Good morning. It’s Wednesday, Nov. 5.
- California Democrats score major win on redistricting.
- Sen. Alex Padilla says he won’t run for governor.
- And the “Big Short” investor bets against AI.
Election 2025
1.
“A stinging rebuke to President Trump”
— Los Angeles Times
“A jolt of momentum” for Democrats
— Politico
A “triumph for Newsom”
— Bloomberg
While the result was largely seen as a foregone conclusion, California’s passage of Proposition 50 on Tuesday was a meaningful victory for Democrats who have spent the last year locked out of power in Washington. As of late Tuesday, 64% of the state’s voters favored the measure, which redraws congressional districts in an effort to shift as many as five of them to Democrats from Republicans in what supporters portrayed as an emergency counter to gerrymandering in other states. Opponents called it a power grab. Speaking in Sacramento, Gov. Gavin Newsom was more somber than celebratory. “I hope it’s dawning on people the sobriety of this moment, what’s at stake,” he said. “We can de facto end Donald Trump’s presidency as we know it. It is all on the line.”
- See the latest results broken down by county.
2.
Even before the polls opened in California on Tuesday, President Trump began Election Day by declaring the democratic exercise “rigged.” The redistricting effort is not only unconstitutional, but the voting is engineered to exclude Republicans, he wrote on Truth Social. Asked to elaborate, Karoline Leavitt, the White House press secretary, said there were “countless examples” of fraud in California that she “would be happy to provide.” Pressed to do so, a White House staffer cited a New York Post article about a Costa Mesa woman who faced felony charges for registering her dog to vote. No other examples were offered. L.A. Times | N.Y. Times
3.
“They’re trying to steal our government from us. And if we don’t do something, we’re going to lose it.”
“I want to live in a country that is free and I don’t believe the party that is in office is OK.”
“They say it’s because of what Trump did, but that doesn’t make it right for them to do it.”
Voter turnout appeared to be strong, election officials said on Tuesday, as Californians on both sides of Proposition 50 seemed eager to make their voices heard. The Associated Press, which surveyed thousands of voters at polling sites, found that 51% of Californians were motivated by a desire to oppose Trump. A.P. | KQED | Press Democrat
4.
Well before Tuesday, the jockeying had begun to challenge California Republicans made vulnerable by redrawn House districts. Three are especially at risk: Rep. Doug LaMalfa, whose district encompasses the state’s rural northeast; Rep. Kevin Kiley, whose district includes suburban Sacramento and the Northern Sierra; and Rep. Ken Calvert, who represents much of Southern California’s Inland Empire. The New York Times gamed out how Democrats could end up representing some of California’s most conservative communities.
5.
Other election odds and ends:
- Democrats swept key elections across the country on Tuesday. Aside from the triumph in California, democratic socialist Zohran Mamdani clinched the New York City mayoral race, while Democrats won governor’s races in New Jersey and Virginia. Here are key takeaways. 👉 Washington Post | N.Y. Times
- Among the winners Tuesday was Gov. Gavin Newsom, who has acknowledged that he’s weighing a 2028 presidential run. “The two-month campaign sprint cemented Newsom’s status as one of Trump’s leading adversaries at a time when even many Democrats described the party as ineffective and weak,” the A.P. wrote.
- A few opinions:
- S.F. Chronicle’s Joe Garofoli: From military deployments to efforts to extort UCLA, Trump sabotaged the opposition to Proposition 50 by relentlessly targeting California.
- L.A. Times’ George Skelton: “It’s all sleazy, but Trump started it.”
- Politico’s Alexander Burns: “Many voters also sent another message: They’re done with Bidenism.”
Statewide
6.
Sen. Alex Padilla announced Tuesday he will not run for California governor in 2026. Padilla would have been a formidable candidate in a race with many contenders but no clear favorite after Kamala Harris declined to run and Katie Porter faced fallout from damaging videos. Despite a concerted campaign to draft him, Padilla said he wanted to focus on countering President Trump. “I choose to stay in this fight because the Constitution is worth fighting for,” he said. L.A. Times | CalMatters
7.
