Home>Articles>Less Than Half of Californians Approve of Gov. Newsom, and the Legislature, a New PPIC Poll Finds

Gov. Gavin Newsom glamour shot at the Great Wall of China 10/26/2023 (Photo: gov.ca.gov)

Less Than Half of Californians Approve of Gov. Newsom, and the Legislature, a New PPIC Poll Finds

‘Gavin Newsom is by far the most unpopular Governor in America’

By Katy Grimes, June 15, 2024 3:55 am

Less than half approve of Gov. Gavin Newsom, the California legislature, and their own legislators, a new Public Policy Institute of California poll finds.

“Gavin Newsom is by far the most unpopular Governor in America,” California Congressman Kevin Kiley noted in a blog post. “Newsom’s approve/disapprove rating is fully 10 percent lower than any other Governor in the latest data. Among Independents, his rating is negative 34 percent; even 28 percent of Democrats disapprove. And just this week, we got a very clear demonstration why.”

Here’s what else the PPIC poll found out about California voters:

Six in ten Californians say the state is going in the wrong direction.

Californians also disapprove of the state legislature and the legislators representing their own assembly and senate districts, with a majority of adults and likely voters disapproving and about four in ten each approving.

Close to seven in ten (68%) expect bad economic times in the next year.

Forty-two percent of Californians say that the state’s budget situation is a “big problem.” Fifty-four percent of residents favor the May revision of the governor’s state budget plan.

After May’s budget revision, majorities of adults (54%) and likely voters (52%) disapprove of the way Gavin Newsom is handling his job as governor. The share of both adults and likely voters disapproving of the governor has steadily increased since last June (43% disapprove among each) and first reached 50 percent this February.

More than a third of Californians (36%) say their personal financial situation is worse off than it was a year ago.

A majority of Californians say the cost of housing places at least a little financial strain on them and their families (29% a lot, 24% a little). This sense of strain is highest among residents in Los Angeles (56%) and lowest in the San Francisco Bay Area (49%). Among demographic groups, residents earning less than $40,000 (74%) and those without at least some college education (67%), Latinos (64%), and 18- to 34-year-olds (64%) are the most likely to report at least some financial strain. Renters (72%) are almost twice as likely than homeowners (37%) to say this.

With regard to the state of the country, When asked to name the most important problem facing the United States, about a quarter of California adults name the cost of living, the economy, and inflation (26%) as the most important problem; about two in ten named government in general, elected officials, and political parties (19%); and 10 percent mention immigration.

Among partisans, Republicans (25%) are far more likely than Democrats (4%) and independents (7%) to say the top issue is immigration; however, somewhat similar shares across these groups say that the top issue is government in general (25% independents, 23% Republicans, 19% Democrats) or cost of living, the economy, and inflation (26% Republicans, 25% independents, 24% Democrats).

The share of Californians who say the US is going in the wrong direction is rising: Sixty-eight percent of adults and 62 percent of likely voters expect bad times financially in the US over the next year.

California likely voters would choose Joe Biden (D) over Donald Trump (R) by a wide margin (55% to 31%) if the November election were held today.

Adam Schiff (D) leads Steve Garvey (R) by a wide margin (62% to 37%) in the US Senate race. Ninety-three percent of Democrats favor Schiff and 90 percent of Republicans favor Garvey—while independents are more evenly divided (53% Schiff, 45% Garvey).

Grab a fresh cup of coffee and spend some time on this poll. It’s that interesting.

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12 thoughts on “Less Than Half of Californians Approve of Gov. Newsom, and the Legislature, a New PPIC Poll Finds

  1. Both Democrat and Newsom approval remain far too high. The pain in California is going to get far worse.

    1. Agree with you. The disapproval numbers for all that is unholy and non-functional in this state, including the governor and the supermajority Dem legislature, should be HIGHER. I went a bit deeper into the poll details at the link Katy provided and took a quick look at a few items, such as methodology and questions asked.
      I scanned the methodology and it appeared they over-sampled Democrats (is there a good explanation for this?) and did a weird thing where Hispanics who spoke no English AT ALL were accommodated for language in a cumbersome way, questioned, and allowed to participate. This was a large enough category for their results to be separately listed in the poll. I think it is fair to say —- please correct me if I’m missing something here —- that the average California citizen thinks the odds are pretty good that the average Hispanic who speaks NO ENGLISH AT ALL is likely in the country illegally. Meanwhile, African Americans and Asian Americans were NOT separated in the poll results but folded into the White category of results? Seems to me both African Americans and Asian Americans comprise large enough groups to have their responses separated in the poll results. In addition, poll readers might be particularly interested in the responses. But if the pollsters found the numbers were too insignificant to be separated, are those groups still smaller than the group of Hispanics who speak no English AT ALL?
      I also scanned the questions asked, which were awkward and had an oddly high percentage of “don’t know” answers, I thought. Many did not know for sure if they were even registered to vote. What’s that about?
      Just a few things I noticed from taking a quick look. I’m not a poll expert, so maybe I missed something and/or got it all wrong in my interpretation, but my long-time skepticism of the PPIC poll always makes me want to look at the methodology and questions first when the numbers don’t resonate.

  2. If less than 5% of California voters approved of Newsom and the manner in which the Democrat supermajority is running the state, moron voters and election “idiosyncrasies” would guarantee their reelection.

    1. Totally agree with that Fed Up!
      (D) should stand for denial.
      Our state is falling apart and 40 percent think this is okay?
      They will overwhelmingly vote for Resident Pudding Brain who at this point can’t find his way out of a paper sack!
      Please do not get me started on Shifty Schiff!

    2. Yes, Fed Up. The “idiosyncrasies” are baked into the corrupt system. One of them is the electronic voting machine; which should be banned, as Robert Kennedy is saying on X:

      “Puerto Rico’s primary elections just experienced hundreds of voting irregularities related to electronic voting machines, according to the Associated Press. Luckily, there was a paper trail so the problem was identified and vote tallies corrected. What happens in jurisdictions where there is no paper trail? US citizens need to know that every one of their votes were counted, and that their elections cannot be hacked. We need to return to paper ballots to avoid electronic interference with elections. My administration will require paper ballots and we will guarantee honest and fair elections.”
      Puerto Rico uses the Dominion voting machines…..as does California:

      https://apnews.com/article/puerto-rico-primaries-discrepancies-voting-problems-machines-8019db17829c7b1fbae5fb3fde623a4b

  3. It’s ironic that the picture of Newsom is in China, a country that knows how to develop infrastructure and get things done versus California which can’t even build a reservoir near Sacramento that was planned in the 1950’s.

  4. This is not surprising to me. Recently everything Newsom has been associated with has been backfiring on him. I still contend that a recall is viable if it collects enough signatures bay the September deadline.

  5. Newsom needs to be hauled before a tribunal for crimes against humanity for imposing draconian lockdowns of healthy people and small businesses along with mandating toxic mRNA shots that have injured and killed thousands of Californians. He and his wretched evil soul have a lot to account for!

  6. The will of the voters no longer relevant. Voting occurs solely to distract the populace and give hope for solutions not scripted to occur.

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