A man votes in California's special election in October 2025.
Sacramento, California – One week before California voters decide Proposition 50, a measure redrawing the state’s congressional map, Republicans appear to have all but surrendered. What once promised to be a multimillion-dollar fight over political power in the nation’s most populous state has fizzled into a one-sided rout — with Democrats flooding the airwaves and Republicans largely falling silent.
Governor Gavin Newsom’s Yes on 50 campaign spent $3.8 million on ads last week alone. The two Republican opposition groups combined spent just over $150,000. The biggest GOP donor in the race, Charles Munger Jr., has virtually disappeared from the field. His committee, Protect Voters First, which once poured $4 million a week into television and digital ads, spent less than $300 in the week of October 21.
“It’s as full-throated a campaign for Democrats in California as if we were in the middle of a presidential election,” said Jon Fleischman, a former executive director of the state Republican Party. “But you can go to the house next door, occupied by Republicans, and it’s crickets.”
The imbalance is striking. Back in August, when Newsom first announced the proposal, internal polls showed the measure’s support hovering barely above 50 percent — a margin small enough to make Republicans optimistic. Then–House Speaker Kevin McCarthy pledged to raise $100 million to defeat it, framing the ballot fight as a referendum on California’s one-party rule. But that effort never materialized.
A CBS News poll released last week showed 62 percent of likely voters now support Prop 50 — a 12-point swing in just two months.
Republican committees insist the race isn’t over. “We still believe there’s a pathway here,” said Jessica Millan Patterson, a former California GOP chair now leading McCarthy’s Stop Sacramento’s Power Grab committee. But her optimism sounded more dutiful than convincing.
Munger, a wealthy philanthropist and longtime advocate for California’s independent redistricting process, has personally spent more than $30 million defending that system over the years. His committee said in a statement that it will “continue to communicate with voters” but declined to discuss strategy. Insiders say Munger hit a self-imposed spending cap — and no other major donors stepped up to fill the void.
The lack of investment has left Republican organizers struggling to match Democrats’ digital dominance. “They’re still sending snail mail,” Fleischman quipped. “Somebody’s wasting money.”
The frustration has spilled into public view. Assemblymember Carl DeMaio, one of the few Republicans still campaigning against Prop 50, accused the state’s party establishment of “defrauding donors” and “profiting off failure.”
For Democrats, the collapse of GOP resistance is both political and symbolic. The measure would cement Democratic control of California’s congressional delegation for a decade, securing a firewall against Republican gains elsewhere in the country.
