2026 CA DSA General Election Voter Guide
Introduction
We, in 2026, are in a new era for democratic socialism. Wins across the country by DSA members—from Zohran Mamdani, Claire Valdez, and Darializa Avila Chevalier in NYC; to Chris Rabb in Philadelphia; to Melat Kiros in Denver; Donovan McKinney in Detroit; and more—have shown that a politics grounded in working people, in solidarity and collective action, and in democratic socialism, are not only popular but powerful. DSA chapters across the country, as well as other leftist and progressive groups and candidates, have seized this moment and are running more ambitious and plentiful campaigns than ever before.
However, the socialist analysis of our election ballots must extend beyond just DSA endorsements. DSA’s endorsements are rare and special. They are democratically decided upon by chapters and mean that chapter is committing to devoting time and resources to that campaign.
However, there is still value in recommending certain candidates, largely to contextualize the choices on our ballots. Who are these candidates and how did they build power? What are the dynamics of the races they’re running in? Will their priorities build socialism, or at least help California’s working class? We hope this guide will function as an educational tool to understand what it takes to bring working class power to the state, as well as help you fill out your ballot.
For some races, CA DSA opted to issue no recommendation. The reasons for these vary from race-to-race, and will sometimes be explained by a write-up. However, most “no recommendations" stem from the simple fact that no candidate in the race, which is usually filled by Corporate Democrats or MAGA Republicans, is progressive enough to be recommended. We’ve generally chosen to focus on Democrat vs Democrat races (as well as statewide propositions). Where Democrats are running only against Republicans, there’s no need to issue recommendations, as we would never consider recommending a Republican, and we can assume that readers of a democratic socialist voter guide will not vote for Republicans. Intraparty contests are where distinctions between the left and the center come to the forefront.
Below we will link the voter guides of DSA chapters across California as they are published for greater insight into local races.
Contents
Click or tap on a button above to jump to that section
Local Chapter Voter Guides
Links added as voter guides are published
Statewide Offices
California Governor: No recommendation
After a crowded and chaotic primary, California’s general election for governor is between former U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra and Republican Steve Hilton. Becerra’s résumé is certainly long; he has been in some kind of public office almost uninterrupted since 1990. His milquetoast policy platform promises very little change from the status quo, and during this time as HHS Secretary, he largely refused to take more progressive action. With his deep ties to the Democratic establishment, Becerra is more of the same disappointing corporate Democrat we’re used to. His general election campaign has been somehow even less inspired than his primary campaign. Our only hope for him right now is that his campaign doesn’t suppress turnout from progressive voters. He is not likely to be a good governor.
Republican Steve Hilton is a unique candidate insofar as he is a Tory apparatchik so notorious he inspired a Thick of It character. After so long in the wilderness, it seems the CA GOP is hoping that unreconstructed Cameron-ite One Nation Conservatism is the solution to their problems. We hope, going forward, the Republicans will run bureaucrats from increasingly obscure failed overseas political projects.
Becerra will win; he does not need or want our recommendation.
Lieutenant Governor: No Recommendation
The general election for lieutenant governor pits State Treasurer Fiona Ma against Republican Gloria Romero. Ma entered the primary with the bulk of endorsements from California’s political establishment and much of organized labor. But her politics are largely those of the state’s Democratic establishment, and a former staffer has accused her of sexual harassment and racial discrimination.
Whatever the differences between Ma and Romero, Ma has not given socialists an affirmative reason to recommend her. As in other straightforward Democrat-versus-Republican statewide contests, we make no recommendation.
Attorney General: No Recommendation
Incumbent Attorney General Rob Bonta advanced easily to the general election, where he faces Republican Michael Gates. Bonta has generally governed from the more progressive side of what we have come to expect from a California attorney general, particularly one originally appointed by Gavin Newsom, but he fumbled the bag pretty spectacularly on the Paramount-Warner Brothers deal, harming Californian workers in the process.
Bonta doesn’t need our recommendation; he will win easily.
Secretary of State: No Recommendation
Incumbent Secretary of State Shirley Weber faces Republican Orange County Supervisor Don Wagner in the general election. Weber’s tenure has otherwise been fairly unimpressive. California’s ballot-counting process has continued to become slower, which Weber argues is necessary for accuracy, and disability advocates unsuccessfully sued her office over voting accessibility.
Wagner is a conventional Republican opponent, and Weber remains the overwhelming favorite. No recommendation.
Treasurer: No Recommendation
Lieutenant Governor Eleni Kounalakis advanced to the general election for State Treasurer, where she faces Republican Jennifer Hawks. Kounalakis entered the race after abandoning a gubernatorial campaign that had failed to gain traction. She is extraordinarily well-connected, comes from a wealthy family, and has the blessing of much of California’s Democratic establishment, including Governor Gavin Newsom and both of California’s U.S. senators.
This is another conventional Democrat-versus-Republican statewide contest, and we make no recommendation.
Controller: No Recommendation
Incumbent State Controller Malia Cohen faces Republican investment executive Herb Morgan in the general election. Cohen was never seriously threatened in the primary and is strongly favored for re-election.
There is no compelling socialist candidacy here and no reason for CA DSA to issue an affirmative recommendation merely to restate the partisan choice already obvious to voters. We make no recommendation.
Superintendent of Public Instruction: No Recommendation
The race for State Superintendent of Public Instruction is formally nonpartisan, but the general election is effectively a contest between two very different political projects. Richard Barrera, longtime president of the San Diego Unified School District board and a senior adviser to outgoing Superintendent Tony Thurmond, is strongly backed by the California Teachers Association. Barrera points to a record of raising educator pay, protecting family health benefits, expanding community schools, investing in school facilities, and defending immigrant and LGBTQ students. Barrera also alienated much of organized labor in San Diego during his time as SDUSD president.
His opponent, Chino Valley Unified School District board president Sonja Shaw, represents the organized right in California education politics. Shaw has made opposition to protections for transgender students a centerpiece of her politics and is backed by the California Republican Party, Moms for Liberty, and the California Rifle and Pistol Association.
Barrera was not our preferred candidate in the primary, and his coalition also includes charter-school advocates and all sorts of unsavory establishment Democratic figures. We therefore make no affirmative recommendation, but do not vote for Sonja Shaw.
