Secretary of State Alex Padilla released the certified final results of the November 8 general election. Turnout among registered voters was about average of presidential general elections since 1976. (See below.)
The vote margin Clinton garnered over Trump is 4,269,978. The national popular vote margin is ~2.9 million, meaning California accounts for all of Clinton’s popular vote margin, plus an additional 1.3+ million. Aside from the District of Columbia, California led the nation in the percentage of votes cast for Clinton. The top 5 states for Clinton were California (61.7%), Hawaii (60.98%), Maryland (60.33%), Massachusetts (60.01%), and Vermont (55.72%). The lowest for Clinton was Wyoming at 21.63%. The coal message really helped Trump in West Virginia, where he garnered 68.83% of the vote in the once reliably Democratic state.
The national average of the popular vote for Clinton is (currently) 48.08%.
There were 14,181,595 total votes cast for President. There were 14,610,509 total voters, meaning the undervote was 428,914 (2.9%). Thus, despite talk of people holding their noses out of disdain for the two leading candidates does not appear evident.
The undervote in the U.S. Senate race was 2,666,549 (18.25%), which means that a majority of Republicans and conservative-leaning decline-to-state voters cast votes in the race between the two Democrats in the state’s first test of voter behavior in the top-two system among two candidates of the same party.
While 2018 will see lower turnout and a modestly more conservative electorate, the margin that Hillary Clinton garnered and voter behavior in the intra-party race, it is extremely unlikely the California Republican Party and aligned interests, particularly in the business community, will prioritize the statewide races in our next general election. For good or for bad, this is an extremely Democratic state now–the most Democratic in performance in this presidential election. That doesn’t mean it is the most Democratic state, but in performance in Clinton v. Trump, it was.
That means that the strong majority of Decline-to-state voters cast ballots for the Democratic presidential candidate. Also, as mentioned in the graf below, an overwhelming of majority DTS and Republican voters were willing to cast ballots for a Democratic candidate in the Senate race. That’s not good news for Republicans.
A big question for 2018 will be, assuming San Diego Mayor Kevin Faulconer is the on Republican in the top-two primary and the main Democratic candidates are Treasurer John Chiang, Lieutenant Governor Gavin Newsom, and former Los Angeles mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, do GOP and conservative Decline-to-state voters vote for Faulconer (who will be very under-resourced) or vote for the Democratic candidate that most appeals to their values?
- Turnout of registered voters: 75.27%
- Highest turnout of registered: Marin: 88.96%
- Lowest turnout of registered: Fresno: 66.73%
- Turnout of eligible voters: 58.74%
- Highest turnout of eligible: Marin: 78.91%
- Lowest turnout of eligible: Kings: 43.51%
- Historical turnout of registereds comparison:
- 1976: 81.53%
- 1980: 77.24%
- 1984: 74.93%
- 1988: 72.81%
- 1992: 75.32%
- 1996: 65.53%
- 2000: 70.94%
- 2004: 76.04%
- 2008: 79.42%
- 2012: 72.36%
- 2016: 75.27%
- Voting method:
- Polling: 42.21%
- Vote-by-mail: 57.79%
- Presidential:
- Clinton (D): 8,753,788 (61.7%); Trump (R): 4,483,810 (31.6%); Johnson (L): 478,500 (3.4%); Stein (G): 278,657 (2.0%)
- Bernie Sanders write-in votes: 79,341 (0.8%)
- S. Senate: Harris (D): 7,542,753 (61.6%); Sanchez (D): 4,401,417 (38.4%)