican and a Democrat advance out of the gubernatorial primary. In that case, he suggested, the issue of fairness \u201cwon\u2019t have the same resonance.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd even if it\u2019s a Democrat and a Democrat,\u201d he added. \u201cIt would lead to Republicans not liking the system, but I\u2019m not sure how Democratic voters might respond. Voters might like two Democrats on the ballot.\u201d<\/p>\n

Focusing on the issues<\/h4>\n

The lack of a frontrunner for governor has led to at least one net positive for voters, experts say: A lot of ideas.<\/p>\n

A seeming marathon of debates among the leading contenders for governor was held right around the time that ballots were hitting mailboxes. Candidates talked about a wide range of political issues in California \u2014 ranging from affordability and homelessness to immigration, taxes and more.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat\u2019s a good thing,\u201d DeSipio said.<\/p>\n

\u201cSome of the debates sort of descended into personal attacks. But at the beginning, there was some effort to talk about things that were actually bothering people in the state.\u201d<\/p>\n

Still, DeSipio isn\u2019t optimistic that the trend will continue in the fall should a Republican and Democrat advance.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey\u2019ll go back to the traditional Democrat versus Republican kind of conversation,\u201d he predicted.<\/p>\n

\u201cBut that\u2019s too bad because the debates did expose you to different ideas.\u201d<\/p>\n

A look at history<\/h4>\n

In the 2022 primary \u2014 another non-presidential election year \u2014 .<\/p>\n

Fast forward to March 2024, a presidential election year, and the primary turnout only increased slightly, to just under 35%.<\/p>\n

But in June 2016, amid a tense battle for the Democratic presidential nomination between Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders, 47.7% of California\u2019s registered voters participated in the primary election.<\/p>\n

The highest participation among registered voters came in the June 1976 presidential primary, when 72.6% of registered voters in the state cast a ballot.<\/p>\n

That was, of course, an election where California primary voters chose two of their governors to lead the top of the ticket: Ronald Reagan on the Republican side, and Jerry Brown for the Democrats. Neither wound up winning their party\u2019s nomination that year. Republicans eventually went with incumbent President Gerald Ford, and Democrats chose Jimmy Carter, who would win.<\/p>\n

Read more Tough advice for property owners is key to being a successful adviser<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Even with a competitive race for governor, California is seeing lower turnout than would generally be expected heading into the week of June 2 Election Day.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":10870,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[43,2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-10871","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-based-on-facts-either-observed-and-verified-directly-by-the-reporter-or-reported-and-verified-from-knowledgeable-sources","category-news"],"yoast_head":"\nWhat low voter turnout in California means, or not, for June 2 primary - Silicon Valley Moving Post<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/siliconvalleymovingpost.com\/?p=10871\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"What low voter turnout in California means, or not, for June 2 primary - 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