Supermajority to the Rescue? California’s Democrats win a complex victory while opposition inflates expectations

By BRETT WARNKE

California liberals had hoped new supermajorities in both legislative chambers bring in changes to the trend of austerity that has monopolized conversations in Washington.  But the fiscal situation will loom heavy over their governance while political success came from factors other than rising liberalism.  And the growing fad of “fiscal accountability” will no doubt be used as a bludgeon against progressives who push for new or restored spending. 

Political shifts toward Democrats and demographic changes are rapidly underway at a time of great social hardship for most Californians, 6 million of whom live in poverty.  That’s 1 in 6.  Over the last twenty years the income for the top 1% of Californians has increased by 50%, that’s an average of nearly $1.2 million a year.  Meanwhile, income for the middle fifth has fallen by 15%.  Despite these numbers, the cuts to public programs that support the poor will come.  What happened in 2012?  And more importantly, can the new supermajority accomplish much considering California’s deep budget affliction? 

The 2012 state election was historic:  The new class is marked by the highest number (39) of freshman legislators since 1966 and because Democrats won a 2/3 supermajority, allowing them to pass tax increases without Republican support.  Many of the incoming Democrats come from swing districts and 10 incumbents lost, 7 in districts that had been heavily redrawn.  It is the first time either party has obtained the super-majority since the 2/3 threshold was established in 1978 and the second Democratic super-majority, the first one since 1883. 

Tenoch Flores from the California Democratic Party argues that the vote was a referendum on the Republican Party. 

“Democrats achieved a two-thirds majority by out-organizing Republicans and effectively making the case to voters that Democrats are better prepared to lead,” he said.   

But California underwent political changes that made the Democratic supermajority possible.  .  First, the supermajority was helped by term limits and a non-partisan redistricting plan that made districts more competitive.  In 2010, the state began using districts drawn by an independent commission instead of the legislature.  This reshaped the districts and reshuffled the political scene by increasing competition. 

California’s voters did pass Prop 30—a tax increase assumed in the budget that Democratic candidates supported and high Democratic turnout supported.  But it doesn’t add funds.  The state has already, under a Democratic governor, reduced spending in most areas including health and social service, universities, community colleges, the courts, and state administration.  Prop 30 simply prevented further cuts. 

UCLA Professor Daniel B. Mitchell is skeptical that the new super-majority will usher in a restoration of funding support or new programs. 

“Governor Brown doesn’t think so,” Mitchell said.  “Although technically a 2/3 vote could override a gubernatorial veto of more taxes that is very unlikely to occur.  Some of the Democrats that were added to get to 2/3 come from swing districts.  They aren’t going to vote for more taxes.” 

Many of the seats won by Democrats were not in comfortably liberal areas.  Instead, they ushered in moderate to conservative “valley Democrats.”  Also both parties will be looking ahead to the 2014 races which appear more Republican-friendly, whereas the fall 2012 fell in more favorable Democratic territory.  And while historic, Democrats should not get too overconfident.  Roughly 1/3 of the races were decided by less than 10 points. 

The second argument for Democratic success was the new “blanket primary” or “top-two primary” which allows all candidates to run in a single primary regardless of their affiliation and the top two candidates who receive the most votes advance for a runoff, even if they are from the same party.  Previously, voters had to vote to the party to which they were registered and candidates of that party now made infamous by the Sherman vs. Berman Democratic face-off in the 30^th district.  Yet, most incumbents won reelection in nearly the same numbers as before. 

“Under the new top-two primary and new legislative districts, those Democrats have to be careful not to lose voter support.  And even those in districts that are solidly Democratic under top-two have to pay attention to minority Republican in their districts.  That wasn’t the case under the old primary system,” Mitchell said.  

Thirdly, Governor Brown seems to have succeeded in getting more young voters to the polls by threatening to cut $500 million from higher education, which would have brought tuition increases.  Voters between 18 and 29 made up 28% of the electorate, an increase of 7% from 2008 and 13% from 1996 levels. 

