US: California governor recall reaches enough votes

ANKARA

The recall election effort to remove California Governor Gavin Newsom from the office has reached enough votes in the Golden State, according to California's Secretary of State.

Out of over 2.1 million signatures submitted, 1,626,042 signatures have been validated as of Monday, which is more than the 1,495,709 needed in state law, it said.

County elections officials, however, must continue to verify the validity of any remaining signatures and must report the final signature verification on April 29, 2021, it added.

After that date, there will be a 30-business day opportunity for voters to remove signatures from the recall petition if they choose so. More than 130,000 signatures are needed to be removed at this point to prevent the recall.

If the recall is not prevented, California Secretary of State Lieutenant Governor Eleni Kounalakis will announce a date for the recall election, which is expected to come in the fall.

While groups demanding a recall hold Newsom accountable for unemployment, lockdowns, homelessness, rising crime and pension debt, the governor claimed last month a coalition of national Republicans, which include anti-vaxxers, Q-Anon conspiracy theorists and anti-immigrant Trump supporters, are behind the recall efforts.

Gray Davis was the only California governor to be recalled. He was replaced with Arnold Schwarzenegger who announced his candidacy in the 2003 recall election, which was called "Total Recall" -- one of the hit movies of the Hollywood star.