Insurance Commissioner: Jane Kim
California’s Insurance Commissioner is one of the state’s more obscure elected offices, but it has unusually direct power over one of the most predatory industries in the state. The commissioner licenses, regulates, and investigates insurance companies and enforces consumer protections at a moment when Californians are facing soaring premiums, lost coverage, and a growing climate-driven insurance crisis.
Jane Kim, the former San Francisco supervisor and former executive director of the California Working Families Party, has a long history as a prominent figure on the California left. She won office in San Francisco against the Democratic machine, served as California political director for Bernie Sanders’s 2020 presidential campaign, and has spent years organizing around working-class economic issues.
Kim has clearly distinguished herself as the progressive in this race. She is running on aggressively regulating the insurance industry and creating a public Disaster Insurance for All program. She is endorsed by Bernie Sanders and has significant support from organized labor, including major teachers’ unions, nurses, and other unions.
Her opponent, State Senator Ben Allen, is a mainstream coastal liberal with deep support from the Democratic Party establishment. Allen is to the left of many California Democrats and has worked on insurance and climate issues in the Legislature, but he does not offer the same politics of confrontation with the insurance industry or the same broader working-class orientation as Kim.
This is exactly the kind of general-election race where a socialist recommendation matters: voters have a genuine choice between an establishment liberal and a candidate rooted in the progressive and labor left. We recommend Jane Kim for California Insurance Commissioner.
Board of Equalization
District 1: No Recommendation
District 2: Sally Lieber
The only non-term-limited incumbent on the Board of Equalization, Sally Lieber is a progressive former Assemblymember who was elected to the BOE in 2022 with the endorsement of Silicon Valley DSA. Though she hasn’t been endorsed for re-election, she remains an ally, and her challenger, Democrat John Pimentel, is to her right. We recommend Sally Lieber for California Board of Equalization, District 2.
District 3: Sam Sukaton
The low-visibility, low-voltage, countywide California State Board of Equalization (the recently-defanged state tax commission) is one of the few Dem-on-Dem races coming out of the June primary. The California State Board of Equalization (BOE) is the only elected tax board in the US. We Californians love voting for things, especially when they’re very esoteric to voters. Before 2017, the BOE had far more responsibilities, but due to mismanagement of millions of dollars of funds and political corruption, Governor Jerry Brown and the California Legislature stripped the BOE of most of what it was tasked to do. Now, it primarily administers taxes and audits state-assessed properties. The BOE has four elected districts—District 3 covers all of Los Angeles County.
Mike Gipson is leaving the Assembly after twelve years of service to Big Oil, Big Tobacco, and the cop lobby, up to lying about his own police service. He's leveraged his power in the Capitol to build a war chest for his retirement gig on the BOE. The status quo coalition is falling in line behind him, as he’s received the endorsement from the Democratic Party, the California Federation of Labor, and numerous electeds from his time in the state assembly. The BOE is an office that is largely bureaucratic and non-political in nature, but the campaign donations from big corporations don’t instill confidence in us that he’ll make sure that everyone pays their fair share of taxes.
Democratic socialist and higher education labor organizer Sam Sukaton beat a field of ten, including a self-funded millionaire and a former Assemblymember to face Gipson in November.
With Gipson’s warchest and establishment support, making up the 10% gap between him and Sukaton will be tough. But between an immigrant-baiting, Islamophobic, unprincipled, fossil fuel-funded corporate hack and a comrade with a vision to tax the rich, fix Prop 13, and fund our future, there's no contest.
Vote Sam Sukaton for State Board of Equalization.
District 4: No Recommendation
Ballot Propositions
Proposition 1: Yes
Prop 1 authorizes $11.25 billion in state bonds, mainly for multifamily affordable housing, preservation/supportive housing, veterans' housing, homeownership assistance, and farmworker/tribal/student housing.
California's housing crisis is fundamentally a result of housing being treated as a commodity; working-class tenants bear the consequences through enormous rents, displacement, and homelessness. Prop 1 is a flawed solution, but the positives outweigh the negatives. These bonds create a real public subsidy for housing that the private market will not produce at affordable rents. The proposition includes billions for affordable rental construction/preservation and supportive housing. However, as socialists we must note that bonds are a bad way to finance public investment compared with progressive taxation: the state ultimately pays hundreds of millions annually in debt service to bondholders. This is fundamentally a band-aid; we need to tax the rich and build state capacity to build social housing at scale, on the road to decommodifying housing.
Prop 1 is supported by some developer and real estate interests, but also by most affordable housing advocates and organized labor. Socialists should fight for permanently funded social housing, funded by taxing the rich, but we should not reject billions of dollars for affordable housing because just California's financing system is inadequate. We recommend a Yes vote.
Proposition 2: Yes
Prop 2 raises the state reserve cap from 10% to 20%, requires more saving when revenues surge, and importantly excludes deposits into those reserves from California's Gann spending limit.
Recessions routinely become excuses for austerity. Capitalists use economic precarity to justify cuts to schools, health care, public workers, and social programs precisely when working people need them most. Larger reserves give the state greater ability to maintain services during downturns, rather than balancing budgets on workers and service recipients. Excluding reserve deposits from the Gann Limit also slightly weakens one of California's artificial constitutional constraints on public spending.
The California Labor Federation has endorsed Prop 2, as have most progressive institutional endorsers. Opposition comes primarily from Republicans and fiscal conservatives who are hostile to redistributive politics.
Saving money rather than spending it immediately is not intrinsically progressive; socialists generally don't fetishize balanced budgets or reserves for their own sake. However, this proposal leaves workers better off in the long run by providing more security at the state level. A larger cushion against austerity is better than mandated tax rebates/cuts triggered by California's fiscal constitution. We recommend a Yes vote.
Proposition 3 — Yes (CA DSA Endorsed) 🌹
Prop 3 makes permanent a wealth tax on the top 2% of income earners in the state in order to fund public education and healthcare (as of 2026, those making over $350,000). This wealth tax increases individual state income tax rates by 1% for those making over $370k and up to 3% for those making over $740k. This state income tax on high earners was initially passed in 2012 (as Prop 30) and extended in 2016 (as Prop 55).
