Two of these recall targets, both in Northern California’s East Bay, have received particular notice: Oakland Mayor Sheng Thao and Alameda County District Attorney Pamela Price. Like most recalls, policy decisions are the impetus for the fight. The two recalls were in part launched due to pushback against approaches to crime and the criminal justice system, with organizers arguing both Thao and Price have failed to stem the tide.
The primary financial backer of the Price recall is also a big spender against Thao. Based on the campaigns themselves, voters could assume that the two recalls are connected. For example, Congresswoman Barbara Lee announced her opposition to both recalls at the same time (and seemingly recalls in general, echoing the odd claim that recalls are undemocratic). The anti-campaign efforts also seem to be connected, as numerous posted signs just say “No on the Recalls,” not specifying which official is facing the vote.
But there are differences as well, which suggests some daylight between the two efforts. As an executive of a major city, Oakland’s mayor has many other issues to use to defend her performance — or be attacked on. (Thao’s home was the subject of an FBI raid, though she may not be the target.) By contrast, being district attorney is a much more focused position with a very limited sphere of action, and therefore more vulnerable to criticism over the sole issue of crime. The mayor may have won over allies on ancillary issues, a feat the D.A. is unlikely to accomplish.
Although there don’t seem to be groups who are recommending voting to recall one but not the other, there are some that have chosen to highlight their support or opposition to just one recall. For example, the American Civil Liberties Union of Northern California has pushed their support for Price, while the Oakland NAACP has called for a yes vote to kick out Thao.
Oakland is by far the largest city in Alameda County, so these two officials share many of the same voters, but their offices operate on two separate levels of government. Having two recalls on the same ballot in this fashion is an unusual development. Outside of recalls that are scheduled for the same day as the gubernatorial recalls in Wisconsin in 2012 and California in 2021, there do not appear to have been any other overlapping recalls in the country over the last 14 years.
It's sometimes the case that multiple officials from a single city council, school board or special purpose entity face recall votes for a single action, such as the firing of a school superintendent or a development approval. This makes sense, as the ability to enact change or reverse a policy decision usually requires ousting more than one official. Thanks to America’s district-based approach to elections, however, each of these officials usually represents a separate group of voters.
Occasionally, a mayor and city council will face a recall at the same time, though in many places the mayor represents only a small city council district rather than the whole town. But even in those cases when the mayor of a whole city and a councilmember face a recall at the same time, they are taking place at the same level of government. Here we have recalls on the county and city level.
The recalls in Alameda County may serve to show the impact of different electoral systems. Alameda used a top two voting system to elect Price, under which there are no primaries and the top two contenders move up to the general election in November. Price came in first in a four-person field in 2022, garnering 43 percent of the vote. She then received 53 percent of the vote in November to win the office.
Oakland uses ranked choice voting. Thao came in second out of 10 candidates in the first round, garnering slightly under 32 percent of the vote. It took until the ninth round of reallocation before she was decisively named the winner, with 50.3 percent of the vote. It is possible that Price will benefit from her stronger original showing.
We have sometimes seen officials in high-profile recall efforts receive roughly the same vote in the recall as in their original election. Both California Gov. Gavin Newsom and Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker received votes in their favor within 1 percent of the share they’d originally won two or three years earlier. However, plenty of recalls are blowouts (in either direction), so we shouldn’t necessarily expect a similar result.
Due to a change in California law, a successful recall will not result in an immediate vote for a replacement in either case. Instead, the replacement race is put off for three months for mayor and until the next regularly scheduled election for district attorney. It is not clear whether the lack of a clear and immediate replacement will change the voters’ calculus come Nov. 5.
There is one more interesting though often overlooked fact that is worth noting: The importance of ballot placement. In the ballots mailed out to voters, the Price recall is on page 3. The Thao recall is buried behind many ballot measures and pushed all the way back to page 8. We will soon see if that makes a difference.
