In the heart of Los Angeles, a team of canvassers tirelessly knocks on doors, asking voters to let California redraw its electoral map to favor Democrats and resist US President Donald Trump.<\/p>\n
The flyers warn Trump “is rigging and trying to steal the 2026 elections before we can vote.”<\/p>\n
“California can protect fair elections by fighting fire with fire,” they say.<\/p>\n
Trump set in motion a vicious cycle this summer by asking his allies in Texas to redraw electoral boundaries in a way that will provide five more Republican seats in Congress for next year’s midterm elections.<\/p>\n
The maneuver was intended to maintain a slender right-wing majority in the US House of Representatives.<\/p>\n
It was also highly unusual — redistricting normally occurs every decade in the United States, after each national census.<\/p>\n
To counter Trump’s ploy, California is now holding a dramatic referendum.<\/p>\n
The goal: to amend its constitution so California too can alter its electoral map and create five districts favorable to Democrats.<\/p>\n
With just days to go before voting closes Tuesday, Californians appear likely to approve the measure.<\/p>\n
“I’m not really for it, but I’m gonna vote for it, because I think it’s what’s necessary…to level the playing field,” 61-year-old contractor Patrick Bustad told canvassers.<\/p>\n
“If the Democrats don’t get dirty and get in the mud with the Republicans to fight back, we’re going to get run over.”<\/p>\n
– ‘Stick it to Trump’ –<\/p>\n
Trump “wants to be a dictator, not a president,” said Bustad, recalling how the Republican refused to concede defeat despite losing the 2020 presidential election.<\/p>\n
Spearheaded by state governor Gavin Newsom, the California referendum represents for many a difficult moral dilemma.<\/p>\n
Unlike most other US states, California has abandoned gerrymandering — a controversial practice by which legislators redraw electoral maps to benefit their party.<\/p>\n
Back in 2008, under then-governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, the Golden State voted to hand the power to draw up district boundaries to an independent commission.<\/p>\n
Newsom’s new “Proposition 50” asks voters to temporarily abandon this equitable system, and return to partisan redistricting for the next five years.<\/p>\n
Polls predict a landslide victory for in favor of the measure.<\/p>\n
Newsom’s confident campaign even stopped fundraising more than a week before voting closes, telling supporters: “You can stop donating.”<\/p>\n
Mutual loathing between Trump and California has backdropped the entire campaign.<\/p>\n
One prominent “Yes on Proposition 50” ad imagines a furious Trump raging at his television as news breaks of the referendum’s passage, with a simple slogan: “Stick it to Trump.”<\/p>\n
– Injustice –<\/p>\n
Faced with resentment, Trump and his supporters have not campaigned in California against the vote.<\/p>\n
The most notable Republican voice against the measure has been Schwarzenegger, who has warned that “two wrongs don’t make a right.”<\/p>\n
Sara Sadhwani, a member of California’s redistricting commission who supports “Prop 50,” said that she usually imparts the same message to her three children.<\/p>\n
“However, I also tell my kids that when a bully comes after you, you can defend yourself,” she added.<\/p>\n
“And I think that’s what Californians are being asked in this moment — there is a very real attempt to rig this election nationally.”<\/p>\n
Still, the political scientist laments how the entire situation has become a “race to the bottom.”<\/p>\n
Several more Republican states — Missouri, North Carolina, Indiana — and Democratic states — New York, Virginia, Illinois — are also considering joining the redistricting battle.<\/p>\n
“Trust in elections is at an all-time low, and I don’t see this as really improving that situation,” she sighed.<\/p>\n
That deepening mistrust is already palpable in Taft, a Republican stronghold north of Los Angeles.<\/p>\n
With the likely passage of the referendum, “the Democrats are going to take over, and we’re not going to have any rights,” said Paula Patterson, a 66-year-old retiree.<\/p>\n
Newsom “wants it his way so he can rig it,” she added.<\/p>\n
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