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51% want Davis out, poll shows The first public survey taken since the rapidly accelerating recall effort received a major cash infusion shows that 51 percent would boot Davis while only 43 percent want to keep him. "We're on the verge of creating more history involving direct democracy," said Mark Baldassare, pollster for the nonpartisan Public Policy Institute of California. "It would be as historic a moment as using the initiative process for Proposition 13 25 years ago. This potentially sets the stage for a new level of voter involvement." The statewide survey of 961 likely voters was conducted May 22-June 1. The margin of error is plus or minus 3 percentage points. The poll numbers are horrific for Davis. His popularity plunged in 2001 during the electricity crisis. Now, the latest poll shows likely voters think little of his ability to fix the state budget deficit. Only 17 percent believe the issue would be harder to solve if Davis were recalled. Almost all the rest say it would be easier with him gone or would make no difference. In other words, "they don't feel that the governor is part of the solution," Baldassare said. "They're more likely to think the governor is part of the problem." The discontent toward the Democratic governor crosses partisan lines. A third of his own party would recall Davis if the balloting were held today. "That's why this recall effort has reached the serious level," Baldassare said. "If all the Republicans wanted a recall but the Democrats were strongly opposed, it would never reach the kind of threshold that it has today." Through his career, Davis has tried to position himself as a centrist. But the poll shows that self-described moderate and conservative Democrats are more likely to recall him than liberals. A gubernatorial recall has never qualified for the ballot in California. But players in both major parties say the current signature-gathering effort, funded in large part by Rep. Darrell Issa, R-Vista, will succeed in placing Davis' fate before voters. Moreover, recall leaders are confident they will collect the needed 897,158 signatures by mid-July. That would almost certainly ensure a fall election and block Davis' hope to delay balloting to the March 2 statewide election, when Democratic turnout would be higher because of the presidential primary. Bob Mulholland, strategist for the state Democratic Party, insisted the governor will survive a recall vote. "Right now it's Gray vs. Gray. When it's Gray vs. a Republican we win just like last November." That will be a tricky strategy for Davis. A recall ballot would first ask voters whether to remove Davis. The decision on his replacement would be a separate item on the ballot. Nevertheless, Mulholland said, voters will meld the two questions when they reach the voting booth. "What the campaign will be about is Gov. Davis, the pro-choice, pro-public education, pro-law enforcement governor versus some Republican thug." That won't work this time, said Republican strategist Dan Schnur. "Gray Davis is the absolute master of the lesser-of-two-evils school of politics," Schnur said. "He's not as rich as Al Checchi, he's not conservative as Dan Lungren, he's not as inexperienced as Bill Simon. That's the way Davis has won his elections over the years." But with a recall, Schnur said, "he can't just attack the alternative, he's going to have to defend himself. That's when he tends to get himself into trouble." ON THE POLL
The statewide poll was conducted by the San Francisco-based Public Policy Institute of California. The institute is a nonpartisan think tank established in 1994 with an endowment from William
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