Gov. Gavin Newsom of California wants more changes to make voting easier this fall in the nation's most populous state. And he's pushing his Democratic colleagues in the Legislature to turn his moves into law, expecting that would brush back Republican lawsuits seeking to keep the status quo in place.
The governor's latest executive order, announced Wednesday, tells all 58 counties to create at least one venue for in-person voting on Election Day and also permit voting on the three days before.
Last month he told those local election officials to send all 20.6 million registered voters a general election ballot as a way to make mail-in voting the dominant system and minimize the public's exposure to the coronavirus.
But his new order says disabled, non-English-speaking and homeless Californians, among others, need the option to go to a voting station. It also says counties need to create at least two places with drop boxes, set up a month ahead of time, for voters who don't want to rely on the Postal Service to deliver their ballots in time.
The easing of the rules, especially if they survive legal challenges, could help boost turnout significantly this fall in the place where 13 percent of the country's voters live — and minimize the long lines, populated by people complaining about undelivered mail-in ballots, that marred primaries this week in eight states and Washington, D.C.
[See how election officials in California — and every other state — are preparing for November.]
California is reliably blue overall, its 55 electoral votes a lock for former Vice President Joe Biden and Democrats sure to remain in control in Sacramento, but the GOP has a shot at picking up a handful of congressional seats.
President Trump has focused much of his rhetoric about easier voting rules fomenting fraud on recent results from California, but his claims are almost completely unsubstantiated.
His party has already gone to court to stop Newsom's send-everyone-a ballot move, saying that he's overstepped his authority, and similar legal claims against Wednesday's orders are likely. But those claims would presumably be moot if the Legislature clears measures doing what Newsom wants, and this week the state Senate advanced one such bill.
The cost to implement the latest guidelines will be substantial, easily exceeding California's share of the federal funding sent to all states so far for conducting smooth and safe elections during the Covid-19 outbreak. That means legislators will have to provide funding to carry out Newsom's plan in the annual state budget, which is supposed to be completed by June 15.
Some large counties, including Los Angeles and Orange, already allow several options for early voting and balloting by mail — which was how three of every five ballots were cast in the state two years ago. But many of the more rural counties operate a very traditional system, with almost everyone going to a local polling station on a single day.
Newsom's order pushes these counties to save money, and work to reduce long lines that threaten social distancing, by setting up countywide voting centers that open starting Oct. 31 — perhaps with county officials acting as poll workers.
"As the demonstrations across the country remind us, civic participation is critical to our democracy," he said. "If we are to address the racial inequities that exist in our institutions, policies and representation, we must ensure that all eligible Californians have an opportunity to safely cast their ballot."
A golden tray sits on the Resolute Desk as President Donald Trump speaks during an announcement on American nuclear innovation in the Oval Office at the White House on July 24, 2026, in Washington, D.C. Trump is signing multiple executive orders targeting the nuclear energy sector and easing rules for new reactors and nuclear fuel supply chains.
Trump’s hubris rivals the fallen heroes of ancient Greek mythology
In January, the New York Times asked President Donald Trump if there were any limits on his global powers.
“Yeah,” the president responded, “there is one thing. My own morality. My own mind. It’s the only thing that can stop me.”
That was eight months ago, but fortunately Christopher Nolan’s blockbuster adaptation of “The Odyssey” has made ancient Greek literature newly relevant. Before that window closes, I’d like to talk about hubris.
Today, the term mostly means excessive pride or arrogance. That’s part of what the Greeks meant by it too, but the meaning was a bit richer and more specific. Hubris was an insolent or outrageous act that offended the gods, often because the transgressor was claiming abilities or authorities that solely belonged to supreme beings.
Nolan renamed and slightly modified the concept of xenia for the film, calling it “Zeus’ law.” In the director’s telling, mortals should follow the rules laid out by the gods, specifically the requirement to treat strangers with respect lest they be gods in disguise.
In a sense, hubris is the opposite, or at least the rejection, of xenia. The hubris of the suitors, and at times Odysseus himself, invites punishment by the gods and their mortal instruments.
Which brings me back to Donald Trump. His claim that there are no constraints on his personal power to dictate events on the global stage was one of the greatest expressions of hubris ever uttered by a political leader.
Trump’s claim was obviously false when he made it.
He vowed that he could end the Russia-Ukraine war in 24 hours. He’s proved powerless to make that happen. If he had divine powers to work his will, why would he have balked at implementing his tariffs so often that Wall Street adopted the “TACO trade” term for his deals? “TACO” stands for “Trump always chickens out.”
And why would Trump have made so many embarrassing concessions to China — from rescinding tariffs on Chinese goods to allowing them to buy crucial and incredibly valuable computer chips?
But Trump saw his success at capturing Venezuelan strongman Nicolas Maduro as proof of his ability to launch missiles to the same effect as Zeus’ lightning bolts. Trump believed he was the most powerful man who ever lived.
This is no exaggeration. In March, when the Iran invasion seemed successful, Trump gave a document penned by“Presidential Historian David King” to New York Times reporters Maggie Haberman and Jonathan Swan purporting to prove that Trump was “the most powerful person to have EVER walked this planet.” King was, in fact, a businessman and occasional caddy for legendary golfer Gary Player.
King compared Trump favorably to many of history’s most powerful, and often heinous, figures: Alexander the Great, Attila the Hun, William the Conqueror, Napoleon Bonaparte, Joseph Stalin, Genghis Khan, Mao Tse Tung, Adolf Hitler and Vladimir Lenin. Many of these men thought they were the most powerful person in the world, too. And many were defeated precisely because they believed it.
At least Napoleon and Hitler had a string of truly impressive victories before they learned the folly of hubris. The limits on Trump’s power have been exposed by far less august forces than the combined might of the allies in World War II or the fearsome Russian winter.
Iran is a comparatively middling power. But the regime’s ability to absorb punishment while imposing its will on the Strait of Hormuz has proved to be a greater constraint on Trump’s power than his morality or mind. We should note that, at least rhetorically, his morality has not proved much of a constraint. He has repeatedly promised to destroy Iranian “civilization” if the regime refuses to capitulate.
But they haven’t — and won’t anytime soon — because the regime’s tolerance for pain far outstrips Trump’s. The combined fear of skyrocketing oil prices, outrage of Gulf state potentates, diminishing weapon supplies and domestic unpopularity is doing the work that international law, congressional oversight and the collective opinion of foreign policy experts can’t or won’t do.
If I considered Trump more heroic than reason and facts could allow, I would say his Sisyphean predicament has the whiff of Greek tragedy to it. Trump is vexed by the fact that the Iranians won’t honor deals or ratify his countless premature claims of victory — giving new meaning to his vow that his presidency would make people tired of winning. It’s almost like they’re out-Trumping Trump.
Things might have gone better if he’d heeded that great Greek tragedian Sophocles: “For Zeus utterly abhors the boasts of a proud tongue.”
____
Jonah Goldberg is editor-in-chief of The Dispatch and the host of The Remnant podcast. His Twitter handle is @JonahDispatch.