The vast majority of counties had a decrease in turnout compared to the 2018 gubernatorial election, that was widely expected considering this was an "off-year." The turnout deficit could explain the marginal swings against Newsom from reliably blue counties such as Los Angeles and San Francisco. The sharpest swings against and toward Newsom were from Lassen and Lake counties respectively. Lassen was not only the county that Newsom did the worst in, but also had the second highest turnout increase compared to 2018. (The highest increase was in Amador which favored recalling the governor.) Meanwhile, Lake had the biggest drop in turnout, while having the most favorable swing. Turnout difference had the strongest correlation to the swing compared to the other variables: COVID cases and the unemployment rate. It accounted for 30% of the variation across counties.