A recall campaign to oust California Governor Gavin Newsom is approaching the threshold required to qualify for a statewide vote.
Over the weekend, the recall organizers said they collected 1.2 million of the 1.5 million signatures needed by March 17 to qualify for a vote.
ARCHIVE: California Governor Gavin Newsom speaks during a press conference at Veterans Home of California in Yountville, California.
(AP)
Under state law, petition sponsors must collect signatures for 12% of the electoral participation in California’s previous state election, which is about 1,495,709 names.
Rescue California, one of the two main groups that organize the campaign, says its goal is to collect 2 million signatures to explain the fact that many of the signatures will inevitably prove to be invalid.
The San Diego KUSI reported on Saturday that the California Secretary of State has confirmed that 84% of the signatures collected so far are valid.
CALIFORNIA IGNORES PUBLIC RECORDS REQUEST, KEEP CORONAVIRUS DATA HIDDEN
This is the sixth recall effort the Democratic governor has faced in two years. Once considered a chimera in the all-blue state, this latest recall effort gained momentum last year because of growing discontent with the governor’s handling of the coronavirus pandemic and its impact on the economy.
“It is absolutely gaining momentum. We are receiving petitions not only from Republicans, but also from Democrats and independents,” said John Cox, Newsom’s Republican opponent in 2018, who recently launched an exploratory committee to challenge the governor again in 2022, to Fox News last week. “It just went on for a long time – the bad management that accompanied this pandemic.”
CLICK HERE TO GET THE FOX NEWS APPLICATION
Public frustration increased in November, when the governor was photographed in the sophisticated French Laundry restaurant in Napa, amid the coronavirus pandemic.