Gold Country Republicans expect Newsom to cheat in California recall election

Republicans in Sierra-Nevada foothills--sometimes called the Motherlode or the Gold Country--are articulating  skepticism about whether the Gubernatorial Recall election a week from today will be on the up-and-up.  Hailey Branson-Potts brings us the story for the Los Angeles Times, dateline Sutter Creek, in Amador County.  Here's a quote from Ed Brown, 67, whose trailer of pro-Recall and pro-Trump merchandise sits off "Gold Chain Road," apparently a reference to famed Highway 49, named for the 49'ers.

“They’ll probably do something to cheat,” Brown said of Newsom’s supporters, adding that he will vote for Larry Elder because “he’s more like Trump; he’s for the people.”

Tomi Lahren has been on Fox News similarly alleging election shenanigans in the upcoming recall.  

“Yes, Gavin Newsom has raised a whole lot of money from teachers unions and special interests and tech, but that money is not going to save him,” said Lahren. “The only thing that will save Gavin Newsom is voter fraud, so as they say: Stay woke. Pay attention to the voter fraud going on in California because it’s going to have big consequences not only for that state but for upcoming elections.”

Washington Post columnist Erik Wemple linked Lahren's claim to Trump and the 2016 election;   

The idiocy of this claim dates back almost five years, at least. Though Donald Trump in the 2016 election won the electoral college vote, he lost the popular vote, a shortcoming that quite clearly anguished him. “In addition to winning the Electoral College in a landslide, I won the popular vote if you deduct the millions of people who voted illegally,” Trump wrote on Twitter, also alleging that there was “serious voter fraud in Virginia, New Hampshire and California.”

Also responding to Lahren's claim, a San Francisco Chronicle reporter noted on Twitter that it'll just be simple math if Newsom survives the recall.  After all, registered Democrats outnumber registered Republicans 2 to 1 in the Golden State. 

Branson-Potts' story out of Sutter Creek also features the Amador County Republican Party chair, Vince Destigter, who say 

the recall has channeled rural voters’ deep-seated anger at the state’s liberal politicians and at institutions such as public schools and the news media, which they claim give them the short shrift.

“We have to be real sure that you understand: We don’t like your newspaper,” Destigter told a Los Angeles Times reporter at a diner in Jackson last week. He said he screams at the news: “Come on, you guys have no concept of what we do up here!”

I must say I think there's some truth to that--that urban folks, including politicians in Sacramento, don't much understand what rural folks do, in California or elsewhere.  

Destigter, 79, of Pioneer said people here are an independent lot who “don’t like the government running our lives.”

Elsewhere in the story, Destigter reports that he's vaccinated.  He also opines on other issues driving the California recall:  

Recall supporters, Destigter said, blame Democrats for forest management policies that they believe have made wildfires more destructive.

“There are many — I’m sorry, but they’re liberals — they don’t believe in cutting trees,” he said.

Destigter voted for Elder and dropped his ballot off at a drop box instead of mailing it.

“We’re very fussy about that,” he said. “We believe that there were a lot of shenanigans done with the voting” in the presidential election.

Finally, the story features details of how folks in neighboring El Dorado County, also Republican leaning, are voting amidst the Caldor Fire.  

Postscript:  Within a few days of this Los Angeles Times story, allegations of (anticipated) voter fraud were showing up in other national news fora, with the allegations being made by Larry Elder and Donald Trump.  And they allegations weren't just coming from rural California.  Read stories here, here, here, and here.