Why It Appears California Will Reject a Proposition to Bring Back Affirmative Action

It has a lot to do with higher education.

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In June, California lawmakers felt that the time was right to end the state’s longstanding ban on affirmative action, created by a ballot measure in 1998, Proposition 209.  Rep. Shirley Weber, introducing Proposition 16, said “The ongoing pandemic, as well as recent tragedies of police violence, is forcing Californians to acknowledge the deep-seated inequality and far-reaching institutional failures that show that your race and gender still matter.”

Given the mood at the time—George Floyd’s death at the hands of Minneapolis police prompted protests around the state—as well as California’s liberal electorate, lawmakers could be forgiven for thinking that the odds of overturning Proposition 209 were very much in their favor.  

But California voters appear poised to reject the ballot measure on Election Day. One of the last major victories for conservatives in California looks like it will be upheld by an electorate that has shifted markedly to the left since it was enacted. Polls from the Public Policy Institute of California, a nonpartisan research center, show that only 37 percent of likely voters support the measure, with 50 percent against and 12 percent undecided. For the “yes” side, this is only a modest improvement on polls taken in September, which showed 31 percent of voters for and 47 percent against. 

It’s not for a lack of support from prominent figures. At the federal level, Kamala Harris, Diane Feinstein, and Nancy Pelosi have endorsed the measure. Gov. Gavin Newsom, who is very popular in the state, has also said he supports 209’s repeal. Some of the state’s largest papers (the San Francisco Chronicle, the Los Angeles Times, the San Diego Mercury News, and the Sacramento Bee) have also all officially endorsed a “yes” vote.

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  1. Avatar photo
    David Link

    Good piece. You neglected one relevant fact: Washington State tried last year to do the same thing: repeal their affirmative action ban, and it lost. I agree with your very solid analysis about inter-group dynamics, but I think the bottom line for most people is that they don't believe the spin. Affirmative action is a departure from equality under the law. There was a time when that was probably a necessary corrective, but that time seems to have passed. No one can credibly claim that Washington State or California are hotbeds of racism in 2020. Yet that is the premise of the initiative, and it feels less and less credible the more emphasis it is given.

    It's still possible Prop. 16 could pass. There are a lot of unknowns about who, exactly, will be voting this year, when registration has exceeded all expectations. The Washington proposal just barely failed last year. But whatever the outcome, I think it is a good sign that equality under the law is something that we all understand and cherish, and that equality of outcomes remains controversial as public policy.

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    rlritt

    Most people are against it because allowing hiring based on race, ethnicity or sex can work both ways.

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    Pat Riot

    This article's surprise and confusion has to do with tripping up on the words, "Democrat" and "Republican".

    Those words don't mean what they did even 10 years ago.

    A quick check on the demographics of the electorate shows that millions of well-to-do college-educated suburb dwellers--who used to define the core of the Republican base--are voting *Democrat* now. Meanwhile, white working-class non-college voters--again, the former base of the Democrats--are voting Republican now.

    The Democrats, meanwhile, have held on to a larger chunk of their old base e.g. non-white working class based on the GOP's embrace of Trumpism.

    So the articles thesis of, "erma gerd millions of flaming liberals voted down affirmative action" isn't quite right.

    People with **Conservative sensibilities** would vote down this proposition, and those people are a voting majority of Californians, it seems.

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  4. Ryan

    Excellent reporting! I was completely unaware of Prop 19, and this article does a very good job of explaining the immense complexities surrounding support and opposition to affirmative action policies

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    Alexander

    It is just mind-boggling that there is even a potential majority in California that would legalize state-sponsored racial discrimination.

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    1. Avatar photo
      David Chen

      Well there isn't given how big the margin looks to be (we'll see tonight). But it is mind-boggling (or maybe not at all) how out of touch the 'elites' are when they all uniformly support it.

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      Aylene Wright

      I wish the article had actually addressed the text of the Proposition 16 and not just glossed over it as "a bill to bring back affirmative action". The wording basically asks voters to repeal a law that prohibits both racial *discrimination* as well as racial preferences. I can easily get why many voters might be wary of doing that, even if on the surface, keeping the law in place might be against the immediate interests of their own racial or ethnic group.

      I'd like to think that not everyone looks at these issues as merely that of discrete groups with totally different interests perpetually fighting over who gets a proportionate share of the pie. Also, while the numbers may be different in CA, overall, only a minority go to college. So I don't think it's just about parents hypocritically putting their children's interests over their principles, either.

      There's also no interviews with the actual opposition, only outside political analysts. I agree with Miller that "a lot of people just have pretty nuanced and thoughtful views on this topic". Unfortunately, we don't hear from them in this article.

      Sorry if this sounds harsh. But I am because I expect better from the Dispatch. In contrast, the article about pro-life objections to treatments derived from research using fetal cell lines, actually started from an assumption that those who do have a moral objection are actually motivated by principle, not just tribal self-interest or partisanship.

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        David Chen

        I guess the counter-argument can be that spot-interviews may also be unrepresentative since you are just picking one person out of many. There's been very very long articles written about this from all angles so I don't know if the typical length of a TD article can really explain it. The opposition also appears far less organized and funded than the people for it so I don't even know if anyone can really speak on behalf of 'the opposition'. If it does fail by wide margins, I think the story is more about just how disconnected the 'elites' and the press is with the general public.

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    Kevin Johnson

    Thanks for this. One huge problem is the morphing or intentional manipulation of terms, a problem getting worse every day in the US. On this topic, “ affirmative action” initially meant steps to help certain groups increase their representation in colleges, jobs, contracts by outreach, remedial training, etc. It specifically excluded quotas. Over time, however, affirmative action has come to mean racial (and other) preferences which guarantee group representation, regardless of discrimination against individuals in non-favored groups. While the original affirmative action seemed fair to most, given discrimination against specific people, the new version of racial preferences and group rights does not seem fair, because it isn’t fair. Negative quotas against Jews in the past and Asian Americans today make clear to ordinary folks where Critical Race Theory (CRT) disparate impact, and other theories will take us if we don’t stop the left from pushing stereotyping and racism in the name of FIGHTING racism, sexism, etc. We now have the media saying the government is blocking “diversity “ training, when it is only blocking such training if it scapegoats by stereotype, and seeks to indoctrinate people in CRT. One can favor affirmative action, opening jobs and school slots to women and minorities, and basic fairness and still oppose what CA and many others want to do. We need to resist the left’s argument that stereotyping and racial preferences are OK...when THEY push them, and that those who oppose all discrimination are racists. The absurdity of CRT came out with Smithsonian document calling positive characteristics ( e.g. punctuality) white. The left long bullied people from objecting to such stuff by screaming “ racist.” Dr. Kendi has popularized an entire world view justifying stereotyping, group rights, and crass discrimination. We need to keep pushing back against this warped world view and work for fairness.

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