Ballotpedia's Mid-Year Recall Report (2018)

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Recall elections in 2018: Mid-year report
Statistics
225 targeted officials 155 separate recall efforts
Notable recalls
California Santa Clara County Alvord Unified School District Nevada

June 15, 2018
By Ballotpedia staff

Recall efforts targeting state legislators in California and Nevada made national headlines through the first half of 2018. During that time, Ballotpedia covered a total of 155 recall efforts against 225 officials from January 1 through June 14, 2018. Of those recall efforts, 12 percent were approved, 14 percent were defeated, 36 percent did not make it to the ballot, 31 percent remained underway, and the remaining percent were either scheduled for the ballot or the targeted official resigned. City council officials and school board members drew the most recall petitions during the first half of 2018.

In California, a Democratic state senator was voted out of office after he voted to increase the state's gas tax. In Nevada, support of sanctuary city legislation was one of the reasons given for an effort to recall two Democratic state senators, but those efforts were halted when a judge ruled that the recalls did not qualify for the ballot after petition signatories filed to have their names removed.

The state senate recall was not the only successful recall in California. The state had the highest number of officials targeted for recall in the first six months of 2018 with 50. Here were two other noteworthy recalls in the state:

• In the first successful judicial recall in the United States in more than 40 years, Judge Aaron Persky was removed from his position on the Superior Court of Santa Clara County. Persky was targeted for recall after sentencing Stanford student Brock Turner to six months in prison on sexual assault charges, which recall supporters said was too lenient.
• Voters in the Alvord Unified School District recalled school board member Joseph Barragan. The recall effort began after Barragan allegedly posted comments on his Facebook page that recall supporters called racist. Recall supporters said the posts brought fear and negativity to the district community. Barragan said he did not write the comments and that they came from copycat accounts that used his image. Unlike the Democratic state legislators targeted in 2018, Barragan identified as a Republican. He said the effort to recall him started after he attended President Donald Trump's (R) inauguration.

What exactly happens in a recall election? Staff Writer Elisabeth Moore gives a 2-minute overview, including what it means and which officials can be recalled View other episodes here.

Statistics

From January 1, 2018, through June 14, 2018, Ballotpedia covered a total of 155 recall efforts against 225 officials. Efforts against 70 of those officials remain ongoing. Recall attempts targeting 82 officials did not make it to the ballot and are marked as "Unsuccessful" on the chart. Of the 60 officials whose recalls made it to the ballot, 28 were recalled and 32 survived the attempt. Five other officials resigned before their recalls could go to a vote. A breakdown of the various recall outcomes is displayed in the chart below:

City council officials drew the focus of more recall petitions than any other group in the first half of 2018. A total of 74 city council members faced recall campaigns while school board members faced the second-most with 61. Recalls were also sought for 28 mayors and 30 special district board members. In state government, a total of four legislators faced recall efforts. A breakdown of the various recall targets is displayed in the chart below:

Targets by state

California led the way in officials targeted for recall with 54 through June 14, 2018. Michigan followed with 42 officials facing recall. To view the number of recalls in a particular state, hover your mouse cursor over that state:

When adjusted for state population using the U.S. Census Bureau's July 2017 population estimates, North Dakota emerges as the recall leader with 0.66 recalls per 100,000 residents. It is followed by Idaho (0.64 recalls per 100,000 residents) and Maine (0.52 recalls per 100,000 residents).

Notable recalls

Josh Newman recall, California State Senate

See also: Josh Newman recall, California State Senate (2018)

California State Senator Josh Newman (D)

California state Sen. Josh Newman (D) was recalled from the Orange County-based Senate District 29 on June 5, 2018, and replaced by former Assemblywoman Ling Ling Chang (R). About 59 percent of voters chose to recall him, and 34 percent voted for Chang as his replacement. Newman was the fifth California state legislator recalled since 1913 and the first since Assemblywoman Doris Allen (R), also of Orange County, was recalled in 1995.

Republican activist Carl DeMaio targeted Newman for recall in April 2017 after he voted to increase the state's gas tax. The state GOP and Republican-affiliated groups like Reform California and the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association began a signature-gathering effort against him and reached enough signatures to trigger a recall by late August 2017. Democrats in the state legislature passed legislation that resulted in the recall election being delayed until June 5 and argued that the signature gatherers had used deceptive methods. Republicans argued that moving the election to June 5, the same day as the statewide primary, was intended to help Newman survive the recall because Democratic turnout was expected to be higher.

Newman's recall ended Democrats' two-thirds majority in the California State Senate, although resignations by Democratic members accused of sexual harassment had already made the status of the party's supermajority uncertain since the end of 2017. When DeMaio first announced the recall, he said he wanted to end the supermajority because that is the voting power required to increase taxes in the state. He also said Newman was being targeted before other Democrats because he won his 2016 election, also against Chang, by fewer than 2,500 votes. Chang will hold the seat until Newman's original term expires in late 2020.