If Prop 3 does not pass, the higher tax rates on the wealthy will sunset in 2031, and the state will see a loss of between $5-$15B in annual funding for public education. With the associated loss of funding for public education, 1 in 6 public school teachers will be facing layoffs. This is an important measure to maintain funding for public goods and a strong demonstration that taxing the wealthy works to advance the interests of the working class. California DSA has endorsed a Yes vote.
Proposition 4 — Yes (CA DSA Endorsed) 🌹
Prop 4 repeals California's ban on state/local public campaign-finance systems and allows governments to establish programs for qualifying candidates who accept spending limits. It doesn't itself create a statewide public-financing program.
Electoral politics systematically privileges people who can raise money from wealthy donors, corporations, and professional political networks. In cities and states across the country, public financing of elections has allowed socialists and working people to compete on something at least marginally closer to a level playing field. Many socialist wins across the country, like Zohran Mamdani in New York City, would not have been possible without public financing. This is a clear positive step for working people, and can reduce candidates' dependence on wealthy private donors and allow working class mass membership organizations like our own to participate in larger and more expensive elections.
Prop 4 isn’t a silver bullet: it’s only enabling legislation, not the final reform. Winning Prop 4 creates space for socialists and reformers to fight locally/statewide over what strong public-finance systems actually look like. Public financing also does not eliminate capitalist political power, independent expenditures, lobbying, or wealthy ownership of media, or even come close to leveling the playing field. It is, however, an important and necessary step forward for working class political power. California DSA has endorsed a Yes vote.
Proposition 5 — Yes
Prop 5 ends the simultaneous successor contest when a statewide officer is recalled. If the governor is removed, the lieutenant governor succeeds; other vacancies are filled under normal law rather than by a second question on the recall ballot.
This is not a sexy reform, nor is it a socialist one, but it is basic good government housekeeping. California's recall system creates a bizarre democratic loophole in which a majority can elect someone normally, then a smaller and differently composed electorate can remove them and potentially install a replacement with only a small plurality. Previous gubernatorial recalls have had dozens or even hundreds of candidates on the ballot, and often only recall supporters will even vote in the simultaneous successor contest, meaning a tiny plurality of voters can choose the governor.
The recall mechanism should answer the democratic question “should this official be removed?” rather than create an alternative low-turnout route to power for a minority of voters. Despite its abuse in California, socialists shouldn't oppose recall as a democratic mechanism itself. Recall has long been a democratic demand of historical socialist movements. We should, however, eliminate the anti-majoritarian successor-election mechanism. We recommend a Yes vote.
Proposition 37 — No Recommendation
Prop 37 creates up to a $25 billion revenue-bond program providing qualifying middle-income buyers a second mortgage worth up to 17% of a newly built home's price. The bonds are repaid from borrowers' mortgage payments rather than the state budget.
Housing unaffordability is a real crisis for workers. The proposition gives households without enough accumulated wealth for a conventional down payment access to homeownership, and this is a real material benefit for some workers. However, it treats the housing crisis principally as a problem of financing individual purchases rather than expanding permanently affordable/public housing or reducing the power of landlords and landowners. Ultimately, promoting homeownership is not a socialist solution, and this proposition will only help a small subset of workers. Socialists do not and should not support homeownership as an end in itself.
Labor supporters include nurses and carpenters, and the California Labor Federation supports a Yes vote. Roughly $22.6 million has gone to Yes, dominated by the California Association of Realtors and the billionaire front group Building a Better California.
Ultimately, this is, in many ways, a subsidy for finance capital. This proposition could genuinely help individual working families while simultaneously using state machinery to support private real-estate transactions, developers, and asset ownership. Renters and most working class Californians don’t get much benefit from Prop 37. Prop 37 can deliver some real material benefit to some working class Californians, but it’s not a socialist solution. We have No Recommendation.
Proposition 38 — No
Prop 38 borrows $8.4 billion for immunology/immunotherapy research—and directs half the proceeds to one qualifying UC-affiliated research institute run by a billionaire, with the rest distributed through grants.
Public investment in biomedical research is obviously good and something we strongly support. But Prop 38 is not constructed primarily to best facilitate this research. The eligibility language appears effectively tailored to the California Institute for Immunology and Immunotherapy; billionaire Gary Michelson is its co-founder/board chair and the chief financial force behind the initiative. FPPC data show roughly $36M in top support contributions dominated by Michelson/Michelson Center and Meyer Luskin.
This proposition is pretty naked self-dealing by wealthy individuals. By phrasing it as promoting medical research, something no one opposes, Michelson hopes to smuggle in a popular mandate to deliver state funds to his own institution. Voters should not constitutionally commit billions in public debt through an initiative constructed around a particular private institution. Instead, we should democratically fund actual public institutions that are accountable for their work. California must expand publicly governed research, make discoveries broadly available, and fund it through progressive taxation. We recommend a No vote.
Proposition 39 — No (CA DSA Endorsed) 🌹
Prop 39 is a Republican initiative that requires government-issued ID for in-person voters and identifying information for mail voting, plus new citizenship-verification/reporting requirements.
Voting is a democratic right, not something conditioned on navigating unnecessary administrative barriers. This is a proposal to add as many barriers as possible to voters to stop a non-existent fraud problem. Reactionary anti-democratic forces want to disenfranchise working class Californians in an effort to rig our elections. People with less money, less stable housing, limited transportation, or complicated documentation are least able to absorb new restrictions. This is just one more step in the fascist MAGA movement’s quest to disenfranchise the poor and anti-democratically rig our elections for their own benefit.
The Yes campaign has raised more than $28 million and is heavily financed by conservative billionaire Richard Uihlein and Carl DeMaio's Reform California. Official opposition includes ACLU, Common Cause, the League of Women Voters, civil rights groups, and most of California’s labor movement. It also includes us. California DSA endorses a No vote.
Proposition 40 — Yes (CA DSA Endorsed) 🌹
Prop 40 would levy a one-time 5% wealth tax on individuals with over $1 billion in assets (a little over 220 people in California) in order to offset the loss of almost $100 billion in federal funding for Medi-Cal due to cuts from HR1 (the “big beautiful bill”). In the absence of alternate funding, hospitals across the state will face closures, healthcare workers will be laid off, our most vulnerable neighbors will face increasing challenges to get the care they need, and mortality rates will rise.
