To me, the significant thing about the Gavin Newsom recall effort wasn't that Newsom survived it, but that, despite the current unpopularity of President Biden and the Democratic brand overall, he didn't lose any votes compared to his original election in 2018, in which he got an unusually high 61.9%. During the first year of the Trump presidency, there were lots of special elections to fill seats vacated by Trump cabinet/staff appointees and such and Republicans predictably retained those seats, as the appointees were chosen from safely Republican areas. However, the average Republican margin in these votes through the summer was down 10 percentage points compared the preceding Republican victories therein, and that proved to be a sign of things to come. It was a sign of how the off-year elections that November would go, wherein many seats had previously been won by Republicans by margins far thinner than 10 points. And it was an indication of how the midterms the following year would go, wherein Democrats led by 8.5 percentage points overall, picking up 41 House seats for their biggest midterm victory since 1974 (the year of Richard Nixon's resignation).
For these reasons, I'm taking the fact that there was no reduced margin for Newsom in this recall effort as the significant thing here. It's a warning to the Republican Party that they can't just keep fielding Trump-alike candidates and expect to get different results than they did during the Trump era. This outcome reveals that it was and is NOT just Donald Trump's sparkling personality, lifestyle, and tweets that people objected to, but the substance of his program and general attitude towards other people. Trumpism still fails politically even in the absence of Trump himself, and even in the absence of a popular Democratic president to boot.
Specifically, I would highlight the issue of Covid-19. Every notable candidate vying to replace Newsom (including the Democratic ones who sought to do so, mind you) positioned themselves as softer on the coronavirus. They wouldn't be as safety-conscious or restrictive. No vaccine passports here! And maybe we should just ditch mask-wearing, especially for unvaccinated people. You know? This was the single most unifying theme among Newsom's major detractors on the ballot. This outcome hence makes it very clear -- clearer than it's ever been -- that keeping people safe from the virus is not only the right stand morally, but also remains the winning one politically. People. Want. To live. It's a reality.
As to the Larry Elder himself, the candidate who emerged as the Newsom's principal challenger, all I can do is scoff. Polling indicated that Newsom was struggling until one Larry Elder emerged as the front-runner of the opposition. From there, Newsom was able to recast the vote not as a referendum on him, but as a referendum on the more polarizing Larry Elder instead, and Elder lost. Badly. Why? Well, illustrating why is the fact that his supporters have endlessly complained that Elder was referred to as "the black face of white supremacy." The man proposed that "reparations" payments to slave owners were called for for the loss of their property! I don't know what more they want for evidence that the man would say anything, no matter how unbelievably stupid and reactionary, to try and get the votes of white people. He also claimed on the campaign trail that employers should be permitted to fire women who become pregnant, for becoming pregnant. You can't make this $#@! up! That Republican voters seriously thought this was the best candidate tells you all you need to know about where they are as a party right now and how completely divorced from reality that party is.