Segura and Fraga
ii
Abstract
We focus on the ways in which race and ethnicity are fundamental dimensions to
understanding the 2003 election in California. The specific observation that gives rise to this
effort is that 1,282,253 fewer voters supported Democratic Lieutenant Governor Cruz
Bustamante than voted against the recall of sitting Democratic Governor Gray Davis. Who were
these switchers, and to what extent were these switchers racially motivated in their electoral
decision-making?
Using the Los Angles Times exit poll from the recall election, we examine the
characteristics of voters who displayed two unusual behavioral patters and compare them to
voters who voted in more conventional ways. In the first such pattern, a sizeable portion of
voters voted No on the recall and Against Bustamante. The second unexpected pattern is where
individuals voted Yes on the recall and For Bustamante. We find that Latinos and African
Americans, as compared to Whites and Asian Americans, were far less likely to have defected
from Bustamante given a ‘no’ vote on the recall, and far more likely to have voted for
Bustamante given a ‘yes’ vote—and possibly a strategic ‘yes’ vote—on the recall. Moreover,
every one of those relationships holds up in the multivariate analysis, even once we control for a
host of other socio-demographic and political factors that might have conceivably created the
appearance of a racial divide when there was none.
Convention