California’s Sept. 14 recall election could shift the balance of the US Senate.
Larry Elder, the Republican best positioned to replace Gov. Gavin Newsom, would have the sole power to name a replacement for 88-year-old Democratic Sen. Dianne Feinstein in the evenly divided body — and hinted he might do just that.
“God forbid Gov. Elder should replace Dianne Feinstein who nobody’s seen in weeks,” Elder — who leads the pack of potential replacements for Newsom — said Friday.
Feinstein, a six-term senator from California, is the Senate’s oldest member. She has faced sharp criticism from fellow Democrats in recent months over her mental acuity — grumblings that forced her to give up her perch as the chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee in December.
“I’m told she has a worse mental condition than even Joe Biden,” Elder told conservative radio host Mark Levin, Fox News reported.
“They’re afraid I would replace her with a Republican — which I most certainly would do and that would be an earthquake in Washington DC,” he said.
Democrats control the Senate by the barest possible margin. Only the tie-breaking vote of Vice President Kamala Harris keeps Majority Leader Chuck Schumer in his role.
In a poll released this week, Elder was the choice of 26 percent of California voters who favor ousting Newsom, whose pandemic policies have been widely unpopular in the Golden State.
None of the other 45 candidates on the lengthy slate hit double digits in the poll, which was conducted by the nonpartisan Public Policy Institute of California, the Los Angeles Times reported.
But the same poll found only 39 percent of likely California voters in favor of kicking Newsom out of office, with 58 percent opposed — meaning that the governor may retain his office once the all-mail election is complete.