Interestingly though, while appearing more Democratic with population swelling in the Bay area and southern California, the state’s voters are increasingly independent.  While Democrats once possessed 60% of registered voters, their numbers have dropped to 44%.  True, 38 of 53 House of Represenative seats are Democrats and while the party won their super-majority by remarkable wins in the 20 contested seats, 2014 races are more Republican-friendly and special elections in 2013 may open as members seek other elected offices before their legislative terms expire. 

Republicans, though, are taking a breath after devastating losses.  They have little power in government and one likely path will follow the McConnell opposition in the wake of a 2008 sweep—oppose everything and see what happens.  Currently, there are 400,000 fewer Republicans than eight years ago despite 1.6 million more voters; today, less than 30 percent of the state’s registered voters call themselves Republicans.  Steven Smith of the Labor Federation argues that Republicans are down but not gone.  “Everything the legislature does moving forward is going to be under the microscope and the Republicans are going to relentlessly attack the supermajority does,” he said.  “It is the only weapon left in their arsenal, try and publically attack them.  They don’t have much sway in the legislature anymore,” Smith said. 

Eric McGee, a policy fellow at the Public Policy Institute who studies policy and elections described in a web video the future prospects for incumbents and how future races in California will depend on a revision to a term limits law.  “Previously, there was no reason to contest a sitting assembly member or state senator since he/she would be forced to retire anyway,” he said. 

“Now, any new legislator can potentially serve longer.   Six years longer for the assembly and four years for the senate.  This might encourage potential challengers to throw their hat into the ring rather than wait as long as a decade for their next chance.  In fact, this logic already applies to congress relations where there have never been term limits.  But where competitive seats will most likely nurture the hopes of enterprising politicians in particular parts of the state.  In uncompetitive states, the top-two primary gives candidates a second chance to knock off the incumbent in the general election, even if they don’t win the first time” McGee said. 

A fourth factor in the victory is California’s rapidly changing demographics.  In 2012, the Democrats’ younger and Latino constituents went to the polls--1/3 of races were decided by less than 10 points.  And while once a bastion of the right wing—being the incubator for Nixon and Reagan—in the last twenty years California has become more reliably Democratic on the electoral map.  Part of the change has been an increase in diversity:  In 2010, 40% of the state’s population was White while Hispanics totaled 38%.  In thirty years, Asian-Americans, 73% of whom voted for Obama in the 2012 national election, climbed from 5% to nearly 13% of California’s population.  

The next chapter for Democrats will be the difficulties of governing with consistently bleak estimates for California’s budget.  Democratic spokesman Flores believes able governance will ensure reelection in 2014.

“2012 was the year voters decided they had enough of the Republican Party's slash and burn philosophy. In 2013, it's going to be up to Democrats to demonstrate that we can in fact govern responsibly and effectively and we intend to do so,” Flores said. 

The new legislature and Governor Jerry Brown will need to tackle a $1.9 billion budget problem in order to pass a balanced budget by June 2013 for the next fiscal year.   And while it is a “dramatically smaller budget problem” than the state has faced since the financial crisis, according to the Legislative Analysis Office (LAO), it produces a crisis of expectations for Democrats.  With little stimulus to the states, the financial institutions, households, and businesses have been forced to “deleverage” which requires saving and reducing consumption and further slowing hopes for recovery.

 According to the LAO report, the projected national recovery period is “much longer than for the prior recessions” because of the overall unwillingness to lend (and as a result) inability to spend.   According to Professor Raphael J. Sonenshein, executive director at the Edmund G. “Pat” Brown institute of Public Affairs at California State University, Los Angeles for California, a lot depends on the national recovery. 

“That recovery has another year or two to do,” he said.  “California will come out of it slowly when business conditions improve and there is less spending on catastrophic economic things.  My guess is that the state has another rough year to go, at least.” 

