Nick Hamilton | United States

For some people, one California was enough.

However, after a petition, named “CAL 3” was completed by venture capitalist Tim Draper reached enough signatures, we may see three new states on the West Coast if this motion is on the ballot and it’s passed by voters in November.

The three new states would all be inside California’s current state boundaries, with the Los Angeles area and some surrounding cities to the south being called, “Cal,” the Northern part of California being called “NorCal,” and the southern part being, you guessed it, “SoCal.”

But let’s think about this for a second. While yes, this may intend to give these culturally different places statehood, we must remember something. California is a Democratic state by far, and it’s not even close. While the “NorCal” region (minus San Francisco and Oakland) tends to be more conservative than other areas, it’s not crazy to think that this may strengthen California’s power overall. Instead of having two seats in the Senate, the geographical region of California would hold six. This could be a threat to the Republican Party for sure. Also, we need to figure out how their electoral voting system will work. While NorCal flipping conservative one of these elections is possible, which would be fantastic for the Republicans, these three states shouldn’t have more than 55 electoral votes combined. If they get more, that’s a power surge.

At the moment, this looks to be a huge win for the Democrats if this ends up becoming a thing. However, the Republicans can mold this into their favor as well, if they can manage to express enough influence in the NorCal region to flip it red. Nonetheless, splitting California into thirds has its benefits and its cons. One major benefit, of course, is added power in the US Senate. It’s inevitable. However, the chances of this happening are quite slim. This would require congressional approval, which is unlikely to happen.

Draper argues that one state government controlling this many people is to blame for California’s homelessness, and their awful education system. While again, the chances of this happening are slim to none, it should be very interesting to see how this plays out.

Image Source WikiMedia