Prop 40 responds to the immediate need for more healthcare funding, provides a corrective to Trump’s push for greater wealth consolidation, and offers a pilot wealth tax in order to address expanding inequality. Billionaires like Google founder Sergey Brin are spending hundreds of millions in an effort to fight this necessary redistribution of resources. California DSA has endorsed a Yes vote.
Proposition 41 — No (CA DSA Endorsed) 🌹
Prop 41 is one of two measures put on the ballot by billionaires to thwart the Billionaire Tax (Prop 40). Prop 41 supposedly creates audits of new state tax revenues and makes them subject to a cap. The Billionaire Tax will easily earn more than the cap, over which any money is either returned to voters or goes to education. It doesn’t mention the Billionaire Tax directly, and contains a standard California poison pill that if it receives more votes than other measures with an overlapping topic (the billionaire tax), it nullifies it.
This measure, like 42, is ultimately about defeating the billionaire tax and more generally, the possibility of expanding the public sphere. One of the primary funders of Prop 41 is Sergey Brin, who recently surpassed Jeff Bezos to become the third richest person in the world. California DSA has endorsed a No vote.
Proposition 42 — No (CA DSA Endorsed) 🌹
Prop 42 is the second of two measures put on the ballot to thwart the Billionaire Tax (Prop 40). It prohibits new taxes on personal property including retirement accounts, financial assets, or business interests. It deceptively proposes that unnamed “Sacramento politicians” are planning to do this to everyone. The only tax it would apply to, without naming it, is the Billionaire Tax. Like with 41, more votes for 42 than 40 nullifies the Billionaire Tax. This would very directly block the advancement of the kinds of wealth taxes that can achieve a much needed redistribution of resources and power. California DSA has endorsed a No vote.
Prop 43 — No (CA DSA Endorsed) 🌹
Prop 43, backed by the Howard Jarvis Taxpayer Association, aims to make it harder to raise local revenue by changing the threshold on local ballot measures that raise taxes from a simple majority to a ⅔ supermajority. This would apply to initiatives placed on a local ballot on or after January 1, 2027. This new supermajority vote requirement would apply to measures raising revenue for all types of local governments, including cities, counties, special districts, school and community college districts, and any other local or regional government entity.
Prop 43 would undermine basic principles of democracy by making it easier for big corporate interests like the Realtor’s Association, the Chamber of Commerce, the fossil fuel industry, and other likely suspects to kill funding for the things we need by propagandizing a sufficient minority to prevent funding of public goods. California DSA has endorsed a No vote.
Prop 44 — Yes
Prop 44 requires nonprofit federally qualified health centers (FQHCs) to spend at least 90% of revenue on "program services" advancing their charitable purpose, intended as patient service delivery and workforce stability, as opposed to management and overhead spending.
Waivers, providing a temporary pause of this requirement, may be requested and issued by the Department of Public Health in exceptional circumstances. These circumstances would have to directly impact the clinic's ability to continue to operate, leading to the closure of patient services or programs and the loss of jobs.
These nonprofits receive enormous amounts of public health care money while operating as private institutions whose management structures are not democratically controlled by workers and patients. The measure attempts to constrain how much revenue can be diverted away from the charitable/health-care mission into management compensation and administrative overhead and related spending.
Socialists believe these should be public institutions, not private institutions funded by the government. We certainly think they should treat their workers well. That is, however, not how things work, and in the near to medium-term future, these institutions will continue to exist.
There is a catch here as well: SEIU-UHW (Service Employees International Union-United Healthcare Workers West) is the sole major financial force behind Yes, putting about $17 million into it. This proposition exists essentially as a tool for SEIU-UHW's organizing strategy more so than an attempt to craft the best possible public policy.
There are reasons for skepticism, as FQHCs serve poor and uninsured patients, and these changes could have unintended consequences: some level of administration, IT, facilities, and other overhead costs can actually be necessary to deliver care. On the other hand, the temporary waivers are intended as a tool to preserve the clinic workforce and access to care for these patients.
However, this is fundamentally a class struggle issue, and the opposition is financed overwhelmingly by the clinic industry: AltaMed, the California Primary Care Association, and numerous individual health-center operators. The existence of currently socially necessary nonprofit employers doesn't mean workers or the public should defer to those employers' claims about how public health-care dollars must be managed. We recommend a Yes vote.
Proposition 45 — No
Prop 45 is an initiative statute backed by the California Chamber of Commerce that makes sweeping changes to the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA). Prop 45 creates a fast-track version of CEQA for a broad range of “essential” projects, including housing, transportation, energy, water, healthcare, schools, broadband, and public-safety infrastructure.
CEQA can be and is regularly abused to delay housing, transit, clean energy, and other necessary infrastructure at the expense of working class Californians. We don’t default to defending all regulatory and permitting processes just because they give the government power over private business. This is a genuinely thorny issue, with many costs and benefits and bad actors on both sides that can be difficult for socialists to disentangle. CEQA does desperately need further reform. Prop 45 sets fast timelines. It also limits agencies' obligation to study feasible alternatives and restricts the evidence and remedies available to courts reviewing approvals for a broad range of housing and infrastructure projects. Beyond this, it gives much of the housing it fast-tracks weaker labor standards than the other “essential” projects it covers.
For socialists, the key question we care about here is who gains power when review is weakened? As certified Bad Guy Alec Baldwin says in The Departed, “cui bono?” A good reform would accelerate democratically planned affordable housing, transit, and green infrastructure, while preserving workers' and affected communities' power over pollution and development. Prop 45 instead applies broad deregulation across many kinds of private and public projects, concentrating this power in the hands of developers themselves. There’s a reason for this. This reform was written by and for some of the most rapacious capitalists in the state.
The Yes campaign is heavily financed by the Building Industry Association, Chamber of Commerce, Edison, Realtors, developers, and billionaire cutout Building a Better California, a veritable rogues gallery of California politics. The No campaign includes most environmental groups and the state building trades. The latter is notable: the building trades will generally support nearly all construction. The old joke is they would pave over the Pacific Ocean if there was a project labor agreement.
