Popular Radio and TV Commentator Susan Shelley of the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association and the Southern California News Group shares her complete 2026 Voters Guide to all races–the Props–Spoiler Alert: Vote YES on Prop 43–the City Measures, even Judges. There are explanations and reasons and even a laugh or two. Read it. Share it. Print it. And VOTE like you life depends on it!
Overwhelmed by election material? Too busy to read a thousand pages of single-spaced “voter information” guides? Happy to help! Here’s my voter guide for the November ballot,
including some recommendations for the judicial races.
STATEWIDE PROPOSITIONS:
NO on Prop. 1 – It’s $11.25 billion of borrowed money for "affordable
housing" that will enrich favored developers and burden taxpayers for
decades with $7 billion in interest payments.
NO on Prop. 2 – A budget shell game to enable spending that the
state can't afford.
NO on Prop. 3 – Another permanent extension of "temporary" tax
hikes. Just stop with this.
NO on Prop. 4 – Eliminates the ban on public money being used for
political campaigns. Seriously, no.
NO on Prop. 5 – Guts the people’s power to recall elected officials by
prohibiting the replacement election on the same ballot. Changes the
law to allow the ousted official to run in the later special election to fill
the office. The legislature put this on the ballot. Of course they did.
(There is no 6 through 36. Don’t call the county, your ballot is not
missing any pages.)
NO on Prop. 37 – A $25 billion program to fund second mortgages for
people who can’t come up with a down payment, paid for by the
people who get the mortgages. Caps on the income of people who are eligible. Caps on the price of the (newly constructed only)
homes/condos they can buy. Goodies for developers who agree to
conditions. It’s a lot of government effort to push people into having
two mortgage payments they’re barely able to afford. And then they
have to pay HOA fees, property taxes, insurance premiums and utility
bills. What could go wrong?
NO on Prop. 38 – This is $8.4 billion of borrowed money for medical
research, to be repaid with interest by California taxpayers. The
mandated spending split seems designed to benefit the individual who
paid to collect the signatures to get it on the ballot.
YES on Prop. 39 – Voter ID. It's long past time for California to join 36
other states and the civilized world in verifying the identity of voters.
Here’s my latest column on why it’s needed and how it will work.
NO on Prop. 40 – The "billionaires tax" that has a provision allowing
the Legislature to amend it later. Guess why.
YES on Prop. 41 – Requires pre-election audits of programs that
would be funded by a proposed special tax. Good idea.
YES on Prop. 42 – Prohibits a tax on retirement accounts and other
assets, blocking Prop. 40. Another good idea. It would also prevent
new wealth tax proposals from popping up every two years from yet
another local of the International Brotherhood of I Want That Money.
YES on Prop. 43 – Protects taxpayers by making it harder to raise
taxes. Restores the required two-thirds vote to pass local special
(earmarked) taxes. Closes a court-created loophole that since 2017
has made it easier to pass sales tax increases and other costly taxes.
Vote yes to close this loophole. Here’s my op-ed for CalMatters in
support of Yes on 43.
NO on Prop. 44 – Similar to the kidney dialysis propositions that
relentlessly haunted previous ballots, this is an attempt to harass non-
unionized clinics.
YES on Prop. 45 – Creates CEQA streamlining for certain types of
projects, including single-family home developments and water
projects. May ease the path for some horrific projects as well, so this
one's a mixed bag.
IN THE CITY OF LOS ANGELES:
NO on Measure FD – This is a one-half percent sales tax increase
that would jack up the sales tax in Los Angeles to 10.75%, the third
half-percent sales tax increase in three years following two in the
county of L.A. in November 2024 and, most recently, in June. This one
was put on the ballot by the firefighters’ union as an initiative so it can
pass with fewer votes, racing through the loophole that Proposition 43
will close if voters get the YES on 43 message in time. The city should
fully fund the fire department without a sales tax increase, and it’s a
disgrace that elected officials are wasting money buying motels and
remodeling the Convention Center when they should be paying for
essential services first.
