A vanishingly small number of people are informed on local issues enough to elect people that represent their views. And in California at least, local politics is completely toxic and has very nasty people that have been allowed to bully, yell, and spread falsehoods about anybody new to politics.

It kind of reminds me of a much more innocuous version of the French Revolution when it was going off the rails, and the wrong political opinion meant death. Almost nobody voted in elections, because keeping your head down was the best way to keep it attached to your body.