>> tonight on kqed newsroom. californians voted in record numbers. we'll talk through the winners and losers and state and local measures with her politics team. the presidenti raceis too close to call. mocratic candidate, joe biden, is leading in key battleground sta s. we wandered toe north bay. to fill our i with the old charm of the niche topeared welcome the newsroom. now fokqed newsroom 2020 coverage. let's be good with state and local election news. >> they handed mpanies with a big win with prop 22 winning by

more than 58%. arcus responded by sending stocks sring for uber and lyft. prop 15 failed. crimal justice measures across the bay area are leading. potential he strengthening t.ersight of law enforcem despite a spirited challenge, scott weiner retained his seat for four years. leading in his senate race against dan raffle. politics and governor senior editor and government correspondent. to thank you for joining us. scott, this election is projected to set a state record for the numberof votes st. do you see an impact from the record turnout? >> for joe biden, he will get ai massivoric margin out of california right now. 4 million ballots still coto

t he's got a 4 million+ lead over donald trump. that will pad his national advaage he has. in terms of ballot measures, it's hard to say. its a mixed bag. if you go down the list of ballot measures, californians embraced things like criminal justice rerm. prop 20. they rolled those things back. they endorse giving parolees the right to vote. expanding consumer privacy. at the same time they rejectedwh prop 15 h would raise property taxes on commercial properties. they also rejected affirmative action with prop 16. they accepted prop 22, rejecting labors argument against prop 22 in support lyft and huber and other gig cod anies. >> that wobring back affirmative-action. we notice it was not on track to succeed and it did fail. yo ca tell us what ppened

and why? >> the campaign will talk about this for a ile. it's impossible to get in all the millions of voters minds t we saw in polling thatd play out in terms of the final numbers is it did not resonate with people. i don't think the campaign was successful in making the connection between black lives matter and racial reckonerg having. there seems to be confusion even among latinos and voters of color. what this would do, whether it would benefit them. affirmative action as a statement has a lot baggage attached to it. i think we will see if the polling plays r out, youn voters were more likely to support it. it certt nly was the victory that i think they hope to win when the legislature pu on the ballot. a protest around the nation in june prop 22 one.

that means that workers do not need to be full-time employees. union leaders say they are nodo with this fight. is there anything they can do now that voters have weighed in? >> they are at a clear disadvantage in playing defense. they filed a discrimination lawsuit ying the biases against drivers of color. th may be hoping when joe ts biden into the thwhite house, can go to the labor department and get more favorable rulings. maybe more national guidelines hthat woup these drivers organize, for example. i think it will be tough. thg loss for organized national conversation. a the gig economy is expanding t everywhere, st in california. companies like uber and lyft will take prop 22 elsewhere and use it as a template toat replicate voters here have done in carving out this exception n't california labor law. they don't have a lot of good

options, i would say. >> one of california's biggest export is our ideas. coming up. that nationally and a couple proposals with housing both rent control. what is this say about our perspective about housing and what we arwilling to do about affordability issues? >> this may not be a popular opinion. i think when you look at this ballot, you can't necessarily california's progressive, business, labor? i think what we've seen historically is that californians take their time and lo at them individually. proposition 21 the rent control measure was a battle. rent control has always been controversial in califoia. what you e historically, even though we are progressive on social issues, when it comes to economics there's a split ow between propertyrs and renters, for example. it was also run by an unpopular

figure, michael weinstei the head ofthe healthcare foundation. he got underc by democrats in the legislature passing the mild version of rental hi protection led to governor newsom not supporting this. they got outspent also. i think with the exception of affirmative-action come on every single ballot measure that won they out spent there opponents. you cat look at in a vacuum. with prop 15 the commercial property tax increase. you have a complicated situation for proponents in the recession an much uncertainty and when californians have already's been resident bato rock anything with prop 13. this ballot measure could lead to their property go up not just commercial operties. yospent time this week for with governor newsom and

election elected officials who e hone banking in san francisco. what were their targets and how successful were they in's persuading voters? >> gavin newsom texted maybe 2 to 3 people. he spent a lot of time talking, as did others. he told me when i asked him wherhe was textin pennsylvania, who knows maybe he reached ters that were on the fence. this was an opportunity for him and others inthe bay area. there were two mayors there. jackie speier was there, fr barbara lee the east bay. the local memberfrom the legislature. this is basically to give the media something to do frankly on election day. he did talk about things like who he would name to replace kamala harris if the biden

