Stop the pressure: Tomorrow is Election Day. It matters who you vote for. It will affect you and your children’s lives in the short and long term. The winner will control a vast nuclear arsenal.

We’re talking, of course, about the mayor’s race. Is San Francisco’s mayoral race a priority for you? If so: What’s wrong with you? (Okay, the mayor can’t deploy weapons of mass destruction. Other than that. Sorry Livermore.)

In 2022, nearly 71 percent of San Franciscans voted for Supervisor Dean Preston’s Proposition H, which pushed the 2023 mayoral election to this year. The reason was simple: Turnout in the previous three single-year municipal elections was 42 percent, 45 percent and 29 percent, respectively. In the previous three even-year municipal elections that coincided with presidential and/or gubernatorial elections, turnout was 86 percent, 74 percent and 81 percent.

It’s hard to argue that our most important elections shouldn’t be timed to maximize turnout (as opponents of Proposition H have discovered). You may remember that in 2022, Mayor London Breed claimed that: Proposition H was a “power grab” orchestrated by the city’s far left. It was a statement that was ludicrous at the time and continues to become more ludicrous with each passing minute and million-dollar donations. The most expensive mayoral race of all time.

The idea that getting many more people to vote in a free and fair election is somehow a “power grab,” let alone benefiting the far-left cadre, is the kind of claim you might expect to see espoused in conspiracy podcasts. Sponsored by miracle dietary supplements. It has never been a secret who the real beneficiaries of moving mayoral elections to presidential years will be. we wrote Who would it be in 2022?. We Did it again in January 2024. Not the one on the far left.

On the contrary, rich candidates. Or candidates with access to wealth. There are many reasons for this, but the first is the most obvious: Math.

That’s just simple math. there is currently approximately 521,000 registered voters In San Francisco. In previous mayoral races, around 40 to 50 percent would go to the polls. This year, at least 80 percent of voters will go to the polls. There’s a delta here of maybe 200,000 or more voters. You must reach these less informed voters; they are also -most Reaching voters is difficult.

This costs money.

Political posts you can use to wallpaper three or four rooms of your house? Postage for these is 38 cents per person. If it costs campaigns 80 cents to design, print and send these mailers, and they have to send out up to 200,000 more mailers per batch to reach voters, those costs add up. Come to think of it, it might be more expensive than mailing people the actual wallpaper.