Parsing rural and urban in the final California recall tally

The San Francisco Chronicle this week published some analysis of the final results of the effort to recall Governor Gavin Newsom.  The story compares the September 2021 recall support for Newsom to the support he got when he ran for office in 2018, with data parsed at the county level.  Here's an excerpt that focuses on the state's more red counties, which tend to be the less populous ones or to include large rural populations, like those in the Central Valley: 

Counties that had majorities opposing Newsom in 2018 were likely to further oppose him in 2021. For example, only 38% of the 437,000 voters in Kern County were against the recall. That’s 2.9 points fewer than the share that voted for Newsom in 2018. In neighboring Kings and Tulare counties, Newsom support decreased by 4.3 and 3.9 points, respectively.

Similar patterns emerge in some northern counties, though their populations are much lower. For instance, Lassen County, with about 16,000 registered voters, had the smallest share of voters against the recall at 16%, which is nearly seven points fewer than the share that voted for Newsom in 2018.

There are some exceptions though. Some red counties saw support for Newsom grow slightly. In northern Shasta County, though only 30% of voters cast “no” recall ballots, that’s up 1.5 points from Newsom’s 2018 vote share. Nearby Trinity County had a 1.6 point increase, while support in Placer County in the greater Sacramento area increased 1.4 points.

Few counties with majorities that supported Newsom in 2018 had sizable negative shifts. Imperial County, a historically blue county at the southern border of California between San Diego County and Arizona, had a 2.3 point decrease from 62% to 59%.

Here's an earlier post about the recall.