Eight to nine million votes were cast on 17 different ballot initiatives that ranged from legalizing marijuana to maintaining Medi-Cal funding to speeding up the death penalty.
With the most number of propositions on the ballot in over 15 years, it was also the most expensive ever, with $473 million spent to convince voters which way to vote.
More than one-third of the money spent came from Big Pharma and Big Tobacco to prevent the passage of propositions that would have cut into their profits.
Merck, Pfizer and Johnson and Johnson spent $109 million to defeat Proposition 61, which would have set the price the state government could spend on prescription drugs to the prices paid by the Department of Veterans Affairs. The VA historically negotiates some of the lowest prices it pays for drugs of any private- or public-sector organization.
TV ads, which were aired constantly, falsely portrayed Prop. 61 as an attack on veterans and benefiting a tiny minority of Californians at the expense of the vast majority. This propaganda campaign overwhelmed the efforts of proponents of Prop. 61 that included the California Nurses Association, the AIDS Healthcare Foundation and Senator Bernie Sanders.
In a win for the vast majority of Californians, Proposition 55 was passed, which extended a tax on wealthy couples making $500,000 a year to continue funding health care and education.
Proposition 56, which added $2 to the price of a pack of cigarettes, was passed by voters. Big Tobacco’s Philip Morris spent over $44 million trying to defeat Prop. 56, fearing the increase in cigarette prices would cut into sales and consequently their profits.
In contrast to the racist anti-immigrant tirades that were a mainstay of Donald Trump’s election campaign, California voters passed Proposition 58, which restores the option for local school districts to teach bilingual education.
A serious blow
The defeat of Proposition 62 and the passage of Proposition 66 was a serious blow to the movement to end the racist and anti-poor death penalty and will increase the pace at which California will execute people.
These two propositions were in opposition to each other. Prop. 62 if passed would have abolished the death penalty in the state of California and would have converted all current death penalty sentences to life without the chance of parole. Prop. 66 will speed up the carrying out of executions. Police and prosecutor organizations opposed Prop. 62 and supported Prop. 66.
The League of Women Voters of California supported Prop. 62 and opposed Prop. 66. Analysis by the League explains:
“California has sentenced 930 people to death since reinstating the death penalty in 1978 but has only executed 13. There have been no executions since 2006, and there are 750 people now on death row. This system, with its extremely high legal expenses and appeals, costs the state 18 times more than life in prison without parole would. Californians have spent $5 billion since 1978 to put those 13 people to death, at a cost of $384 million per execution.”
The League analysis further explains, “Prop 66 … would significantly increase California’s risk of executing innocent people. It would shorten the appeals process and limit prisoners’ ability to present new evidence of their innocence. It is modeled after laws in Texas, a state that executes far more people than any other state.” According the League, “for every 10 prisoners executed since the death penalty was reinstated in 1976, one person on death row has been set free.”
The National Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty, reports a preponderance of studies has shown “that the death penalty is sought more often against people who kill white victims than African American or Hispanic victims.” Additionally, the NCADP reports, “While there are comparable numbers of black and white murder victims in the United States, 77% of the people executed since 1976 were convicted of killing white victims and only 13% were convicted of killing black victims.”
While California took a step back on the question of executions, voters passed Proposition 57, which stopped the warehousing of poor people in jail, by reducing sentences for many non-violent crimes. The proposition also stopped the automatic trying of juveniles in adult court based on the nature of the crime and gave discretion to the judge and prosecutor.
