Biden to visit California on Monday to boost Newsom and view wildfire damage
President Joe Biden will make his first visit to California since taking office next week to appear with Gov. Gavin Newsom in Long Beach, a White House official said Thursday, as he seeks to give the incumbent a last-minute boost in the state’s gubernatorial recall election.
Biden will also visit Sacramento on Monday to view wildfire damage in the area, according to a White House official, after a summer of fires in the region have scorched hundreds of thousands of acres of land and forced the evacuation of thousands of residents.
The two-day western swing includes a stop in Boise, Idaho, to visit the National Interagency Fire Center, and an event in Denver, Colorado, where Biden on Tuesday will promote his economic agenda.
Biden’s visit to California will fulfill a promise to campaign for Newsom, a staunch White House ally, and comes less than a week after Vice President Kamala Harris appeared at a Bay Area rally for the governor. The election has drawn national attention as a potential political bellwether for next year’s midterm elections, though in recent weeks the White House has been more preoccupied with a chaotic withdrawal of U.S. troops from Afghanistan.
Newsom has been stuck in a tougher-than-expected race for much of the summer, but polls have shown that public support for keeping him as governor has risen in recent weeks.
Forty-six candidates are on the ballot to replace Newsom, led by Republican talk show host Larry Elder, but recall rules stipulate that a majority of voters must first decide to remove the incumbent from office.
Democrats have encouraged a Biden visit in hopes that the president would boost turnout, particularly among Democratic voters who weren’t paying close attention to the race. But the president’s stopover will come nearly a month after mail-in ballots were issued in the state and, according to Political Data Inc., after more than 6.5 million California voters have already submitted a ballot.
This story was originally published September 9, 2021 at 1:11 PM with the headline "Biden to visit California on Monday to boost Newsom and view wildfire damage."
