Gavin Newsom Recall: COVID-19 School Closures Frustrating Parents | National Review
For parents like Clarissa Falen, California governor Gavin Newsom has been a letdown.
Falen, a Bay Area native, described herself as a lifelong Republican fiscal conservative, social liberal and said she broke party lines for the first time when she voted for Newsom, a Democrat, in 2018.
I thought he would stand up to special-interest groups. And I thought he would be innovative in how to run California, she explained, calling him the most qualified at the time.
But one year into the COVID-19 pandemic, Falen, a mother of two high schoolers who now lives northeast of Sacramento, has joined the growing chorus calling for Newsom to be recalled.
The reason? Newsom s inability to get California s public schools open.
In December, the governor who has drawn scrutiny for sending his four children to a private school with in-person learning introduced his Safe Schools for All Plan, which offered $2 billion in grants for elementary schools to return to in-person instruction. But the plan, which requires legislative approval, has been panned across the board, particularly by the state s powerful teachers unions including Newsom s biggest donor in the 2018 governor race.
You can see the writing on the wall that California government isn t changing. And I think the combination of events has created that level of frustration, where parents have to find a voice to make change, Falen said. The recall effort seems one of those ways, and the loudest way, to get our voices heard.
Baby steps. Perhaps unborn baby steps.