Aaron Persky recall, Santa Clara County Superior Court

See also: Aaron Persky recall, Santa Clara County, California (2018)

Santa Clara County Superior Court Judge Aaron Persky

Judge Aaron Persky was recalled from his position on the Superior Court of Santa Clara County, California, on June 5, 2018, and replaced by attorney Cindy Seeley Hendrickson. About 59 percent of voters chose to recall Persky and 69 percent chose Hendrickson as his replacement. Persky was targeted for recall after sentencing Stanford student Brock Turner to six months in prison on sexual assault charges, which recall supporters said was too lenient. His recall was the first successful judicial recall in the country since 1977 and the first to make the ballot since 1982. The last time a California judge was successfully recalled was 1932.

The Brock Turner case attracted national attention after the victim's personal impact statement was published by news outlets such as BuzzFeed and The Independent. Turner had been found laying on top of the unconscious victim on Stanford's campus in January 2015. He was found guilty of three felonies: assault with intent to commit rape of an intoxicated woman, sexually penetrating an intoxicated person with a foreign object, and sexually penetrating an unconscious person with a foreign object. Persky sentenced him to six months in county jail, three years of probation, and registration as a sex offender. Prosecutors requested a sentence of six years in state prison, probation officers recommended six months in county jail, and Turner asked for four months in jail.

Supporters of Persky's recall, led by Stanford professor Michele Landis Dauber and supported by national politicians such as U.S. Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.), said the six-month sentence was too lenient and that Persky had a pattern of ruling in favor of white male athletes accused of violence against women. Opponents of the recall, including a number of former judges and newspapers in the San Francisco area, argued that recalling Persky would violate principles of judicial independence and possibly lead to greater pressure on judges to hand out harsh sentences, which they said would disproportionately impact people of color.

Joseph Barragan recall, Alvord Unified School District

See also: Joseph Barragan recall, Alvord Unified School District, California (2018)

Alvord Unified school board member Joseph Barragan

A recall election seeking to remove Joseph Barragan from his position as the nonpartisan Trustee Area 2 representative on the Alvord Unified School District Board of Education in California was approved by voters on June 5, 2018. Lizeth Vega was elected to replace him.

The Committee to Recall Barragan began the effort after Barragan allegedly posted comments on his Facebook page that the committee called racist. Barragan said he did not write the comments and that they came from copycat accounts that used his image. He also said the recall was politically motivated and that the effort started after he attended President Donald Trump's (R) inauguration. Recall supporters said the posts brought fear and negativity to their community.

A police investigation into death threats against Barragan examined all posts sent from his account between January 1, 2017, and March 1, 2017. The officer in charge of the investigation said that in the course of that examination the police concluded Barragan had not made any racist comments. Recall supporters criticized the scope of the investigation.

Barragan joined the other four members of the board when he was sworn into office on December 8, 2016. He filed to run in the general election scheduled for November 8, 2016, but the election was canceled due to a lack of opposing candidates. He was automatically appointed to the position for a four-year term.

Nevada State Senate recalls

See also: Nevada State Senate recalls, 2018

Sen. Joyce Woodhouse (D-5)

An effort to recall two sitting Nevada state senators—Sen. Joyce Woodhouse (D) and Sen. Nicole Cannizzaro (D)—failed to make the ballot in 2018. A recall campaign against another state senator, Sen. Patricia Farley (nonpartisan), failed to make the ballot in November 2017. On April 18, 2018, Judge Jerry Wiese ruled that the recalls against Woodhouse and Cannizzaro failed to qualify for the ballot. Wiese's ruling came after Nevada Democrats filed a lawsuit that argued that thousands of recall petition signatures should be removed because those signatories had filed to have their names removed. More than 2,300 people were removed from the recall petitions after Judge Wiese ruled on March 15, 2018, that they could withdraw their names. After a recount of the signatures, each recall was found to have an insufficient number of valid signatures. The Woodhouse recalls fell short by 196 signatures with a total of 14,216 signatures were needed. In the Cannizzaro recall, 14,469 signatures were needed and it fell short of qualifying for the ballot by 506 signatures. In May 2018, supporters of the Woodhouse and Cannizzaro recalls filed a notice in court that they were appealing Jerry Wiese's decision to the Nevada Supreme Court.

Sen. Nicole Cannizzaro (D-6)

The recall petitions for Cannizzaro and Woodhouse did not give an official reason for either recall. The Cannizzaro recall sought to replace her with Republican April Becker. Woodhouse was targeted for recall over her support of sanctuary city legislation, according to the Nevada Independent. The recall organizers sought to replace Woodhouse with Carrie Buck (R). Of the 11 Nevada State Senate seats up for election in 2018, Democrats hold four seats, Republicans hold six seats, and one seat belongs to a nonpartisan member. Overall, the 21 seats on the state senate are held by 10 Democrats, 8 Republicans, and one independent with two vacancies. Sen. Cannizzaro represents a district that voted for Hillary Clinton (D) in 2016 by 50 percent to Donald Trump’s 45 percent. Sen. Woodhouse represents a district that voted for Hillary Clinton (D) in 2016 by 48 percent to 46 percent. Neither Cannizzaro’s or Woodhouse’s seats are up for election again until 2020. Democrats won control of both the Nevada State Senate and the Nevada State Assembly in the 2016 general election, which broke the Republican trifecta previously held in the state.

See also

• Recall overview
• Political recall efforts
• Political recall efforts, 2018
• Laws governing recall
• Ballotpedia's 2017 Recall Analysis
• Ballotpedia's 2018 Recall Analysis