California Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) urged donors Tuesday to stop giving money to the state’s redistricting measure on the ballot this election.
An email from Newsom to donors obtained by The Hill notes that the governor’s team has “hit our budget goals and raised what we need in order to pass Proposition 50.”
“You can stop donating,” the text reads in bold lettering.
After 1.2 million donations, with $38 million raised based on online small-donor fundraising, it’s now “about executing the plan,” the email also reads. “If we can do that, we’re going to win.”
It became clear that the donations could come to an end after news broke of a Friday Zoom meeting where the governor appeared, according to The New York Times. After two senior advisers proposed stopping the fundraising from small donors, Newsom reportedly said, “I love it.”
Voters who choose “yes” on Proposition 50 would allow the redrawn congressional district maps to go into effect in 2026 before new maps are drawn for the 2030 census, according to the California secretary of state’s website.
Should voters choose “no,” the current district maps would stay in place until the 2030 census.
Two recent polls show that California voters favor Proposition 50. A CBS News/YouGov poll released Wednesday showed that 62 percent of voters supported the measure, with 38 percent against it.
Then on Friday, an Emerson College survey showed that Proposition 50 had support from 57 percent of Golden State voters, with 37 percent opposing the measure.
One opponent of Prop 50 is former California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger (R), who on Sunday warned of a “war going on all over the United States: Who can outcheat the other one?”
“You know, Texas started it,” Schwarzenegger continued in an interview on CNN’s “State of the Union.” They did something terribly wrong. And then all of a sudden California says, ‘Well, then we have to do something terribly wrong.’ And then now other states are jumping in, and now this is spreading like wildfire all over the country.”
President Trump has put pressure on red states to redraw their congressional districts before the 2026 midterms in order to protect their slim majority in the House of Representatives. Democratic states responded with their own efforts, but California is so far the only blue state expected to see its district maps change.
Caroline Vakil contributed.