California’s top-two primary system was designed to reward broad appeal and push candidates toward the political middle. Now it’s raising the possibility of something few expected: Democrats being shut out of November’s race for governor.
With eight prominent Democrats competing to replace Gov. Gavin Newsom, party leaders fear the vote could splinter enough that two Republicans — former Fox News host Steve Hilton and Riverside County Sheriff Chad Bianco — emerge from the June primary as the top finishers.
That concern boiled over this week when California Democratic Party Chair Rusty Hicks urged low-polling candidates to drop out just days before Friday’s filing deadline — a move that drew swift backlash from rivals who accused party leaders of trying to push them out.
The backlash from the targeted candidates, whom Hicks didn’t specifically name in his letter, was swift, with many quickly filing their official candidacy paperwork. Tony Thurmond, the state superintendent of public instruction whose candidacy has been polling in the single digits, went as far as calling the political system “rigged,” while newcomer San Jose Mayor Matt Mahan criticized the “political gatekeepers” for trying to choose the next governor. Former Assemblymember Ian Calderon of Orange County was the only candidate to drop out in response to Hicks’ letter — he immediately endorsed East Bay Rep. Eric Swalwell.
Other Democratic candidates in the race are former Rep. Katie Porter, billionaire philanthropist Tom Steyer, former health secretary and Attorney General Xavier Becerra, former Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa and former state Controller Betty Yee.
California transitioned to the top-two primary system following the passage of Proposition 14 in 2010. Backed by then-Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and the California Chamber of Commerce, the initiative came amid broader political reforms that included reducing the share of votes needed to approve the budget to a simple majority of the legislature, and giving the independent redistricting commission created two years prior the power to redraw congressional districts.
Both the California Democratic Party and the California Republican Party opposed Prop. 14. Prior to the change, the state had a closed party system where voters from each party chose the candidate they’d send to the general election.
Andrew Sinclair, an assistant professor of government at Claremont McKenna College who has studied the top-two system, said the “results are pretty mixed” as to whether the system had its intended effect — largely because the state ushered in several other reforms at the same time, making it hard to isolate the effects.
“My overall impression is that it has been an improvement in the process from what we had before, but not something that solved every problem of American politics,” he said.
Under the old partisan primary system, an election for a heavily Democratic district seat could effectively be decided in the primary — when fewer people vote — since the Democrat who emerged would typically win over the Republican in the November general election, according to Sinclair. Independent voters also were excluded from the partisan primary system unless they changed their party affiliation or requested a ballot. The current system ultimately “gives a larger pool of voters the final say,” Sinclair said.
Schwarzenegger, who rarely wades into political debates these days, could not be reached for comment. But Conyers Davis, the global director of the Schwarzenegger Institute at the University of Southern California, said he believes the reform accomplished what it set out to do.
“The top two primary addressed that structural problem by ensuring candidates must compete for the support of the broader electorate, not just partisan insiders,” he said.
But some Democratic and Republican strategists argue that the system has produced a myriad of unintended consequences.
Steven Maviglio, a Democratic political consultant who served as the spokesperson for former Gov. Gray Davis, called the top-two system “anti-Democratic” as it’s “gamed by people who know how to use it.”
“It’s letting the extremists in both parties decide who they want to face in November instead of having the moderate candidate,” Maviglio said.
Maviglio pointed to the 2024 Senate election where now-Sen. Adam Schiff and his allies ran ads touting that Steve Garvey, the former Los Angeles Dodger first baseman and aspiring politico, was too conservative for California in an effort to boost his name among Republican voters. The strategy ultimately worked as Porter and now-Oakland Mayor Barbara Lee, both Democrats, garnered fewer votes than Garvey who advanced to the November election.
The current situation plaguing Democrats — the fear of the majority party being shutout of the election — has happened several times in the past. When the system first went into effect in 2012, the Democratic-leaning 31st congressional district saw two Republicans advance.
It happened again in 2022 — this time in the State Senate’s 4th district where 60% of voters were registered Republicans. Half a dozen Republicans divided the vote, sending two Democrats to the November election.
The top-two system can also end up shutting out large swaths of the electorate if they don’t have a candidate in the general election.
“It doesn’t allow you to vote for the candidate you’d like to vote for in November,” Maviglio said. “As a Democrat, I want to be able to vote for a Democrat and Republicans I think feel the same way. This eliminates the possibility.”
While the top-two system could end up benefiting Republicans in this year’s governor’s race, Ron Nehring, who served as the chairman of the California Republican Party between 2007 and 2011, said parties often chase the “fluke that results in this lockout situation” — a circumstance where he believes everyone loses.
“Think of the irony that the chairman of the party has to actively engage in discouraging Democrats from running for governor, while of course privately he wants as many Republicans as possible to file — not because they want them to earn any votes but because they want to game the system,” he told the Bay Area News Group.
So if both parties are unhappy with the top-two system, why has California kept it around for over a decade?
Sonoma State Political Science Professor David McCuan said that last year there were “low-volume, but high-level talks” between Democrats and Republicans about revisiting the system, which would have to be undone with another ballot measure.
“This season’s events provide an opportunity to show how quickly things can change in politics,” he said. “Because (Republicans) feel they have a better likelihood of getting through the top two and possibly win the governorship, their view on top two has completely changed.”
A spokesperson for the California Republican Party did not respond to a request for comment, but Nehring said that “Democrats have had the opportunity to repeal this thing but they won’t because they have sometimes benefitted from the lockout situation.”
Hicks, the Democratic party chair, said in an interview this week that his “preference would be to have a contest among California Democrats to put a candidate forward to the general election, but that’s not the system that we have.” When asked whether there was an appetite among party leaders to change the system, Hicks said it’s not something that will happen this year as his focus is on taking back the House of Representatives and electing Democrats across the state.
Only a few states in the U.S. use the top-two system for elections. In 2020, Alaska switched to a top-four system that includes ranked choice voting. Nebraska, Louisiana and Washington also use top two in some state elections.
It’s unclear what exactly party insiders might want the state’s next primary system to look like. Nehring and Hicks seem to favor the old partisan process instead of the current one that could shut Democrats out of this year’s governor’s race.
But if Republicans are unable to capitalize on the opportunity to secure their first statewide office in two decades, the appetite to revisit the top-two system could be back on the table, McCuan said. California politics undergo a “political earthquake” roughly every 20 to 30 years, according to the political science professor.
“There are elements here that portend a political earthquake,” he said.
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