California has already undertaken CEQA reform via AB 130 and SB 131, which broadly exempt urban infill housing from CEQA review. Prop 45’s new reforms use the word “essential” to bring in drastic new changes: covering not only apartments and transit but highways and road expansions, subdivisions, private medical-office buildings, major water systems, power infrastructure, and more. Expanding urban housing and giant infrastructure projects present radically different environmental problems, and need different regulatory regimes. We need more housing and transit; that doesn’t mean gutting regulation on highways and data centers. CEQA has been abused by wealthy homeowners, yes, but it has also been a vital tool for working class communities fighting warehouses, freeway expansions, industrial pollution, contaminated sites, and infrastructure that capitalists and more politically powerful actors want to dump in their communities. The answer is to make it harder for wealthy NIMBYs to block socially useful housing and transit, not to strip the ability of under-resourced working class Californians to fight environmental harm.
If passed, this proposition can only be legislatively amended at all by a 2/3rds vote of the legislature. Any defects or unintended consequences would therefore be incredibly difficult to fix through the ordinary democratic process. California history is littered with examples of poorly worded propositions creating seemingly permanent unintended negative consequences.
CEQA needs reform; California needs a faster process to allow our state to build housing at the needed scale. The housing crunch has been incredibly damaging to working class Californians and their ability to live in this state. CEQA needing further reform doesn’t mean developers and the Chamber of Commerce should be writing that reform. Socialists should support targeted reform, not less reform. This means by-right approval for affordable/social housing, transit, and clean energy. We should support greater public planning capacity; strong labor standards; and targeted limits on bad-faith litigation from wealthy and well-connected homeowners who want to block affordable housing and public transit. But we still need community and environmental protections, as well as a democratic process for development. Prop 45 is not the solution. We recommend a No vote.
Bay Area Regional Transit Measure (RTM) — Yes (CA DSA Endorsed) 🌹
California DSA has endorsed a Yes vote on the Bay Area Regional Transit Measure (Connect Bay Area) as a concrete fight against austerity and for a strong, publicly operated transit system. BART, Muni, AC Transit, and Caltrain collectively face operating deficits of more than $800 million annually starting in the 2027–28 fiscal year. The measure would raise approximately $980 million per year for 14 years to prevent major cuts to BART, Muni, AC Transit, Caltrain, and other Bay Area transit services, funded by a 0.5% sales tax in Alameda, Contra Costa, San Mateo, and Santa Clara counties and a 1% tax in San Francisco. It would also dedicate funding to reduced-fare and free transfers, expanded low-income fare programs, accessibility improvements, and projects that make transit faster and easier to use.
The sales-tax funding mechanism is regressive and falls short of the progressive taxation socialists should ultimately fight for. But the alternative is not a better funding system - it is deep service cuts that would certainly push Bay Area transit into a death spiral. Reduced frequency and shorter service hours would make transit less useful and reliable, causing ridership and fare revenue to fall, which would in turn create pressure for still more cuts. Once that cycle begins, rebuilding ridership and service becomes far more difficult and expensive. The burden would fall disproportionately on working-class people who depend on transit, while threatening thousands of unionized public-sector jobs and pushing more people toward expensive, car-dependent transportation.
Bay Area DSA members have already organized to secure regional transit funding, including Peninsula DSA’s successful campaign for San Mateo County to participate in the regional measure. DSA nationally has also identified accessible public transit and publicly owned transportation infrastructure as core socialist priorities.
A socialist vision is one with massively expanded public goods, and we strongly support tapid transit.
We urge and endorse a Yes vote on RTM!
House of Representatives
CA-01: No Recommendation
CA-02: No Recommendation
CA-03: No Recommendation
CA-04: No Recommendation
The incumbent Democratic Representative, Mike Thompson, is a fairly middle-of-the-road Democrat who has been in the House since the last century (1999, but still). While he has co-sponsored Medicare for All and the Block the Bombs Act, he also votes for things like the Trump-backed funding bill that increased funding for the military, included $3.3B for Israel, and defunded USAID and UNRWA.
Eric Jones is endorsed by progressive group Our Revolution and is running on a progressive platform that focuses on affordability through universal healthcare and lowering drug prices, taking on PG&E, and ending forever wars. He also has a policy page that calls for actual regulations on data centers and AI, including investments in worker transition training and green energy.
However, there are really reasons to be skeptical of Jones’s commitment to getting money out of politics. Not only is he a venture capitalist, his campaign has been boosted by over a million dollars of SuperPAC spending by his former coworkers and boss at Dragoneer Investment Group.
We issue no recommendation and urge voters be wary of candidates with progressive rhetoric and aesthetic but corporate backing.
CA-05: No Recommendation
While Prop 50 made some Republican-held districts more competitive, California’s 5th congressional district was not one of them. Tom McClintock, the incumbent Republican, is a ghoulish right-winger who was in the State Assembly for almost two decades, interspersing that time with some failed statewide runs. He’s unfortunately very likely to be re-elected.
The Democratic nominee is Michael Masuda, an engineer and former employee of the US Department of State. His platform is fairly uninspiring from a leftist perspective and doesn’t commit to anything beyond the corporate Democratic regulars. His foreign policy section is especially sparse, with no mention of the Middle East at all.
Ultimately, we can’t issue a recommendation in this race.
CA-06: No Recommendation
CA-07: Mai Vang (DSA Sacramento Endorsed) 🌹
Mai Vang is endorsed by Sacramento DSA for California’s 7th Congressional District. Mai is the daughter of Hmong immigrants and has long stood for the working class as a teacher, organizer, and Sacramento city councilor—where she was a consistent opponent of ballooning police budgets and the surveillance state. Now, she is running for congress to bring a new generation to Capitol Hill and oust the out-of-touch incumbent, Doris Matsui.
Matsui, who has been in Congress for 20 years, wants to “reform ICE”, takes AIPAC donations, and refuses to support popular progressive policies like Medicare for All. Mai takes no corporate PAC money and supports a free Palestine, abolishing ICE, and Medicare for All. Mai is accountable to the people, not corporations, and will be a working-class champion in Congress.
Vote for Mai Vang for California’s 7th Congressional District.
CA-08: No Recommendation
CA-09: No Recommendation
CA-10: No Recommendation
CA-11: Connie Chan
Write up coming soon!
