BAKERSFIELD, Calif. (KERO) — California is eight days away from the gubernatorial recall election on the 14th. 23ABC gives us a deeper look at data of who voted Governor Gavin Newsome into office in the 2018 election.
It was in 2018 that then Democratic candidate Gavin Newsome ran against GOP candidate, John Cox. While Newsome won the election with about 60% of the vote statewide, Kern County, which is traditionally considered a republican county in presidential and congressional elections, gave Newsome only 40% of the vote. He lost the county to Cox by about 36,000 votes.
According to the California Secretary of State’s election data for the gubernatorial election in 2018 70% of people in Arvin, Delano, and McFarland voted for Newsome with 59% in Wasco.
However, for the city of Bakersfield, data shows a majority voted for Cox with 56% while 44% voted for Newsome.
California City, Maricopa, Ridgecrest, Shafter, Taft, and Tehachapi also leaned toward Cox. But the highest percentage of votes for Cox came from the cities of Maricopa and Taft with about 80%. The race was closest in Shafter with 51% voting Republican.
But are voting trends may be making a slow change.
23ABC compared election results from both the gubernatorial races in 2014 and 2018. In the predominantly Democratic areas of Arvin, Delano, McFarland, and Wasco people voted for the Democratic candidate in both 2014 and 2018. However, from 2014 to 2018 the percentage of Democratic votes went down, and the percentage of Republican votes went up in all 4 cities.
On the other hand, in the Republican dominant areas three of the cities; Bakersfield, Ridgecrest, and California City remained consistent. Majority voted for the republican candidate, but by 2018 the percentage of Republican votes went down, and the percentage of Democratic votes went up.
The unincorporated areas like Oildale and Lamont stayed consistent and voted for the Republican in both elections.
So, 23ABC also wanted to look at how Kern County has voted in gubernatorial elections going back to 1998 and found that up until 2010, the percentage of republican voters steadily increased. Then around 2010, it dropped but, through 2018 the percentage voting republican has slightly increased and remained steady.
