Gray Davis isn’t a name you hear much in 2026, but if you lived through the early 2000s in California, his face was basically everywhere. Mostly on posters that wanted him gone. It’s wild to think about now, but Davis was the first governor in California history to be kicked out of office by the voters before his term was even close to being done. It was a political earthquake.
Honestly, his story is kinda tragic if you look at the numbers. He won his first election in 1998 by a massive landslide—58 percent of the vote. People liked him. He was a Vietnam vet with a Bronze Star, a Stanford grad, and he’d paid his dues as Jerry Brown’s chief of staff and then as State Controller. He was the "safe" choice. He was moderate, maybe a little boring, but he knew how the machine worked.
Then everything that could go wrong did.
The Energy Crisis: When the Lights Literally Went Out
You can’t talk about California Governor Gray Davis without talking about the rolling blackouts of 2000 and 2001. Imagine being the governor of the 5th largest economy in the world and suddenly you can't keep the lights on in San Francisco or San Diego. It looked terrible.
But here’s the thing most people get wrong: Davis didn't cause the crisis. It was actually a deregulatory mess signed into law by his predecessor, Pete Wilson. Companies like Enron—yeah, that Enron—figured out they could "game" the system. They’d literally tell power plants to shut down for "maintenance" in the middle of a heatwave just to drive up the prices.
Davis was stuck. If he let the retail rates go up, the voters would hate him. If he didn't, the utility companies would go bankrupt. He tried to play it down the middle, but he ended up looking indecisive. He eventually signed long-term power contracts at high prices to stabilize the grid, which critics then used to say he’d locked Californians into expensive bills for decades. You really couldn't win.
The "Car Tax" and the Final Straw
By 2003, the state budget was a disaster. The dot-com bubble had popped, and the surplus Davis inherited had turned into a $38 billion deficit. To try and fix it, his administration triggered a provision that tripled the Vehicle License Fee—basically the "car tax."
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Bad move.
If there is one thing Californians care about more than politics, it’s their cars. When people started getting DMV bills that were $200 or $300 higher than the year before, the anger became real. It wasn't just "politics" anymore; it was personal.
The Circus of 2003
The recall wasn't just a vote; it was a total spectacle. Because of California’s weird laws, almost anyone could get on the ballot if they had a few thousand dollars and some signatures. We’re talking 135 candidates. There was a porn star, a sumo wrestler, and Gary Coleman from Diff'rent Strokes.
But the "gorilla in the room" was Arnold Schwarzenegger.
Arnold didn't even announce he was running until he was on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno. It was brilliant marketing. While California Governor Gray Davis was trying to talk about budget spreadsheets and policy, Arnold was out there talking about "cleaning house" and "terminating" the status quo.
The vote on October 7, 2003, wasn't even close. 55 percent of voters said "Yes" to the recall. Davis was out.
What Most People Forget
People remember the failure, but Davis actually did some pretty big things that still affect California today.
- Greenhouse Gases: He signed the first law in the nation to reduce global warming emissions from cars.
- Stem Cell Research: He was the first governor to authorize it.
- Education: He made K-12 accountability a huge thing, and test scores actually went up five years in a row under his watch.
He wasn't a "bad" governor in the sense of being corrupt or lazy. He was just a traditional politician who got hit by a perfect storm of corporate fraud (Enron), a tech crash, and a celebrity opponent.
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Where is Gray Davis Now?
He didn't just disappear into the woods. In 2026, he’s still a "gray eminence" in California politics. He’s a lawyer at Loeb & Loeb in LA and he actually spends a lot of time mentoring younger politicians. In fact, he even served on Gavin Newsom's economic task force during the pandemic. He and Schwarzenegger actually became kinda friendly over the years, often appearing together to talk about how the recall system needs to be reformed so it isn't used as a political weapon every time a governor makes an unpopular decision.
Just last year, in late 2025, he was appointed co-chair of the Southern California Leadership Council. He’s 83 now, but he’s still in the mix.
Lessons for Today
If you’re looking at California politics right now, the Davis story is a massive warning. It shows that popularity is fragile. You can win a landslide in November and be looking for a new job by the following October if the "vibe" of the state shifts.
How to think about Gray Davis today:
- Look at the "Why": When you see a political recall, ask if it’s about a specific crime or just general frustration with the economy. For Davis, it was 100% the latter.
- The Enron Factor: Always remember that private companies can tank a politician's career. The energy market manipulation was the real "villain" of the Davis years.
- The "Car Tax" Rule: If you’re a politician, don't mess with things that people see in their mailboxes every month.
Next time you’re looking into California’s budget or energy grid, take a second to look at the 2003 archives. It’s a blueprint for how quickly things can fall apart when the lights go out and the bills go up.