/harris ticket is successful. he was anxious to shake thands ked to a mom with young babies. that's the thing, bread and butter for politicians. >> no update n new ga newsom would appoint for kamala harris seats should she go to the white house. a young challenger lost but she is being hailed as a smart younleader who willbe successful in a future bid. what does that tell us about oge strength of ssives in california? >> it says a lot. this is a 25-year-old woman unknown politically before this ye. she threw hehat into a ring a few months ago. she had a great showing and excited a lot of folks in the bernie sanders camp of the republican party here in san francisco. they are both progressive democrats. one san francisco scott gets painteis business friendly democrat if you look at the record he's part of the left. also the suboard of rvisors and got the support of the

establishment. for her, she has raised her name and excited a coalprion of ressive democrats in san francisco, we will be hearing from her again. >> on the south bay, david is leading against the rival. and what the lead signifies.rt >> dave he is very well known in santa clara county, a member of the board of supervisors he ran unsuccessfully for more mayor. he's tight with ornized labor. and the challenger they are both democrats. you see is republicans have succeeded inmore moderate democrats. and atbble was in vein. she was endorsed by president obama. he had appointed her to serve on the fcc. the general election commission. she served as a general counsel for santa clara county. not as well known as david

cortez he but the power dynamic betwn the more moderate, business friendly democrat and d david cortez he seems to be winning that see. he will be going to sacramento, six criminal justice reform measures look likely to prevail. if you look at this as a whole, what changes do expect see. >> this is in concert to what we've seen around iminal justice reform. local voters and even statewide voters with the defeat of prop 20. are rtlling to go r than state lawmakers are to take on police unions and the status quo in law enforcement. these are all oad press strokes and accountability and oversight measures. san francisco for example, sheriff's department will have oversight for the first time ever. real win for justice advocates.

me will put pressure on state lawmakers to look more closely on some of these reform issues of the governor haed prome will revisit next year. it speaks to how further have the electorate has been in california over the past10 to 15 years on questions about criminal justice reform and police accountability. of the grassroots support is going to continue to spread throughout the state. distract incumbent mayor, michael tubb has been a popular young democratic superstar in some ways in the rtdemocratic he's trailing his republican challenger, does that surprise you? >> everyone assumed he would úhe ofwon 70% the vote last time. he was not on the radar of the media. that might've been part the problem. the newspaper there has had a lot of layoffs. a new online news organization called the 209 lled the area code.

is run by mayor tubbs and a stream of negative articles online about him. alleging corruption without evidence. it influenced voters there. vin lincoln, african- american, more conservative, up republican. he's ahead. there's still more tubbs is a rising's dart. rack obama had endorshim. a documentary on hbo. real surprising outcome if the current margin holes. former san francisco district attorney has won over the cumberland in los angeles. they were down 20 points and sometime. what changed in the race to give him the wind? >> we did see a lot of financial pport from crimin justice reform and grassroots efforts. he was talked in running by folks down there who saw that

the democrat was not ti repres the future of criminal justice in california. we seen a left would tilt in los angeles coty. all first steimle female board of county supervisors. we have a lot of on the ground organizing. it's not always been as politically engages san francisco. maybe thth's changing. k you both. for the latest california state and local election results visit kqed.org /elections/ results. we've made and mentally prepared for election day to turn into election week but as vote counts drag on, many are becoming weary of the uncertainty over who will be the next president of the united states. vice president e biden has resounding won the popular

vote. as of friday afternoon he was leading in pennsylvania, nevada, arizona and georgia. with a razor thin leadin georgia a recount will take place there. president trump has made baseless lames of voter fraud. and they will have lawsuits in key battleground states. joining me now is a fellow at st the hoover ution and former advisor to the presidential campaign of mitt romney and marco rubio. and from los angeles is a professor of the loyal law school and st of the passing judgment podcast. thank you for joining us. let's start with the legal challenges president trump has i mounted in s states. do you see any of them having the strength to prevail? >> i don't at this point. y

