Proposition 50, the mid-decade congressional redistricting effort pushed by Gov. Gavin Newsom and other Democrats, may be the current talk of the town.

But it’s not the only ballot measure Republicans are paying attention to.

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At the same time that members of the GOP are devoting vast sums of money and time to defeat Prop. 50 this November, others are working on getting a separate measure — one focused on voter ID reform — onto the ballot for next year.

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The California Voter ID Initiative, an effort headed by Assemblymember Carl DeMaio, R-San Diego, and state Sen. Tony Strickland, R-Huntington Beach, has been busy recruiting volunteers and raising money in hopes of getting a measure placed on the 2026 ballot.

If the initiative is successful, voters in California would have to show a government-issued ID to vote in person, or provide a verified ID number, like the last four digits of one’s Social Security or driver’s license number, when voting by mail.

In addition, the initiative would require voter rolls to be updated to ensure accuracy and that all registered voters are U.S. citizens.

“Voters are losing trust and confidence in our election system,” DeMaio said in an interview, adding that both Democrats and Republicans have raised claims of alleged election rigging in recent times.

“One of the most important reforms that we can make is voter ID, not only because it works but also because voters have said that that would make them feel much more comfortable in the process, to restore their trust,” he said.

Reform California, the grassroots organization chaired by DeMaio, and supporters were recruiting volunteers during last weekend’s California Republican Party convention in Orange County as they make plans to start gathering voter signatures to get their proposed initiative onto next year’s ballot.

Once the signature gathering period starts, the campaign will have 180 days, or until about mid-March, to collect signatures.

The campaign will need just under 875,000 valid signatures from registered voters to qualify their measure for the ballot, and they hope to collect roughly 1.25 million signatures statewide to ensure they meet the requirement, according to a Reform California video.

As of Thursday, Sept. 11, the campaign had over 10,000 confirmed volunteers, and Reform California had raised about $1.5 million toward a goal of $3 million, DeMaio said. Other groups that support the effort may be raising money as well toward the overall cause, he said.

Currently, 36 states request or require voters to show some form of ID at the polls, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures.

But California and 13 other states, plus Washington, D.C., rely on other methods to verify a voter’s identity.

Meanwhile, recent public opinion polls show the majority of those surveyed support some form of voter ID.

An October 2024 Gallup poll showed that 83% of Americans supported requiring proof of citizenship when registering to vote for the first time and 84% favored requiring a photo ID to vote.

Another poll conducted in April by the UC Berkeley Institute of Governmental Studies, which was co-sponsored by the Los Angeles Times, similarly found that a majority of Californians surveyed (71%) — including 59% of Democrats, 95% of Republicans and 71% of third-party voters or those registered as no party preference — supported requiring proof of citizenship to register to vote.

In addition, the poll found 54% of all respondents backed requiring voters to show a government-issued ID each time they cast a ballot, though about 60% of Democrats opposed the idea.

Matthew Dobler, a resident of Lake Elsinore in Riverside County who attended the recent CAGOP convention, considers voter ID “basic common sense.”

“You need an ID to buy alcohol, cigarettes, get on an airplane. You should have to show an ID to vote,” he said. “That ensures fair and safe elections. … It would ensure one person, one vote.”

A Costa Mesa woman recently made headlines after being charged with five felonies for allegedly registering her dog to vote — and casting ballots in the dog’s name during the 2021 recall election against Newsom and the 2022 primary election. The 2021 ballot was counted, but not the 2022 one.

The woman’s attorney said her client, a Republican who registered her dog as “no party preference,” regretted her attempt “to expose flaws in our state voting system, intending to improve it by demonstrating that even a dog can be registered to vote.”

According to the California secretary of state’s office, instances of voter ID fraud are “exceedingly rare.”

Besides requiring voters to attest, under penalty of perjury, that they are a U.S. citizen and are eligible to vote, the secretary of state’s office cross-checks each person’s identity with the state Department of Motor Vehicles, federal Social Security Administration and other government agencies, the office said.

“California takes every allegation of voter fraud seriously,” the secretary of state’s office said. “The state has multiple safeguards, from signature verification to routine audits, to ensure the integrity of every ballot cast in California.”

According to the Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank, there were 68 documented cases of individuals committing some form of election fraud in California since 2000. That included 40 over the past decade and one in 2024.

There are roughly 23 million registered voters in the state.

DeMaio, meanwhile, has been a vocal advocate for voter ID reform.

He initially sought to enact similar reforms through a proposed state bill earlier this year. But AB 25 never made it out of committee in the Democratic-controlled California Legislature.

So now he’s looking to change the law through a ballot initiative.

Over the next several months, Reform California has planned over 50 events, both online and in person, related to its voter ID campaign and, in most of those instances, to also campaign against Prop. 50, the congressional redistricting measure appearing on the Nov. 4 ballot.

DeMaio said Democrats are using Prop. 50 to distract the public from the issue of voter ID, but he said that tactic is not working.

“We haven’t let it distract us. We can chew bubble gum and walk at the same time,” DeMaio said. “Our volunteers are concerned about both.”