Brown Retains Lead In Governor's Race

The Public Policy Institute of California statewide survey shows Brown with a 54 to 33 percent lead over Republican challenger Neel Kashkari. Brown has a job approval rating of 55 percent among likely voters.

A majority of Democrats support the governor while a majority of Republicans support Kashkari. Independents tend to back Brown over Kashkari as well, 45 to 31 percent. Andrew Tauriainen is one of them. He lives in El Dorado Hills and says he’ll be voting for Brown.

“He seems to be more proactive about water issues than Neel Kashkari is,” Tauriainen says. “And that’s near and dear to both my professional and personal lives.”

Registered Democrat Monica Davis lives in Los Angeles and plans to vote for Brown again.

“I think that California needs someone who is strong on environmental issues,” she says, “and I feel like he is being proactive about the drought.”

Davis says Brown’s experience will help him deal with difficult issues the state is facing.

But Registered Republican Steve Thomas of Santa Barbara disagrees.

“I think Brown is a completely failed governor,” Thomas says. “I think he is irresponsible with the budget and he’s trying to force through this bullet train. And I think that California is desperately in need of reform.”

Thomas says he’ll be voting for Kashkari, though he'd rather be voting for Tea Party Republican Tim Donnelly. Donnelly lost in the primary. That mirrors another of the poll’s findings. While 71 percent of Democrats are satisfied with their candidate, only 38 percent of Republicans are satisfied with theirs.  

The poll also found 58 percent of voters support Proposition 1, the 7.5 billion dollar water bond. Just under half of likely voters support Proposition 45. That would require the state insurance commissioner’s approval for changes to health insurance rates. Over 60 percent of voters support Proposition 47, which would require misdemeanor sentences, rather than felonies, for certain drug and property crimes.