wh need in a legal challenge you have to find a provision of the law that has beenyoiolated and then have to find evidence to support that assertion. at this point, i'm not sure i see that any the cases and that's why frankly, president trump's legal team is having a bad batting average where a number of cases have been dismissed or they've failedthto continue those cases. the real question i think a lot of people have is, is there a case in a statthat's outcome determinative where the case itself, could determine the tc e of that stay. at this point i think the answer is no. of the hypothetical would be, of cours everything comes out for pennsylvania and then pennsylvania comes down to laa few arriving ballots and then those late around arriving ball s are subject challenge and it could potentially go all the way to the supreme court. i don't see that allenge right no not the bush versus gore

moment. >> did the president have republican party support in his coinued fight for the white house? >> if it dles, it's dwg. there is some republicans who continue to stand with the president. what i've observed of over the last couple ofhours and days. the number of republicans that are willing to go all the way with the esident, willing to endorse there's notion of widespread voter fraud or somehow counting on to stop in one state or another, that's by the broad majority of republicans. you are hearing more and more officials begin to pull the ri ord to cu the tiand express their own concerns about some of the president's claims and the impact of the claims on our abilitto trust in the electoral process in american democracy more broadly. >> what is your response to anger over mail-in ballots d.is mispla he should instead direct his anger to fellow republicans to state legislature that restrict did counting of mail-el ballots beforetion day? >> the president, as i understand it himself he voted early. and not by mail but he voted early.

he clumped in his criticisby early voting and vote by mail and he tried to get those mplaints and that was confusing. at the end of the day. whatthwe saw year in the electoral process was a processh in most states, the vast majorityf situations worked ext even when you had cows that began late. yes, it took time for pennsylvania to process its counts. we are seeing the same thing in arizona, nevada and other states. can there be improvements made? of course there cabe and should be. republican and democrat legislatures need to look at state law that would allow votes to be counted earlier. the president himself, so did so much disinformation and discord into the process, i fear many republicans it will fi be dlt to bring this

back. hopefully over the next couple of years we will have the process of trying repair some of the damage that done. >> one of the presidents big wins has been the supreme court and nominees there. he's indicated he will take the fight to thsupreme court. jessica, do you see a role for a supreme court? it to stop counting mail in ed ballots re ived after electi day. is there a legal argument there ? >> i don't think there's a winning one at best. you thmention something is so important and not just now but going forward. president trump has remade th federal bench. he has nominated now a third of the supreme court. that's largely in part iswhy estaent republican stayed with him. they may not have liked x, y, z but he was enormously effective in anremaking the . your question about could this make it to the supreme court? at this point, i don't see itat again, you would need is a case like in pennsylvania that you mentioned, where goes

through either the state supreme court, trl court level, court of appeals, pennsylvania supreme courand then if ere's a question of federal law, it jumps over to the u.s. supreme court or a casethhere goes of federal system, trial court of appeals in u.s. supreme court. you would still need four memberof the supreme court in every case to agree to take the case and eren five methat would make it did decision favorable to president trump. i know it was important for him to have justice barrett onhe court before the election in case there was litigation. my two suspicions right now, number one i don't think t is the big litigation that reaches the supreme court. number two. i don't think there is a law that everyone that is appointed by president trump would vote in a way that would get him a favorable outcome. ndthis may s nacve. there is a difference betweeng

ha conservative legal philosophy and wanting a republican political win. they don't map onto each other always. >> yen are right you sayre blicans didn't leave him despite his concerns about his behavior. we saw that through the vote and how splithe countris. you have thoughts on why the polling, once again seemed to be so off it, especially when they were ying to gauge voters preferences for trump in swing states. >> polls she a sn in time first of all. second of all they reflect assumptions from the posterior about who will show up to vote. electorate is off, thpole will be off. one thing the trump campaign said all along, they were looking to remake the electorate and introduce voters who havever voted before. upper midwest or places like miami dade county in florida. they did that. they actually introduce folks into the electric who have tenot

