New Poll Shows Majority Of California Voters Want Sen. Feinstein To Resign

A new Emerson College Polling/Inside California Politics survey of California voters released on Monday found that nearly 2 in every 3 voters favor the resignation of Senator Dianne Feinstein (D-CA), with both Congressman Adam Schiff (D-CA) and Congresswoman Katie Porter (D-CA) currently running neck to neck in the 2024 U.S. Senate race.

While Feinstein has successfully bounced back from previous calls to resign, the most recent incident from a few months ago with her staying out of Washington for a few months due to combatting several illnesses and, in turn, creating a huge legislative pileup in her absence, has continued to stick with voters months after she returned to the District.

Polls in April found that 64% of Democrats and 71% of Republicans in California wanted her to resign. Last month, a Berkeley IGS poll placed that percentage at 67%. On Monday, the Emerson poll continued the trend with more reports of Feinstein’s health still not being all that great, with 63% of Californian voters favoring her resignation, and only 37% saying that she should serve out the remainder of her term.

Even worse are her overall approval ratings. As of the Monday Emerson poll, only 22% of Californians currently approve of her, with a whopping 48% disapproving of her and 31% expressing no opinion. Compared to Senator Alex Padilla (D-CA), who currently holds a 32% approval/23% disapproval/45% No opinion ranking and Governor Gavin Newsom, with a polarizing 45% approval/39% disapproval rating, Feinstein is by far the most unpopular high-level Californian lawmaker in the state today.

“Older voters are more likely than younger voters to say Feinstein should resign: 68% of voters over 50 think the Senator should resign compared to 58% of voters under 50 who say the same,” Executive Director of Emerson College Polling Spencer Kimball noted on Monday.

Russell Martin, a political advisor in the Bay Area, stressed in a Globe interview Monday that “Feinstein is really looking worse and worse right now, and each passing day is hurting her legacy. Politicians who stay way longer than welcome tend to be remembered as just that: the person who refused to retire despite starting to be detrimental to things in Washington and their own state. Her aides have been propping her up for way too long. And, for many, this isn’t a charming “I’m going to go as far as I can” sort of political run like Sam Rayburn or Daniel Inouye. They found a way to make it work in their later years of their long runs. Feinstein is hated now, with more than a few now comparing her stubbornness to Strom Thurmond and others who went too long. She is really jeopardizing a lot.”

“And it really goes to show. Democrats have loved her for being a top politician in the state since the 70’s, and Republicans  aren’t liking that Newsom is going to pick an interim candidate if she retires. But the vast majority from both parties generally agree that, yeah, she needs to go. In this partisan era of politics, finding 60-70% of both parties agreeing on something is hard to find, but Feinstein has managed to do that. That’s how far she has fallen.”

Schiff, Porter currently lead in Senate polling

The poll also released where candidates in the 2024 Senate race currently stand. Previous polls found that Porter and Schiff are the two top Democratic candidates, frequently coming within only a few points of each other, with Congresswoman Barbara Lee (D-CA) often getting a distant third around 5-10 points below them. For the GOP, Attorney Eric Early showed a huge double-digit percentage lead over other candidates, and when combined with the Democrats, has even been out ahead in those polls due to a Democratic candidate split.

The Emerson poll on Monday showed a somewhat different story. According to the poll, Schiff now has a one point lead both in the overall poll with all voters and in the poll with just registered Democrats, coming in with a respective 15% overall total and 23% Democrats only total. This is compared with Porter, who came in with a 14% overall/22% Democrats total and Lee with a distant 6% overall/10% Democrats total.

On the GOP side, Businessman and Coast Guard veteran James Bradley managed to get a bump of support over Early. According to the poll, Bradley currently stands at 4% of the overall vote and 13% amongst GOP voters, with Early now behind with 3% overall and 8% of GOP voters.

However, the biggest factor by far are undecided voters. Overall, 47% remain undecided, with GOP voters having a huge 60% undecided contingent.

“Registered Democratic voters are split between Schiff at 23% and Porter at 22%, while 10% support Lee; only 34% are undecided. By contrast, 60% of Republicans are undecided and 58% of independent voters are undecided,” Kimball said. “Thirteen percent of Republicans support Republican candidate James Bradley and 8% support Republican Eric Early. Among Independents, 11% support Porter, 10% Schiff.”

Martin added, “The Democrats have three candidates coming in with a lot of political experience and noteworthy names. For the GOP, while Bradley and Early are known by some, many within the party aren’t really jazzed about them, at least not yet, with many independents and possible Democrats who can switch over not finding them all that compelling. The GOP does have some big named people they are looking at, with the biggest right now being Steve Garvey, so this equation can still very much change.”

“Right now, it is a Schiff-Porter fight, and there are many people from both parties who really want to change that. This is just where we are at now. It’s June 12th now. The primary is on March 5th next year. There is still a lot of time.”

Others polls over Feinstein and 2024 elections are expected soon.