Opinion: Ticket-Splitting Shows California Voters Don’t Always Back the Democratic Party

In the parlance of politics, “ticket-splitting” refers to someone who votes for candidates of both major parties. It bedevils political devotees as they turn out partisan voters.

In some states it has been discouraged by allowing voters to back all of one party’s candidates by pulling just one voting machine lever and making it difficult to opt for individual choices.

California is one of the nation’s bluest states with Democrats holding all statewide offices and huge majorities in the Legislature and congressional delegation. However, the state’s voters engaged in some serious ticket-splitting this week, implying that they are not as wedded to the dominant party and its ideological causes as widely assumed.

The state’s blue credentials were certainly evident in voting for the two top-of-the-ticket offices, president and U.S. senator.

Vice President Kamala Harris defeated Donald Trump by an almost 3 to 2 margin to capture California’s 54 electoral votes, a virtually identical margin to Congressman Adam Schiff’s win over former baseball star Steve Garvey in the Senate race.

However, a number of Republican congressional members who had been targeted by Democrats in hopes of recapturing the House were all running ahead of their Democratic challengers, albeit by very thin margins with many votes still to be counted.

Democratic strategists chose the districts because they had tended to vote for the party’s presidential candidates or had Democratic voter registration pluralities.

The dissonance was especially obvious in the San Joaquin Valley districts of Republicans John Duarte and David Valadao, both of which have Democratic voter margins of well over 10 percentage points. Nevertheless, both were narrowly leading their challengers.

With countless millions of dollars having been spent on congressional races, the bottom line is that despite the state’s overall Democratic bent, the GOP could retain some of its targeted seats and might even gain new ones.

Ticket-splitting was also evident in down-ballot issues, particularly voting for and against ballot measures with ideological profiles.

While about 60% of California voters were opting for Democrats Harris and Schiff, more than 70% backed Proposition 36, a measure that increases penalties for some crimes that the state’s Democratic leadership, including Gov. Gavin Newsom, opposed.

To punctuate the hardening mood on crime even more, two big city district attorneys who identified with the left-leaning criminal justice reform movement, George Gascón in Los Angeles County and Alameda County’s Pamela Price, lost their positions — Gascón to challenger Nathan Hochman and Price to a recall.

Likewise, Proposition 5, a measure to lower the voting requirement for many local bond issues from two-thirds to 55%, backed by Democratic legislators and their allies in public worker unions, was failing on Wednesday, with well over 50% of voters opposed.

Two other ballot measures reflecting left-of-center ideology were also failing or defeated: Proposition 32, which would raise the state’s minimum wage to $18 an hour, and Proposition 33, which would make it easier for local governments to impose rent control, was called early Wednesday morning.

While there are still many votes to be counted and the margins are thin, the overall thrust of this week’s election in California is that, while it’s still a blue state at least in voting for major offices, its voters don’t always march in lockstep with the dominant party.

California can be somewhat conservative, especially when it comes to crime and money.

CalMatters is a public interest journalism venture committed to explaining how California’s state Capitol works and why it matters.