CA-12: Lateefah Simon
When now-Mayor of Oakland Barbara Lee stepped down from the House in 2024 to run for Senate, many worried about the loss of her progressive, anti-imperialist voice. But since her election, Lateefah Simon has done well to fill her shoes and uphold the tradition of Black radicalism left by Lee and Ron Dellums before her. Simon, a powerful orator if you've attended one of the many protests and rallies she's spoken at, has been outspoken on left-wing issues, domestic and international alike, including Palestine, and she is undeniably the most left-wing member of California’s House delegation.
Though we hope to one day have a DSA member in this seat, the East Bay will do well to re-elect Simon.
CA-13: No Recommendation
CA-14: Aisha Wahab
We recommend Aisha Wahab for a full House term. The former state senator has a long record of public service and progressive advocacy, pounding the pavement for Measure A and being a warrior for foster youth. A champion of single-payer healthcare, the repeal of Citizens United, anti-racist legislation, and the expansion of rent control, she has earned a number of progressive endorsers. These include: US Representatives Pramila Jayapal (WA-7), Greg Casar (TX-35), and Maxwell Frost (FL-10); the CA Working Families Party; and many unions, including SEIU-CA, CA Nurses Association, the AFL-CIO, and United Farm Workers. Send her back to Washington to tackle the problems of the nation.
Written by Silicon Valley DSA
CA-15: Don’t Vote for Mullin
We are not recommending anyone in this race. Kevin Mullin is a corporate-aligned Congressman and should be pushed by his constituents to back more people-friendly legislation.
Written by Silicon Valley DSA
CA-16: No Recommendation
We recommend no candidate in this race. Sam Liccardo is a corporate Democrat and we have no love for corporate types.
Written by Silicon Valley DSA
CA-17: Ro Khanna
We recommend Ro Khanna. We have supported Khanna in the past for his advocacy of Medicare for All, the Green New Deal, debt free college, and his efforts to get corporate PAC money out of elections. In his recent term, Ro has continued to align with our goals by becoming a more outspoken critic of Israel’s genocide, shifting to a position of ending all military aid to Israel (including defensive weapons), has championed Prop 40, and is starting to take the lead on regulating AI by developing an Internet Bill of Rights.
Written by Silicon Valley DSA
CA-18: Zoe Lofgren
We recommend Zoe Lofgren. Lofgren has been a steady progressive vote in the House for years and has been one of the key tech policy leaders there. We are not thrilled with the fact that she was one of the key figures helping funnel funds into opposing Aisha Wahab in CA-14, so we hope a strong progressive candidate emerges soon to challenge Lofgren.
Written by Silicon Valley DSA
CA-19: No Recommendation
We recommend no one here. Jimmy Panetta is a son of the military-industrial complex and we do not need to spend more time or money waging violence on the world.
Written by Silicon Valley DSA
CA-20: No Recommendation
Write-up coming soon!
CA-21: No Recommendation
CA-22: Randy Villegas
Oliver Ma isn’t the only exciting candidate to come out of the Central Valley this year. CA-22 is one of the districts restructured by Prop 50, giving Dems the best chance to flip it in decades, and after running milquetoast candidates for years Randy Villegas, a Visalia school board trustee and organizer, is a candidate who may be able to flip it not just for Democrats but for working people.
Villegas is endorsed by CA Working Families Party, Bernie Sanders, and a broad swath of progressive labor, including the United Auto Workers—of which he was a member when at UC Santa Cruz—where he organized and struck for cost of living and housing equity. His platform includes Medicare for all, taxing the 1%, regulations on AI, universal childcare, and other DSA-aligned policies. He faces incumbent Republican David Valadao in the general election.
This race is an easy choice for DSA members: vote for Randy Villegas in California’s 22nd Congressional District.
CA-23: Tessa Lynn Hodge
CA-23 is one of the districts that was packed with Republican voters by Prop 50 to make other districts more Democratic.
The Democratic candidate is Tessa Lynn Hodge. However, Hodge is not running with typical establishment politics. She supports single-payer healthcare, rejects “money from AIPAC, J Street, or any PAC that seeks to influence U.S. policy in ways that conflict with my commitment to human rights and accountability,” is willing to name the genocide in Gaza, and supports the elimination of anti-BDS policy. She is a truly progressive candidate in an unfortunately Republican district; while she, unfortunately, is unlikely to win, we recommend you vote for Tessa Lynn Hodge in CA-23.
CA-24: No Recommendation
CA-25: No Recommendation
CA-26: No Recommendation
Seven-term U.S. Rep. Julia Brownley announced her retirement in January 2026, opening up a seat that spans most of Ventura County and a slice of northwestern L.A. County including Westlake Village, Calabasas and Agoura Hills. Under Prop. 50, the district extends further east to Quartz Hill in the Antelope Valley, making the electorate bluer — 43% Democrat, 28% Republican. The district is majority white (though 43% Latino), and quite wealthy with 70% homeownership and a median income 20% higher than the rest of California’s.
The frontrunner is Assemblymember Jacqui Irwin (D-Thousand Oaks), who carries Brownley’s endorsement and is term-limited out of her Assembly seat. Irwin previously served as mayor of Thousand Oaks and has represented communities in both Ventura and L.A. counties. Irwin was a classic conservative Democrat when she was in the Assembly, voting against bills that sought to curb police surveillance, provide more oversight of charter schools, and abstained from a vote that would have prohibited ICE from wearing face masks.
Irwin faces Republican challenger Sam Gallucci, a (stop us if you’ve heard this one before) white conservative businessman who wants more cops, mass deportations, and to stop the woke left. He thinks “Washington is full of talkers” , something that can be solved by… an evangelical pastor?
With no clear socialist or progressive choice in this race that strongly favors Irwin, we’re issuing no recommendation.
Written by DSA Los Angeles
CA-27: No Recommendation
This district is the far northern edges of LA County, covering a bit of San Fernando and then Santa Clarita up through Lancaster and Palmdale. This district is historically white, wealthy homeowners but has rapidly shifted to be a plurality Latino, median income district over the last decade as multiracial renters and families have been priced out of Los Angeles proper.