Democrats then will be in an unenviable position:  They will have to continue to cut while increasing taxes.  The conservative media is banking on either overreach or under-delivering on Democratic promises.  The Wall Street Journal’s editorial page is revving up expectations, in an editorial the paper argued that “the silver lining here is that Americans will be able to see the modern liberal-union state in all its raw ambition.” 

But despite the bugaboo of redistributive liberalism, there are few funds to fight over or be “ambitious” with, even with recent reductions in the state’s $2 billion prison payroll.  Governor Brown’s harsh cuts left prisons unable to adequately care for and supervise thousands of California prisoners and, overall, the combined number of federal, state, and local government jobs in California has declined—down 1.7 percent from one year ago. The bulk of the decrease is attributable to a drop of 35,000 jobs in local government educational services.

Eventually, according to Mitchell, “payroll taxes will have to go up since the state’s unemployment insurance fund is in trouble due to high unemployment.”  But Sonenshein, believes otherwise. 

“[Tax increases] are not an easy sell,” he said.  “If I’m a politician who wants to get reelected, I can’t be a lockstep voter.  I don’t see an appetite from the leadership to get tax increases.  Swing voters won’t matter for general policy.  There may be legislation where Republicans and moderates ally with the governor.”

Competence, according to Sonenshein, will be the measure of the next two years of the Democratic supermajority.  “2/3 or not, getting through this crisis would be a victory.  When you get this much power the question is:  Can you use it to govern effectively?  Getting a budget that adds up would be a pretty good achievement,” he said. 

Darrell Steinberg, the president pro tempe of the state senate says he wants to use the Democrats’ new supermajorities in the Legislature to reform the state’s taxation system and the initiative process.  Given the budget woes, according to Sonenshein, even safe liberals who are eager to restore funding after years of deep cuts will need to lower expectations and temper their rhetoric. 

“It’s just too risky,” he said.  “They’re not done cutting.  They’re not done cutting and they don’t want to raise expectations.  The metaphor I like to think about this is:  The patient didn’t die but he’s not yet out of surgery.”   

  Steven Smith, of the Labor Federation, argued in similar terms.  “Prop 30 helped stop the bleeding, but it doesn’t put the state on a path of fiscal solvency,” he said. 

One alternative to difficult tax increases is identifying additional revenue sources.  Several such sources include corporate tax breaks whose intended purpose is creating jobs.  The Labor Federation favors identifying and pushing legislators to eliminate them.  

Such tax breaks lack transparency and accountability and were often inserted at the eleventh hour in bills order to get Republican votes.   Also, the breaks often lead to big companies cutting hire wage jobs and moving to another part of the state to get a higher tax break and lower wages. 

“This is a lose/lose situation when we are subsidizing the loss of high-wage jobs,” Smith said.  “We don’t want to eliminate every tax break.  We want to put it to the jobs test:  If they’re not creating jobs, we need to eliminate them.” 

Labor hopes to re-tool other breaks like the Change of Ownership because it costs the state money and puts some companies at a competitive disadvantage to others.  

“We enter this next year with eyes wide open about the challenges,” Smith said.  “It isn’t like all of a sudden the sky opens up and we’ve got a perfect situation to pass priorities that have been reduced in recent years,” he said. 

Smith believes the labor coalition will not squabble over the spoils of victory—not just because there are few spoils—but because of Speaker John A. Perez and pro tempe Steinberg’s efforts at uniting a labor-activist coalition around voter priorities.  If successful, California may produce a useful model for governance maintained by a liberal-leaning environmental, labor, health and human service, and non-profit group coalition.  If unsuccessful, it will likely be a tale of underperformance, disorganization, and a failure of these constituencies to organize the public or pressure leaders who were elected for more rather than less government action.    

“There is going to be cooperation between the legislature, the governor and the constituencies,” Smith said.  “This will be done incrementally and it’s necessary to start that way because we are in a challenging budget situation, though, that doesn’t mean you can’t be thinking long-term about making those investments that I think we all agree need to be made,” he said.