San Diego Registered Voters to Receive Mail Ballot for Gubernatorial Recall Election

The Registrar of Voters is alerting all active registered voters in San Diego County that they will soon receive a ballot in the mail for the California Gubernatorial Recall Election.

Ballots will be mailed the week of Aug. 16 for the Sept. 14 election. It will give voters a month to fill them out.

The election comes after the California secretary of state certified the recall effort against Newsom collected enough verified signatures to initiate the special election, with more than 1.7 million people backing the measure, according to a press release. 

How to Vote

Voters can return their ballot in the mail, no postage necessary, or at one of the mail ballot drop-off locations in the county.

The county will also have in-person voting locations across the county for four days. From Saturday, Sept. 11 through Monday, Sept. 13 the polls will be open from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. On Election Day, the hours will change to 7 a.m. to 8 p.m. at the in-person voting locations and the Registrar's office.

Voters can also take advantage of early voting starting Aug. 16 at the Registrar’s office. It will be open from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Friday.

Voters are encouraged to check their voter registration information by visiting the county's website and making sure their information is up to date.

Those who have moved or changed their name must re-register to vote.

Those who are first-time voters must also be registered to vote in the upcoming election.

What Will the Recall Ballot Look Like?

The recall ballot will have two parts.

In the first part, voters would have the option to vote “yes” or “no” to the question of whether to remove the Governor from office.

In the second part, the voter would have an opportunity to select a replacement candidate. If more than 50% of voters vote to recall the Governor, then the replacement candidate with the most votes would be elected.

Who is on the Recall Ballot?

California released a list of 41 candidates running in the recall election targeting Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom.

The lineup of candidates runs from the famous to the anonymous and includes 21 Republicans, eight Democrats, one Libertarian, nine independents and two Green Party members.

A certified list — the one voters will see — will be released Wednesday and changes are possible. According to the secretary of state's office, candidates who have filed the required paperwork include:

• Kevin Faulconer, 54, is a Republican who was twice elected mayor of Democratic-leaning San Diego and left office last year. He was an early entrant in the recall race and has long been seen as a potential statewide candidate, given his centrist credentials in strongly Democratic California. He’s presented himself as a problem-solver who can work across the political aisle and has touted his work keeping homeless encampments off streets while they spread unchecked in Los Angeles and San Francisco.
• Caitlyn Jenner, 71, is a lifelong Republican trying to parlay her celebrity into a surprise win. She won the men's decathlon gold medal at the 1976 Olympics, married into the Kardashian family and with them became reality TV stars, and then came out as a transgender woman in 2015. She has described herself as a fiscal conservative who is liberal on social issues. But she’s proven gaffe-prone in interviews and a sprinkle of polling has suggested she’s no Arnold Schwarzenegger, who used the power of his celebrity to become California governor in a 2003 recall election.
• John Cox, 66, was the Republican nominee for governor in 2018 and lost to Newsom in a landslide. This time around the multimillionaire businessman has displayed a showman’s instincts, campaigning at one point with a Kodiak bear to show he wants to make “beastly” changes to California. He’s long sought public office. Starting in 2000, Cox ran for the U.S. House and twice for the U.S. Senate in his old home state of Illinois, but fell short in crowded Republican primaries. He also ran a largely unnoticed campaign for the 2008 Republican presidential nomination.

To view a full list, click here.

Radio Host Larry Elder Not on List of CA Recall Candidates

According to the Secretary of State's Office, there have been 54 efforts to recall California governors since the power was put in the state constitution in 1911. Only one succeeded: Gov. Gray Davis was recalled in 2003 and was replaced by Arnold Schwarzenegger.