After George Whitesides flipped this seat blue in 2024, Proposition 50 redrew the map to make it much safer for Democrats. The new CA-27 voted for Harris 53% to Trump’s 43% in 2024, making this seat a reliable Democrat hold when the House is up for election in November. Which is great for us, because it really sucked to have to recommend you vote for him in 2024 just to flip the seat, and we don’t want to do that again.
Whitesides is literally a boss – he's the former CEO of Virgin Galactic promising to govern as a “moderate.” During his tenure in office, he voted to send more money to Israel, defund USAID and UNRWA, and voted to honor Charlie Kirk. The Democratic Party and political establishment is backing Whitesides for another term, and he’s likely to succeed here.
In the general election, he’s basically guaranteed to beat Republican Jason Gibbs, a standard Santa Clarita Republican fearmongering about the border, taxes, and crime.
While Whitesides and Gibbs were statistically tied after the primary, Whitesides is going to pick up the votes from Democrat challengers in the primary to ultimately win. Therefore, we’re not recommending a boss and we’re not recommending a fascist.
Written by DSA Los Angeles
CA-28: No Recommendation
Judy Chu is expected to handily win this heavily Democratic district that covers Altadena, Pasadena, Alhambra, Monterey Park, and other parts of the West San Gabriel Valley in Los Angeles County. Chu has cleared 65% of the vote each year, both primary and general, since 2014. She’s one of the top 30 or so progressive congresspeople, supporting Medicare for All and the Green New Deal.
This year, she faces the same Republican candidates 2024 – ex-Arcadia mayor April Verlato who seemed to have toned down her platform from 2024’s desire to “restore America”. Now she’s talking about a "compassionate, comprehensive” approach to solving homelessness as well as "securing our borders”. Also, she’s endorsed by disgraced LA County Sheriff Alex Villanueva and has raised no money this cycle.
Although Chu is far from a socialist and we’re not going to actively recommend her (because her MAGA opponent is going to lose and our recommendation will do precisely zero to change that), we would be remiss if we didn’t note and applaud the large grassroots movement in the district that has successfully moved Judy Chu first to support a ceasefire in Gaza, and then to cosponsor the “Block the Bombs” Act.
By protesting outside her office every Monday for a year this interfaith, community driven group moved a high ranking congressperson, and Chu’s ability to be moved speaks a lot better of her than some of our other Congresspeople. No recommendation.
Written by DSA Los Angeles
CA-29: Angelica Dueñas
CA-29 includes North Hollywood, Van Nuys, Panorama City, Pacoima, San Fernando, and Sylmar. The district is heavily urban, about 40% renter, nearly two-thirds Latino, and is currently occupied by Luz Rivas, elected in 2024. The former California state Assemblywoman was anointed by conservative New Democrat Tony Cardenas who held the seat since 2013, but didn’t run for reelection.
This is where Angelica Dueñas comes in (again). Angelica has challenged Cardenas every year since 2018 and continues her tradition in this cycle by challenging Luz Rivas. Dueñas, is a Bernie to Jill Stein 2016 progressive activist. After losing in the primary in 2018 as a Green, Dueñas switched to the Democrat ballot line and peaked with 43% against Cárdenas in 2020 and 2022, running on a Berniecrat platform that led with Medicare for All and incorporated various other left movement demands around racial justice, canceling student debt, Green New Deal, before falling back to a 24% vote share against Rivas after the Primary election. At some point, you have to wonder when it’s time to take a hint and work on building durable left organizations instead of running solo races.
In 2024, we said this about Luz Rivas:
Rivas has been a fairly progressive assemblywoman spanning the standard CA Dem status quo coalition – strong support from organized labor with a helping hand from a little bit of business and real estate money. The Jarvis Taxpayers Association hates her and the CA Labor Fed loves her, and if she wins the seat (as she’s likely to, given the strength of the establishment machine helping her), she’ll be a slight improvement over Cárdenas. Her background as an educator, MIT trained engineer, and founder of DIY Girls, an organization that promotes STEAM education through programming for young women, remains at the forefront of her mission and she has stated this as the source of motivation for running for office in the first place.
And, this is pretty much what has borne out. Rivas is an improvement on Cárdenas but is a fairly standard LA Democrat – sponsoring Medicare for All and opposing ICE funding, but also taking money from Democratic Majority for Israel (DMFI) and refusing to the Block the Bombs Act.
With under $37k raised and no meaningful endorsements, Dueñas is a protest vote, but one worth taking. ☆
Written by DSA Los Angeles
CA-30: No Recommendation
CA-30 sees first-term congresswoman Laura Friedman against a Republican after winning the primary with 52% amongst an array of long-shot challengers for this majority white, majority homeowner seat covering most of Hollywood, Northeast LA, Glendale, and Burbank. Friedman succeeded to this seat in 2024 after eight years as one of the most progressive members of the California State Assembly, when Adam Schiff moved up to become a Senator (ugh). In the 2024 primary, Friedman’s assembly record and campaign had us hopeful she would be “among the most progressive congresspeople.” Since then, however, she’s taken support from the Democratic Majority for Israel and has thus far refused to sponsor the Block the Bombs act.
Friedman is going to win re-election handily against Republican Scott Alan Meyers who explains that he was inspired when Ronald Reagan “reminded this country that it's okay to be proud of America.”
Laura Friedman can do more to stand up to Trump and end the genocide in Palestine. No recommendation.
Written by DSA Los Angeles
CA-31: No Recommendation
CA-31 covers the swaths of the San Gabriel Valley and portions of Glendora, City of Industry, and Monrovia. Incumbent Gil Cisneros faces Republican Eric Ching in this safe blue district.
Cisneros, who – no joke – launched his political career by winning the lottery, was first elected in 2018 against Trump-loving Korean-American Young Kim in CA-39. He lost in 2020, did a stint in President Biden’s Pentagon, and came back to the house in 2024, this time in CA-31. He was a registered Republican until 2008.
His first term has been spent by him being solidly a coward in ending the genocide in Gaza, refusing to co-sponsor Medicare for All, and supporting pointless resolutions to “denounce socialism in all forms”.
Well, we denounce you too, Gil Cisneros.
If you’re reading this guide you’re not seriously considering voting for his anti-immigrant pro-Trump Republican challenger, so we have no recommendation for you.
