California’s Voter ID initiative goes national

If it wasn’t before, a California initiative to tighten voting requirements became nationalized when Illinois billionaire Richard Uihlein, one of President Donald J. Trump’s large donors, contributed $6.5 million to the Yes-on-Proposition 39 campaign.

Uihlein donated $4 million in December, ensuring that Proposition 39’s backers had sufficient money to gather enough signatures of registered voters to qualify it for the November ballot.

The latest contribution, dated Aug. 4, brings the total Uihlein has donated to the campaign to $10.5 million–half of the $21 million raised so far by the initiative’s backers led by Assemblyman Carl DeMaio, a San Diego Republican.

Proposition 39, which leads in polls, is part of a national push by conservatives to require that voters provide proof that they’re eligible to vote before their ballots are counted.

Voters will consider it as President Trump pressures Congress to approve his Safeguard American Voter Eligibility Act, or S.A.V.E. Act as he claims without proof that large numbers of undocumented immigrants vote and Democrats rig elections. He makes the claim even as Trump occupies the White House, the GOP controls both houses of Congress, a majority of state legislatures, most state attorneys general, and 26 governors to the Democrats’ 24.

In an interview, DeMaio differentiated his ballot measure by saying that unlike the S.A.V.E. Act, Proposition 39 would not curtail mail-in voting.

DeMaio, a podcaster who is known in the Legislature as divisive, said he sought to avoid a “partisan food fight” by tempering his measure, and cited its support from Democrats. Los Angeles developer Rick Caruso, a former Republican turned moderate Democrat, gave $25,000 to the effort in June.

“We felt a bipartisan solution to voter I.D. was necessary,” DeMaio said. “We created a balanced approach of reforms.”

Current state law makes registering to vote seamless when people turn 18 or obtain driver’s licenses, one reason why more than 85 percent of the state’s eligible voters are registered. Californians must provide identification such as a driver’s license or Social Security number when they register to vote, and county election officials check voters’ signatures to verify they’re properly registered.

Proposition 39, which leads in polls, is part of a national push by conservatives to require that voters provide proof that they’re eligible to vote before their ballots are counted.

Proposition 39 would create a state constitutional amendment requiring that voters verify that they’re citizens by showing identification when they vote at polling places, or provide some form of government identification–such as the last four digits of their driver’s licenses–when they vote by mail. Voters would be required to repeat the process each time they vote in any California election, though they could obtain new state-issued voter identification cards.

The nonpartisan Legislative Analyst’s Office estimates that Proposition 39 would cost taxpayers “tens of millions of dollars to low hundreds of millions of dollars” to implement.

Uihlein’s $10.5 million to support Proposition 39 represents his first significant foray into California state politics. Uihlein did not respond to requests for comment left on his voicemail and with his attorney, David Langdon or Ohio.

For years, Uihlein and his wife Elizabeth have been major funders of conservative causes, particularly Republicans who embrace an America First view of domestic policies, as detailed by the investigative reporting organization, ProPublica, in 2022:

“They are major funders to groups spreading election falsehoods, including Restoration of America, which, according to an internal document obtained by ProPublica, aims to ‘get on God’s side of the issues and stay there’ and ‘punish leftists.’”

The New York Times in 2018 described the Uihleins as social conservatives, writing that “opposing gay and transgender rights was frequently a focus” of their political efforts.

The couple initially backed Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis’s failed bid for the presidency in 2024, but shifted to Trump, giving $10 million to the president’s Make America Great Again political action committee in May 2024.

Additionally, the Uihleins donated $2.5 million to the Republican Governors Association during the past decade, and through their Fair Courts American campaign committee, the couple spent millions seeking to tilt state supreme courts toward Republicans, including a failed effort in 2025 to stack the Wisconsin Supreme Court, data compiled by the nonpartisan Open Secrets organization shows.

The Uihleins list their residence as being in Lake Bluff, Ill., and own a corporation, Uline Inc., in Pleasant Prairie, Wisc., which describes itself as the the leading distributor of shipping, industrial and packaging materials to businesses in North America. Its business boomed as more Americans shopped online during COVID-19 pandemic.

DeMaio, one of 20 Republicans in the 80-seat assembly, said he does not know Uihlein and did not solicit the donation. He also pointed to the large numbers of small dollar donations that have flowed in support of the measure.

DeMaio has shown an ability to tap into issues that appeal to conservatives and raise large sums of money from small dollar donors, giving him his own power base. His Reform California ballot measure committee raised more than $4.6 million in the first 18 months of the 2025-2026 election cycle, $3.5 million of which came in increments of less than $1,000. Its $2.2 million in the bank is twice what the California GOP had in its account at the end of the most recent reporting period.

“Proposition 39 has the most diverse small-dollar donor base of all the initiatives put on the [2026] ballot,” DeMaio said. “We’re talking about hundreds of thousands of contributors, and the average contribution is $67 per individual over the past 12 months. … This is fueled by a grassroots, small-dollar donor base.”

The Yes on 39 is vastly outraising the opposition–and that probably will continue as donors who might otherwise spend money opposing the initiative are focused on congressional races and Proposition 40, the initiative on the Nov. 3 ballot to impose a tax on billionaires.

The ACLU has been leading the campaign to defeat Proposition 39, having donated most of its money, $265,000. The No on 39 campaign had $249,000 in the bank at the end of June, the most recent report showing cash on hand.

DeMaio lost twice in court last week, as reported by Courthouse News Service.

Superior Court Judge Shelleyanne Chang of Sacramento sided with Assembly Speaker Robert Rivas and Senate President pro Tem Monique Limón, who sued over what was to be backers’ claims in the voter pamphlet sent to all registered voters that Proposition 39 would save money and make voting easier.

Chang wrote:

“It is hard to conceive how it would be ‘easy’ or ‘easier’ to vote if a voter has to take the extra step of either bringing government-issued identification when voting in person or search for their government-issued identification and supply the last four digits if they vote by mail.”

In a separate case, Superior Court Judge Jennifer Rockwell of Sacramento upheld the official title and summary for Proposition 39 written by Attorney General Rob Bonta, which reads:

“Prohibits citizens from voting unless they present government-issued identification.”

The Yes-on-39 campaign had proposed:

“Establishes additional voter identification and citizenship verification requirements.”

DeMaio’s response:

“California politicians know that a supermajority of California voters support Prop 39’s bipartisan solution for voter ID—so now they are corruptly trying to rig the election by putting a biased and dishonest title on this common-sense measure.”

A slightly different version of this story originally appeared in Dan Morain’s Substack newsletter on August 10th.