A federal judge on Tuesday struck down the Trump administration’s effort to tie federal transportation funding to compliance with federal immigration authorities in a lawsuit filed by 20 states and led by California. U.S. District Judge John McConnell said the government “blatantly overstepped” its authority by meddling in the distribution of funds approved by Congress. “The Constitution demands the Court set aside this lawless behavior,” he wrote. Politico | Courthouse News
Northern California
8.
“It was me and God every night.”
A Fresno County hunter who spent 20 days stranded in the Sierra Nevada told the story of how he barely survived in the dense wilderness. Ron Dailey, 65, was packed for a half-day outing when he entered the mountains near Shaver Lake on Oct. 13. A disabled truck, a snowstorm, and lost bearings left him in dire straits. After camping in his truck for several days, he resolved to start walking or “sit here and die,” he said. He estimates he had walked about 10 miles when he saw the headlights of a car. He hadn’t eaten in six days, he said. CBS News | ABC News
9.
Analysts have been warning for months about the risks of an artificial intelligence bubble. But investors reacted on Tuesday after a filing revealed that Michael Burry, who famously bet against the housing market ahead of its 2008 collapse, bought put options on Nvidia and Palantir, betting that their stock price would fall. By the end of the trading day, Palantir had shed nearly 8% and Nvidia nearly 4%. Alex Karp, the CEO of Palantir, could hardly contain his rage during an interview on CNBC, calling Burry’s move “batshit crazy.” Washington Post | CNBC
10.
Tech bros are getting face-lifts now. Plastic surgeons in Silicon Valley say fears of aging out of tech have driven a surge in procedures such as neck lifts and eyelid lifts. Dr. Stephen Sabin, a San Francisco psychoanalyst who serves male tech clients, said Botox and similar nonsurgical treatments are now so common they’re “almost passé.” He added, “It’s almost a question of: Why aren’t you doing these things that can help you feel better?” Wall Street Journal
Southern California
11.
Steve Ballmer, the L.A. Clippers owner, is being sued by 11 former investors in the failed sustainability company Aspiration who accuse him of a scheme “to secretly funnel millions of dollars to star NBA player, Kawhi Leonard.” Ballmer, the wealthiest owner in sports, has faced allegations of orchestrating a $28 million deal between Aspiration and Leonard that was designed to circumvent the NBA’s salary cap. The league is investigating the allegations, while Ballmer has denied wrongdoing. L.A. Times | PTFO
California archive
12.
More than a quarter century before the rise of highway-ready electric cars, the Southern California artist Dustin Shuler created a monument to the end of the “gas-guzzling automobile.”
Shuler was part of an artistic movement that sought to escape the stuffy confines of the gallery. He plastered outdoor walls with the metallic skins of vehicles, “car pelts” as he called them, like mounted butterflies. In a parking lot near Chicago, he built what locals referred to as the “car kebab,” eight automobiles threaded onto a 50-foot-high metal spike.
For “The Death of an Era,” displayed at Cal State Dominguez Hills in 1980, Shuler bought a 1959 Cadillac for $150 and fashioned a one-ton nail out of steel. A crane then hoisted the nail 100 feet and dropped it through the doomed car’s roof, drawing squeals of delight from spectators.
Critics derided Shuler’s sculptures as crass and attention-seeking, while others saw insightful commentary on consumerism.
The artist himself denied any aspiration to lofty ideas. “There’s no message,” he told the Chicago Sun-Times in 1996. Even so, he bristled at critiques that rejected his work as visually unappealing.
“A lot of people don’t get my stuff when they first see it,” he told NPR in 2007. “They think art has to be beautiful … Art is based on intent of the artist. It doesn’t make it good art and doesn’t have to be beautiful art. But it’s still art. It doesn’t mean you have to like it.”
- Watch archival footage of the Cadillac impalement (starting around the eight-minute mark). 👉 California Revealed
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