IVN Editorial BoardTom Steyer ran the most partisan primary campaign in California — and got beat by the voters who are usually not there. That's the message from Mike Madrid to the Sacramento Bee.
June’s gubernatorial primary counted 9,446,461 ballots — the highest turnout for a California governor’s primary since the state started keeping records in 1914. The fastest-growing slice of that electorate? Latino independents, whose turnout is tracking near 16.5% — a roughly 40% jump over 2022, three times the growth of the electorate as a whole.
Madrid — author of “The Latino Century” — connects the dots: Latinos are dealigning from both parties faster than any group in the country, and none of it happens without the open primary that hands every voter the same ballot.
And they just changed the course of history in California.
Madrid calls efforts to close California's primaries: “voter suppression aimed at the fastest-growing share of the electorate, dressed up as a return to party order.”
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