New poll favors the incumbents + Rally calls for cannabis tax cuts
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POLLS SHOW INCUMBENTS WITH A COMMANDING LEAD
Via Lindsey Holden...
Challengers taking on incumbents in Tuesday’s California primary are struggling to put dents in the commanding leads that officeholders appear to enjoy, a new poll shows.
Gov. Gavin Newsom, Attorney General Rob Bonta and U.S. Sen. Alex Padilla all lead their races by significant margins, according to a poll from the Berkeley Institute of Governmental Studies and the Los Angeles Times.
The survey asked 5,210 registered California voters — 3,438 who said they were likely to vote in the primary — about their candidate preferences. It has a sampling error of two percentage points. The poll oversampled Los Angeles voters, but survey administrators weighted results to “realign the Los Angeles City sample to its actual share of the statewide voter population.”
Voters on Tuesday will narrow races down to two candidates — regardless of party — who will advance to the November general election. So far, incumbents will have no problem getting to the next round, while challengers who win the second spots will need to make up a lot of ground before the fall.
In the gubernatorial race, Newsom has support from 50% of all likely voters, including 83% of Democrats and 46% of those who have no party preference. Only about 10% of likely voters plan to cast ballots for State Sen. Brian Dahle, R-Bieber, Newsom’s closest opponent.
Dahle has support from 26% of Republicans and 8% of no party preference voters.
RALLY CALLS FOR CANNABIS TAX CUTS
On Thursday afternoon, Black and indigenous people of color (BIPOC) cannabis operators, stakeholders and patients rallied on the Capitol steps. They called for repeal of the cannabis excise tax for social equity retailers, a 5% reduction in the tax for all other retailers, and a definition of social equity included in state law to establish eligibility for exemption from the state excise tax.
“Gov. Newsom promoted Prop. 64 less as an opportunity for tax revenue and more as a historical opportunity for racial and social justice and economic empowerment — to remedy the damage of a drug war that had disproportionately criminalized Blacks and Latinos,” said rally organizer Amber Senter, executive director of Supernova Women, in a statement.
“And yet five years later, California’s Black and Brown cannabis operators, many of whom voted for Newsom not once but twice — are literally sitting on the brink of extinction, due to onerous state taxes, while the governor sits on a $100B surplus. Where is the racial and social justice in that?”
State law prohibits social equity programs from considering race or ethnicity as eligibility criteria. Rally organizers want to see a new statewide definition of social equity based on: a 51% ownership stake in a cannabis company and either five years of residency in a low-income community disproportionately impacted by the War on Drugs or an immediate family member with a prior cannabis arrest or conviction.
The rally organizers were unimpressed by Newsom’s proposal to maintain the 15% excise tax, with the intention of increasing it to 19% in three years.
“For five years, our attempts at generational wealth and community empowerment have been thwarted by state-sanctioned exclusion, violence, and a Drug War 2.0 weaponized with oppressive taxes. Eliminating the excise tax for social equity operators and reducing it to 5% for all others would foster prosperity and social mobility for BIPOC operators while protecting BIPOC patient access to regulated and safe plant medicine. We are nearly out of time, but the governor and Budget and Finance Committee can still change this. Let’s hope they do the right thing,” Senter said.
QUOTE OF THE DAY
“I swear this is a real message I received from a voter. Nobody has ever told me I look like @tonyhawk. While I can’t promise to land a gnarly 360, I do pledge to make our insurance market more fair, just, and accountable. Thanks, Andre!”
- Assemblyman Marc Levine, D-Marin County, via Twitter. Levine, running to be insurance commissioner, shared an email from a supporter who thought he resembled a certain famous skateboarder.
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