Democrats at the state capitol will start holding hearing to reform California's recall system.
"I have talked to several key legislators who are ready to rip apart the recall process and put it back together," Garry South, a Democratic consultant and former senior political adviser to Gray Davis, the governor recalled in 2003, told Fox News. "Two of the last elected Democratic governors have been subjected to recall elections in the last 18 years." A July poll by the Public Policy Institute of California found 86% of respondents support having the recall. But 60% back only allowing an official to be recalled because of illegal or unethical activity, and 55% support raising the bar for signatures from 12% of the voters that voted in the last election to 25%. Further, the poll found 68% support having a runoff between the top two if none of the replacement candidates get more than 50% of the vote.
Besides California, only two states have ever had recall elections for governors: Wisconsin in 2011 and North Dakota in 1921. These states and most others allow recall for almost any reason. But Alaska, Georgia, Kansas, Minnesota, Montana, Rhode Island and Washington require misconduct in office, or physical or mental unfitness for office, according to Ballotpedia.
Today two election committee chairmen will begin the process of reforming recall elections.