Marcio Jose Sanchez / Associated Press
23 Jul 2021
If Democrats hoped to keep conservative talk radio host Larry Elder off the ballot in the upcoming recall election of Gov. Gavin Newsom, their plan backfired spectacularly this week.
Not only did Elder win his case in court, forcing Secretary of State Shirley Weber to place him on the list of candidates, but he also earned free statewide publicity as a result.
Elder left open the question of whether Democrats had deliberately conspired to keep him out of the race. But after all the complaints about new Republican voting laws, and continuing accusations of “Jim Crow” from President Joe Biden on down, it was certainly ironic to see Democrats in California try to keep a black candidate off the ballot for allegedly failing to redact his tax returns properly, while exempting the white incumbent from having to submit tax returns at all.