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Crankiness thrives at both ends of O.C.’s political spectrum

June 3, 2026

It was like a wake for the aunt nobody really liked. Not a lot of people showed up. The ones who did were a bit sour and surly. And the attendants seemed suspicious, as if you were there to steal the rings off her fingers or something.

Primary Election Day arrived with more of a growl than a bang on Tuesday as we explored the zeitgeist at the polar opposite ends of O.C.’s political spectrum.

“I feel, nowadays, it’s all false promises,” said Salvador Romero of Santa Ana, who voted by mail but strolled by the Salgado Recreation Center’s polling place Tuesday to take in the scene. “Everybody has ideas about how to make everything better. But look at everything. It’s crazy!”

Politically speaking, Santa Ana, we’ll remind you, is bright blue, with 70,230 registered Democrats (49.9% of all registered voters) and just 28,081 registered Republicans (19.9%). No-party preference folks well outnumber Republicans here, with 34,386 (24.4% of the total).

But the vibe, or lack of it, was much the same in Huntington Beach, where MAGA passions run high.

“I was considering not voting,” said Lisa Halford as she led her adorable dog Clover from the art deco/art moderne City Gym & Pool after dropping off her ballot. “I finally took the time to do it last night. There’s no excitement.”

Surf City, for the record, is among the county’s reddest, politically speaking, with 56,367 registered Republicans (41.4% of all its registered voters); 41,156 registered Democrats (30.2%); and 28,400 (20.9%) no-party preference. Newport Beach has more registered Republicans as a percent of all registered voters (47.6%), as does Villa Park (51.2%), but both cities are much quieter about it.

Orange County, meanwhile, is a purple swirl: Democrats retain a significant edge, with some 695,000 registrations (36.4%), compared with Republicans’ 645,000 (33.8%). And the county’s no-party preference voters, 447,000 (23.4%), can determine winners and losers.

Porterville

UC Irvine graduate student Romeo Ignacio, 27, leaves the campus polling place with an “I Voted” sticker and a smile on Election Day, Tuesday, June 2, 2026. (Photo by Mindy Schauer, Orange County Register/SCNG)

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Let’s be real, though. This primary election, despite meh turnout, will determine who makes the November ballot to lead the largest state in the nation and the fourth-largest economy in the world. So a polling place that might exert more political power than you’d expect could be at UC Irvine, close to where UCI law professor and gubernatorial candidate Katie Porter lives.

Katie Porter! Orange County’s own! We’ve never had a viable gubernatorial candidate before. So, as we headed close to the voting center near her University Hills home, we were psyched to feel some electricity.

And, indeed, there were more people streaming in and out than we’d seen elsewhere. But sadly, we were chased away by a poll worker who apparently didn’t get the memo that the Fourth Estate has the legal right to be inside polling places (and to take photographs, as long as we don’t show ballot detail or talk to voters inside the vote center).

We asked poll workers if they’d seen Porter, but only got some long, stern looks. Turns out Porter voted over the weekend, in Newport Beach, which has a nice ironic ring to it, no? (Irvine, incidentally, is far bluer, with registration running 39.1% Democrat, 25.5% Republican and 30.2% no-party preference, according to county data.)

“It’s so important that everyone makes their voice heard before polls close,” said an election-eve missive from Porter. “That’s the only way we’ll stop the special interests who got California into this mess from buying their preferred candidate into office. … This race has been flooded with Big Oil money, special interests spending, and a billionaire’s personal fortune. But no amount of cash can silence the voices of Californians ready to make a difference for working families.”

All quiet

There are two reasons why polling places were so quiet Tuesday, and perhaps why some poll workers were so glum.

One is poor turnout. About 28% of the county’s 1.9 million registered voters had cast ballots by midday Tuesday, according to the Orange County Registrar of Voters. That’s actually considered good for a primary, which tells you how low our participation expectations have become.

The other is the popularity of voting by mail. Some 86% of all votes cast thus far have been by mail, according to the registrar.

By the way, Orange County Republicans clearly don’t buy the evils-of-voting-by-mail thing. The data posted Election Day by the county shows more than 188,000 GOP mail-in returns versus more than 169,000 Democratic ballots.

“This election cycle, we have stressed the importance of voting early — and Orange County Republicans have responded in a big way,” the O.C. Republican party said in a cheerful pre-Election Day newsletter. “Thanks to your efforts, we have seen historic turnout and tremendous momentum heading into the final days of the Primary Election. But the work is not finished. Thousands of Republican voters have yet to cast their ballots, and those votes could make all the difference on Election Day.”

It invited folks to make calls to rouse the faithful to the voting booths, promising doughnuts and coffee in the morning and pizza at lunch.

Apocalypse, now?

Democracy has gotten really weird. Flaccid Voting Rights Act? Bizarre mid-Census-cycle redistricting? The end of the world as we know it?

“We’re a bit polarized,” said Romeo Ignacio, a graduate economics student at UCI with a gift for understatement, after casting his ballot. “In the moment, it feels awful. But in the long term, the systems are in place.”

Halford of Huntington Beach agreed.

“I think we are going to survive,” she said. “There will be bumps along the way. It is what it is. What can you do? Just treat people kindly and get on with it.”

On this Election Day, it might help to remember that we aren’t the first to feel a bit despondent.

“Perhaps you and I have lived too long with this miracle to properly be appreciative,” California Gov. Ronald Reagan said at his inauguration back in 1967. “Freedom is a fragile thing, and it’s never more than one generation away from extinction. It is not ours by way of inheritance; it must be fought for and defended constantly, by each generation, for it comes only once to a people. And those in world history who have known freedom and then lost it have never known it again.”

OK, perhaps that makes me even more nervous. Forget I mentioned it.

Crankiness thrives at both ends of O.C.’s political spectrum Orange County Register

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Crankiness thrives at both ends of O.C.’s political spectrum

Porterville

All quiet

Apocalypse, now?

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