YES on Measure TE – A tax break for Palisades fire victims who want
to sell without losing even more to the Measure ULA tax.
NO on Charter Amendment LA – Reduces accountability under the
guise of adopting multi-year planning, and removes a ban on
mortgaging city-owned property.
NO on Charter Amendment PL – Removes local planning
commissions, allows the City Council to impose higher density simply
by passing an ordinance.
NO on Charter Amendment EE – Makes it harder to qualify a
referendum (the method by which voters can reject a terrible city
ordinance passed by the Council) and also cuts the number of City
Council meeting days from three per week to just one.
No on Charter Amendment PRK – Gradually increases the charter’s
allocation of property tax revenue to the Parks and Recreation
Department from 0.0325% of assessed property value to 0.065%. The
real problem is that the parks have been robbed of their charter-
mandated share of funding by the City Council, which decided during
the Great Recession to start charging the parks department for
utilities, sanitation and other costs. End the theft, no need for a charter
amendment.
Yes on Charter Amendment PRT – Requires three Airport
Commissioners to live near LAX and two to live near Van Nuys
Airport, to increase understanding of the impact of decisions on local
residents. Also authorizes slightly longer leases for Airports and
LADWP (66 years, up from 50), diverts some Harbor revenue for
public-access waterfront projects, and requires some reporting of
hiring data that unions want collected.
No on Charter Amendment SC – Removes some supposedly
duplicative language related to campaign finance rules for Board of
Education candidates. It would enable the City Council to pass an
ordinance that changes the campaign finance rules for school board
races.
LOS ANGELES CITY OFFICES:
Mayor – There are 87 other cities in Los Angeles County, and any
one of them would be a better choice than Karen Bass or Nithya
Raman.
City Council, District 3 – Tim Gaspar is a better choice than the
candidate running against him.
John McKinney for City Attorney – Without a doubt, vote for John
McKinney.
Los Angeles Community College District:
The board oversees nine colleges, a $10 billion budget and a $5
billion bond program for endless building projects.
Seat No. 2 – Kristina Irwin
Seat No. 4 – Elaine Alaniz
Seat No. 6 – Tonia Arey
IN LOS ANGELES COUNTY:
NO on Measure A – A scheme that would let three arbitrators
approve labor contracts (raises, benefits, pensions) for public safety
employee unions regardless of how it affects the county budget,
followed by a secret 30-day backroom negotiation with the Board of
Supervisors for something less fiscally ruinous. No.
NO on Measure E – In the wake of the 2020 riots, voters in L.A.
County approved giving 10% of the unrestricted General Fund to
NGOs that supposedly were offering community services and
alternatives to incarceration. Due to a clerical error in a later measure
amending the County Charter, this extorted slush fund was
accidentally repealed. Measure E quietly restores it, hiding the
restoration behind a lot of double-talk about “ethics.” Vote NO.
LOS ANGELES COUNTY OFFICES:
Alex Villanueva for Sheriff – As the only county official who seriously
tried to crack down on public corruption, Sheriff Villanueva created a
lot of enemies on the Board of Supervisors. He’s got my vote.
STATE ASSEMBLY, 46TH DISTRICT:
Tracey Schroeder for Assembly. She’s running against Budget
Committee Chairman Jesse Gabriel, who is responsible for the
deceptive Proposition 2, a measure that enables more government
spending of money we don’t have, disguised as a measure that’s
supposedly putting more money away for a “rainy day.” Why is this
even legal? Well, it isn’t, unless the voters are fooled into passing
Prop. 2. Vote NO on Prop. 2, and if you live in this district, vote for
Tracey Schroeder.
STATEWIDE OFFICES:
Steve Hilton for Governor – All the problems in California are man-
made, and Steve Hilton can fix a lot of them. The most sensible,
intelligent, informed, dedicated and hardest-working candidate for
governor you could ever find. Vote for Steve Hilton, and then you can
tell your grandchildren you did something to give them a better future
in California. Go vote. Find a polling place at caearlyvoting.sos.ca.gov.
