AP PHOTOS: Scenes from a blue state as California votes
If anything can be certain in a tumultuous 2020, it's surely California and its 55 electoral votes.
Since the early 1990s, the state that produced Republican Presidents Richard Nixon and Ronald Reagan has gone for Democrats in presidential elections. Its reputation as the anchor of the country's so-called left coast is so entrenched that Republicans elsewhere often use California as shorthand for all things liberal.
But the lack of Election Day drama has not dampened the electoral enthusiasm of the state's more than 22 million registered voters, who are casting ballots in record numbers.
Though California is heavily Democratic, it's not hard to find Trump supporters, including in solid-blue Los Angeles.
Shiela Ruiz kissed a photo of the president while attending a boat parade in Westlake Village, saying she has been waiting “for years for a non-politician to run for office.”
And Gabriel Lebanon stood alone in the streets mocking Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden while waving a large “Trump 2020” flag. “Being a Trump supporter in California is hard,” he said.
He's right that Democratic-minded voters outnumber his side.
Brandon Little has been wearing a facemask emblazoned with the Biden campaign logo. The 32-year-old registered nurse said he believes his and his partner's lives are at stake because of the way Trump has handled the country's pandemic response.
“It's a big slap in the face to anyone that is working in this industry,” he said.
California mailed ballots to all active registered voters this year, and more than 8.7 million have already been returned. That's nearly 60% of all votes cast in the 2016 presidential election in California.
People can still vote in person on Election Day, but they will have fewer options as most counties are running fewer vote centers than in previous elections.
