SACRAMENTO >> Two California elected officials are hoping to move up the date of the state’s presidential primary in a bid to increase its influence over the nomination fight.
Secretary of State Alex Padilla announced this week that he’s backing a bill to move the 2020 primary date from June to the third Tuesday in March, which would make it third in the nation, right after the contests in Iowa and New Hampshire. The bill, which was introduced by Los Angeles-area Sen. Ricardo Lara, would also authorize the governor to approve an even earlier primary if other states followed suit.
In most presidential contents, the race is more or less sewed up by the time Californians go to the polls in June. In 2016, for example, Donald Trump had already won his primary, although Secretary Hillary Clinton and Senator Bernie Sanders were both fighting for every last vote.
“We’ll respect the Iowa and New Hampshire tradition, but for California, the most populous and most diverse state in the nation, we should have a much bigger say on who is elected president,” Padilla said in an interview. The June primary date “really minimized our impact on the process.”
In 2008, California moved its presidential primary up to February, which Padilla said resulted in the highest voter turnout of any presidential primary election since 1980. But it also cost the state millions of dollars to host separate state and presidential primaries.
If Lara’s bill passed, both presidential and state primaries would be held on the same March date, so it won’t cost anything more. Its supporters say the move will also increase voter engagement and turnout in lower-ballot races. State primaries would be held in March even during non-presidential years.
But at the same time, it could spur other states to move their primaries sooner, creating a rush to the front of the calendar. South Carolina and Nevada, which have been the third and fourth states to vote or caucus in recent years, may be especially protective of their places in the primary lineup. That could extend an already torturously long campaign season of negative ads, hours-long debates, and acrimonious back-and-forth.
Padilla said he wasn’t worried about creating a longer presidential campaign because California wouldn’t “leapfrog” Iowa or New Hampshire.
“Regardless of the party you’re in, the current schedule doesn’t allow California voters to have a big impact on the nation’s process,” Padilla said.