before who disproportionately supported president trump. posters were looking to partisan compositions of the n electorateection day that frankly, were not accurate. that was in part, one of the a reasons whlot of pollsters miss on key states like florida. it also reflects certain assumptions that posters themsees have about th nature of the electorate, the nature of support for president trump. i think thposters inthe polling industry, they have to take a good, hard look at what went wrong this time around. when we are all said and done they won't be too far off the national popular vote as they weren't in the 2016. it'sroving how hard is to pull in the states where it's difficult to get an effective response rate or effect of assumptiout who will be there on election day. democrats had their hopesh

in senate races across the country. they were not able to pick up the seats they expected and they face a ry neural path to flip control of the senate appeared to races had to a runoff in georgirp was that sing to you? >> i would love to say i call about but it was a bit surprising and maybe i did buy into some of the polling. i also bought into some of the money. there we a couple of democratic challengers who were really well-funded. i thought there was some people like maybe susan collin lindsey graham that look to the polling ney that their opponents were raising and looked at what was happening in the world and i thought mae there's a chance here. it does show, my nac wasn't a chance and there is such power of name recognition. such power of incumbency. in terms of what's going happen in georgia, it's not a done deal. huge implications for if there is a president by not a vice president biden, huge

implications for his term going forward if democrats control the senate. at this point that's a very bi if. democrats are expected to hang onto the majority of the house but republicans picked up at least six seats in the house races. what part of the darepublican agdo you see our significant and winning those seats and attracting those. >> even members of the house don't even have th do supreme court nominations and confirmations. the nomination of amy coleman barrett reminded a lot of republican voters about the value of having some kind of republican repe sentation. they m not want to vote for president trump so they split the ticket. they supported the senate also think some of the president's remarks about what joe biden would do in terms of energy poly in terms of other

areas of policy where they may have felt a lot of his voters may have felt that sounds extreme to me, they may have decided to gowith a republican down ticket as a check on president biden. there will be a number of things going re. quite obviously, republicans vastly out expectations when you look at the house. expectations on senate side track to hold the majority of the senate. nobody would've thought possible as recently as last we>>. et's say joe biden goes into the white house without senate support because of republicans keep their majority. mitch mcconnell could refuse to bring items to a vote in the senate. jessica, are you expecting gridlock for thnext four years? >> i am expecting some level of gridlock it. republicans in different democrats have different ideological backgrounds and different philosophies on how they wa to achievcertain goals. the question is w much gridlock. vice president biden if he

becomes president biden will want to work with senate mae rity leader. in senate there's things we need to get done in the short term. the question is the long-term goals everyone cacome together and have some sort of consensus. my guess is it leave wanting a little bit more and not merely obstruction for an entire term. >> i'm relatively optimistic there are ways in which a republican senate could be very useful for a president biden. there is rkhistory there g together. mission call mitch mcconnell and joe biden know each her from thsenate. that will be useful to getting things done wethres infrastruchealthcare or the economy. i also think the republican senate gives job biden an important foil to hold off the prwaressive left. bidenever interested in single-payer healthcare and the green new deal he has the republican senate as a convenient party to blame. i ge

cathese things done because we got a republican senate here. it helps them do the things he wanted to do and enforce the priorities he wanted to enforce instead of giving into the progressive left. >> thank you both r joining us and for your insight. le s take a loat something beautiful. tonight we take you to the solana county city of venetia. 53 to 1854. state pital from >> you can find more of ou news coverage at kqed.org/newsroom. you can reach me on twitter, facebook and instagram from alof us here at kqed

newsroom, thanks for joining us, good night.

>> this is pbs newshour weekend, sunday. captioning sponsored by wnetsr >> nivasan: on this edition for sunday, november 8: president-elect joe biden and vice-president elect kamala harris address the nation after their historic win. every state but maine where susan collins won. >> jeff greenfield with election analysis and a return to philelphia where a fatal shooting helped galvanize voters next on pbs newshour weekend. >> pbs newshour weekend is made possible by: sue and edgar wachenheim iii. the anderson family fund. dbernard nise schwartz. the cheryl and philip milstein family.