California Passes Prop 42 Asset Tax Ban as Democrats Gain 5 Seats

California Voters Approve Proposition 42 Banning New Taxes on Personal Property and Wealth

Proposition 42—which prohibits new taxes on personal property including business holdings, intellectual property, and financial assets, and bars lawmakers from applying new taxes retroactively absent a budget emergency—was leading at 54% with nearly 60% of anticipated ballots counted, according to CalMatters reports in the Mountain View Voice and The Almanac.

Primarily bankrolled by tech billionaires with $159 million and endorsed by Governor Gavin Newsom, the California Professional Firefighters, and the Peace Officers Research Association of California, Proposition 42 was placed on the ballot to offset Proposition 40, the proposed billionaire wealth tax backed by Service Employees International Union-United Healthcare Workers West (which exempted ordinary retirement accounts below a $10 million Roth IRA threshold and trailed by 11 points). Yes on 42 spokesperson Nathan Click said the measure protects life savings from double taxation while leaving corporate and sales tax options open, whereas Santa Clara Democratic Rep. Ro Khanna and California Labor Federation President Lorena Gonzalez vowed to continue pursuing wealth taxation (which progressive lawmakers have failed to advance out of committee since 2020), and Senate Budget Committee Chair John Laird and California Budget and Policy Center senior policy analyst Kayla Kitson noted the measure will restrict future tax backdating as Governor-elect Xavier Becerra faces a fourth consecutive year of budget deficits.

Democrats Oust Five California House Republicans Under Prop. 50 as 2028 Spotlight Shifts

California Democrats improved on their 2024 margin by 15 percentage points on Tuesday, ousting at least 5 of the state's 9 Republican U.S. House members and shrinking the GOP delegation to 4 or 3 seats, CalMatters reported. Map drawer Paul Mitchell estimated that Proposition 50—which temporarily suspended California's independent redistricting commission until 2030 after Texas rejected Newsom's detente letter to Texas Gov. Greg Abbott—freed up more than $100 million by shoring up Southern California Democratic incumbents. While California Democratic delegation leader Rep. Zoe Lofgren praised the voter mobilization, Better Choices for Democracy executive director Carah Ong Whaley and Lincoln Project co-founder Mike Madrid criticized the suspension of independent map-drawing.

Among the remaining Republican seats:

• Central Valley Rep. Vince Fong defeated Democrat Sandra Van Scotter with 63% of the vote in a district with a 20-percentage-point GOP registration edge.
• Sierra Nevada Rep. Tom McClintock defeated Democrat Michael Masuda with 56% of the vote.
• In Orange County's 40th Congressional District, Rep. Ken Calvert led fellow Republican Rep. Young Kim with about 54% of the vote.
• In the Mojave Desert, Rep. Jay Obernolte held a narrow 51% lead over Democrat Tessa Lynn Hodge.

Even as Proposition 50 delivered all 5 targeted House pickups, The San Francisco Standard noted that the national Democratic wave was large enough to win the House without California, shifting early 2028 presidential buzz toward Georgia Sen. Jon Ossoff alongside re-elected Governors Josh Shapiro of Pennsylvania and JB Pritzker of Illinois. In Newsom's hometown of San Francisco, a USC Democracy and Fair Elections Lab poll found Democratic voters naming former Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg first at 21%, followed by Ossoff at 20% and Newsom—who is term-limited in January 2027 after making three trips to South Carolina—at 18%.

Richard Barrera Leads State Superintendent Race 57.1% to 42.9%; Shasta County Stalls Count

In the statewide election for California Superintendent of Public Instruction, Democrat Richard Barrera led Republican Sonja Shaw with 57.1% of the vote (3,799,472 votes) to Shaw's 42.9% (2,850,246 votes) with 100% of state precincts reporting Wednesday, according to The Press.

Meanwhile, Shasta County—located a 2.5-hour drive north of Sacramento—became the only county among California's 58 counties (with no major issues in the other 57 counties) that had not finished counting in-person Election Day ballots by Wednesday morning, according to CalMatters reports in The Almanac and the Mountain View Voice. Appointed in 2025 by the Shasta County Board of Supervisors after cutting county ballot drop boxes from 13 to 4—and prompting an FBI visit with bolt cutters in September—elections chief Clint Curtis failed to report initial results until 10 p.m. Tuesday (two hours after polls closed at 8 p.m.) due to computer setup errors and left the office himself to retrieve ballots from drop boxes, telling Shasta Scout, "Because I'm stupid." Curtis lost the June primary to former elections official Joanna Francescut, who takes office in January.