Gloria Romero for Lieutenant Governor – She would make this job
meaningful. As the former Senate Majority Leader, Gloria Romero has
said people don’t realize that the position of Lt. Governor has certain
powers as the president of the state Senate that can help good
policies and good nominees advance instead of getting stalled. The
editorial board of the Southern California News Group asked the
current Lt. Governor if this was so, and she couldn’t say it wasn’t. The
point goes to Gloria Romero, and so does my vote.
Herb Morgan for Controller – the smartest and best-qualified
candidate for controller by miles and miles. No contest. The controller
can audit the entire corrupt eco-system of government agencies and
organizations that accept state money. The state budget has tripled in
10 years and everything got worse. Vote for Herb Morgan.
Michael Gates for Attorney General – No question, Michael Gates
would do a great job as attorney general, fighting for the people of
California instead of against them. He’s challenging the incumbent,
Rob Bonta, who is entangled so close to a federal prosecution of
corruption charges in Oakland that he had to spend about $500,000
paying criminal defense attorneys to help him answer questions from
investigators as well as produce documents and communications from
his computers and phones. Bonta is a disaster. Vote for Michael
Gates.
Don Wagner for Secretary of State – The incumbent, Shirley Weber,
has repeatedly and dishonestly characterized the voter ID measure,
Proposition 39, as limiting the right to vote, and that’s just wrong.
Jennifer Hawks for Treasurer – Although not experienced in public
finance, Jennifer Hawks is a person of integrity and not part of the
California political machine that is destroying the state.
Sonja Shaw for Superintendent of Public Instruction – Sonja
Shaw’s independence scares the teachers’ unions, whereas her
opponent is wholly owned by the teachers’ unions. The California
Teachers Association is so powerful that it virtually runs the state
government, and you can see how that’s working out. Vote for Sonja
Shaw.
Ben Allen for Insurance Commissioner – Much better than the
alternative.
BOARD OF EQUALIZATION:
The BOE is an elected tax board that oversees property tax
assessment.
District 3 – Mike Gipson
WHAT ABOUT THE JUDGES?
If you vote in Los Angeles, Ventura, Santa Barbara or San Luis
Obispo County, there are two appellate court judges on your ballot
who recently wrote and signed an opinion upholding Measure ULA in
Los Angeles by asserting that voters didn’t mean to limit their own
power to raise taxes when they passed Proposition 13 in 1978. This is
an example of judges changing the meaning of plain language in the
state constitution to achieve an outcome that voters never intended,
and it stretched a loophole that could end taxpayer protections in
California. Send a message that you see them and it’s not okay.
VOTE NO to retaining Armen Tamzarian
VOTE NO to retaining Audra Mori
Read the Southern California News Group editorial board’s editorial
recommending a “NO” vote on Tamzarian and Mori:
Similarly, the California Supreme Court has demonstrated an
irresponsible bias against taxpayers.
Vote NO to retaining Kelli Evans
Vote NO to retaining Joshua Groban
L.A. COUNTY SUPERIOR COURT JUDICIAL RACES:
I’m happy to pass along the recommendations of the editorial board of
the Southern California News Group (L.A. Daily News, OC Register
and nine other daily papers):
Office No. 64 – Maria Ghobadi
Office No. 65 – Anna Slotky Reitano
Office No. 87 – Anthony (A.J.) Bayne
Office No. 131 – Donna Tryfman
ORANGE COUNTY SUPERIOR COURT JUDICIAL RACES:
The editorial board recommends:
Office No. 13 – Robert Mestman
Office No. 41 – Ami Sagel
Here are some other sources for endorsements and
recommendations:
Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association and HJTA State PAC
Southern California News Group editorial board endorsements (LA)
Southern California News Group editorial board endorsements (OC)
Southern California News Group editorial board endorsements (IE)
Links to all columns by Susan Shelley for the Southern California
News Group are here.
Susan Shelley is an opinion columnist and editorial writer for the
Southern California News Group. She’s also Vice President of
Communications for the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association.
Opinions expressed are her own. Contact Susan at
Susan@SusanShelley.com and follow her on X at @Susan_Shelley.
