63.8% of California voters approved this Tuesday the so-called “Proposition 50”, which changes the distribution of the districts that elect members of the House of Representatives. The Democratic governor’s proposal, Gavin Newsom, aims to strengthen his party’s options ahead of the 2026 legislative elections and follows a long tradition of what is known in the United States as “gerrymandering”.
This manipulation of electoral districts for partisan purposes has been going on for two centuries: as the old districts change their social, cultural and ethnic profile, the parties in power they balance them to maintain their majorities. The Republican Party did it this summer in Texas, with the public support of Donald Trump. This can be considered the Democratic response in the most populous state in the entire Union, with 39 million inhabitants. The second, not coincidentally, is Texas.
In a state with a long Democratic tradition, with the specific exception of charismatic figures such as Ronald Reagan or Arnold Schwarzenegger, who ran for the Republican Party, the victory of the proposition was predictable, but even so it has been celebrated as a great personal triumph for Newsom, which consolidates him as the great asset of his party facing the elections presidential elections in 2028. There, in principle, he would not have Trump as a rival, no matter how much the New Yorker insists on flirting with an unconstitutional third term.
Getting out of the Barack Obama loop
Now, for Newsom to lead the Democratic Party, he must first know what he wants to be when he grows up. The governor’s Instagram celebration is revealing: in a fictional wrestling match, it features big Democratic figures knocking down top Republican leaders. In the progressive ranks there is Newsom himself, there is the minority leader in the House of Representatives, Hakeem Jeffries and there is the charismatic Alexandra Ocasio-Cortez…but the one who defeats Trump is none other than Barack Obama.
No matter how much good Obama has done for the Democrats in the past, there are several experts who believe that one of the party’s current problems is that it has not quite gotten out of the loop of his presidency. Since leaving the White House, Democratic candidates have been Hillary Clinton -his Secretary of State from 2009 to 2013-, Joe Biden -his vice president from 2009 to 2017- and Kamala HarrisJoe Biden’s vice president. There are no new faces and, above all, there is no differential project.
Can Newsom represent that new project? Obviously, he has many points in his favor: first, his extensive political background. Newsom has been governor of California since 2019 and was previously mayor of San Francisco; In addition, he has been able to stand up to Donald Trump when the president took command of the California National Guard and deployed it in urban centers to help ICE in its fight against illegal immigration.
Newsom protested the decision in the media and in the courts and was not deterred by Trumpist verbiage, which insisted on justifying his decision with a false fact: since the Democrat’s arrival to the governorship, illegal immigration in California has not only not skyrocketed, but has been reduced. Just the opposite of what has been happening in Texas, by the way. Newsom was already in the running to succeed Biden when he withdrew from the electoral race, but the almost immediate election of Kamala Harris ended all hope.
Zohran Mamdani or the populism that came
That said, it’s not all advantages. Despite his recent dalliances with populism on social media, Newsom belongs to the “old school.” It is the complete opposite of, say, Zohran Mamdanithe other big winner on Tuesday by taking the mayoralty of New York against former governor Andrew Cuomo. Mamdani is an “outsider” of the party, a man who challenged the leadership as Trump did at the time and who represents a more radical progressivism with many nods to youth due to his extensive use of social networks and his ingenious promotional videos.
This dichotomy between radicals and centrists has been creeping into the Democratic Party at least since the times of Bernie Sanders and Hillary Clinton and it does a lot of damage to its electoral options… but it will have to adapt. There is a certain traditionally center-left electorate that views Donald Trump very favorably and even racial minorities, especially Hispanics, supported him in the last elections. Many legal immigrants are not only not shocked by the mass deportation of their illegal compatriots, but consider it a reinforcement of their status.
The Democrats not only come from losing the presidential elections, but they also lost control of the Senate and did not regain the House of Representatives. However, the most serious thing was that they lost the popular vote for the first time since 2004 and for the second since 1988. If Newsom wants to become the official candidate of the “establishment” of the party, will have to demonstrate that it can connect with the average American citizen, who is not the one in California, much less the one in San Francisco.
He will also have to stop populism, since it is clear that the “Mamdani effect” will spread in the 2026 legislative elections, with several candidates of that style. Winning in the two big cities on both coasts is nothing new for Democrats nor is it in itself a reason for great hope. It does mean, at least, avoiding cataclysm. Trump bet on Cuomo and lost. He bet against Newsom and lost too. Great triumphs are forged in small victories, but the road is still very long.