Written by DSA Los Angeles
CA-32: No Recommendation
Somehow, Brad Sherman persists after one of the more well-moneyed primary challenges in recent memory. In this San Fernando Valley district, Brad Sherman has been in office representing the San Fernando Valley since 1997! This is as long as a Gen Z’er has been alive!! The Sherman Oaks Galleria didn’t have a Cheesecake Factory yet!!! The Encino Man had barely thawed!!!!
Back to Brad - he is notorious among the left for his vigorous support for Israel; his voting record on Palestine-related issues is amongst the worst among California Democrats, and his views on other issues are fairly bland. He doesn’t support Medicare for All, taxing the rich, or defunding from war. We can go on, but we’ve had many voter guides saying how much Sherman is out of touch with his district.
Here’s one sentence about his Republican challenger Larry Thompson: he has a 32-point platform, with one of the points being “Change and market the image of simply ‘The Valley’ to ‘California’s Valley of Dreams.’” That’s all.
Brad Sherman is a warmonger who has been around for way too many super El Niño seasons. Until the next challenge, there is no recommendation here.
Written by DSA Los Angeles
CA-33: No Recommendation
CA-34: Angela Gonzales-Torres (DSA-LA & National DSA Endorsed!) 🌹
Angela Gonzales-Torres is a lifelong Angeleno, a champion for working families, a democratic socialist, and an advocate for justice who has worked to protect renters and small businesses, help people transition from prison into universities, and fight for immigrant rights. Angela is the first Congressional candidate endorsed by DSA-LA, with 84.7% of the chapter voting to endorse her earlier this year. She was further endorsed nationally by DSA, and if elected would become the 8th member of the growing democratic socialist caucus in the House of Representatives.
As the daughter of a deportee raised on SNAP and MediCal benefits, Angela has fought to support those also impacted by family-separation systems. She feels the urgency of the moment to work to secure federal housing investments, labor protections, Medicare for All, abolishing ICE, and an end to the genocide in Gaza. She is exactly who we need in Congress right now—someone who will not only show up for the working class, but also fight back against the cruelty and chaos of the Trump administration.
Incumbent Jimmy Gomez wants us to believe he can “fight back against Trump,” but he takes money from Trump’s biggest donors. In 2024, AIPAC spent millions of dollars on the CA-34 race to ensure Gomez stayed in office. He is also backed by the same Crypto and AI lobbies that have helped enrich Trump’s family directly, and yet, the district Gomez represents is, unquestionably, one of the most progressive and left-leaning Congressional districts in Los Angeles.
As if that weren’t bad enough, Gomez, who was famously friendly with now-disgraced Northern California ex-Congressman Eric Swalwell, is also under a federal house investigation for sexual misconduct, including an accusation of sexual assault, prompting the LA County Young Democrats to suspend their endorsement. Still, a large number of institutional actors remain disappointingly silent. Los Angeles deserves better.
Angela’s campaign is part of the rising wave of democratic-socialist Congressional victories in New York, Philadelphia, and Denver, and recent polling shows that she is leading in the race. She has been endorsed by DSA National, Leaders We Deserve, Justice Democrats, Our Revolution, and the National Union of Healthcare Workers, as well as LA City Controller Kenneth Mejia.
We have the opportunity to replace a disgraced, AIPAC-backed and corporate-backed Democrat with a long-time community member and DSA member who has committed to running and co-governing with DSA when elected, and to fighting for life-affirming policies like Medicare For All, affordable and public housing, free childcare, prosecuting Trump, and abolishing ICE. Angela Gonzales-Torres knows that our district, in the heart of Los Angeles, belongs to the working-class families who keep our city running, not to AIPAC, the Crypto and AI lobbies, or the corporate real-estate developers who back Jimmy Gomez.
Let’s elect one of us to Congress. DSA-LA is proud to endorse Angela Gonzales-Torres for CA-34.
Written by DSA Los Angeles
CA-35: No Recommendation
That’s because this race looks like an exact repeat of the same district election in 2024, 2022, and 2020, when incumbent Norma Torres faced off against Republican Mike Cargile (however a write-in candidate got 27 votes in the primary this time around, so that’s cute). In the spirit of tradition, we’ll let the DSA-LA 2020 voter guide take it from here, because seriously – nothing’s changed. While some Democrats have reacted to Trump’s imperial presidency by fighting back, Norma hasn’t:
Incumbent Democrat Norma Torres is seeking reelection to a fifth term in this SGV district after besting Republican challengers in 2016 and 2018 [and now 2020, 2022, and 2024]. A member of the centrist New Democrat Caucus with important spots on the House Appropriations and House Rules Committees, Torres’ lowlights include voting to pass Trump’s USMCA trade deal and her rubber-stamp approvals of the yearly National Defense Authorization Act. Taking cash from the gambling, real estate, and agribusiness sectors, Torres is basically a middle-of-the-pack Dem—not openly corrupt, but she ain’t exactly Ilhan Omar, or even Ro Khanna.
Running against Torres is Republican army veteran Mike Cargile. In addition to the anti-immigrant policies proudly featured on his own website, a slapdash anti-Torres site Cargile seems to have set up features a whole page criticizing the Dem incumbent under a heading that just says “Islam.” In other words, Cargile is a nut—his own “Issues” page includes a big picture of the Soviet flag emblazoned with the word Socialism (he’s opposed), and the site he created to defame Torres claims that she “would be content with Sharia law instead of our Constitution.”
Torres should win easily - she doesn’t need our votes. No recommendation.
Written by DSA Los Angeles
CA-36: No Recommendation
A coastal district, what’s up you beach bums! 🤙
Ted Lieu has been in Congress since 2015, has been on your liberal parents’ TV screens talking about impeaching Trump shortly after that, before that having been in the State Legislature for nine years. He faces GOP challenger Houston Brignano, who got 15% of the primary vote and is unlikely to break 30% in the General. His platform emphasizes an “immigration system where Native-born citizens get the first shot at jobs and opportunities” (and no, the capitalization doesn’t mean indigenous), repealing the affordable care act, and “AI Free Market Abundance”, which he believes will lead us to a “New Golden Age”. Oh, and did we mention his hair?
A centrist through and through, Lieu has yet to sponsor legislation for an arms embargo to Israel because he is backed by AIPAC. He also voted for the symbolic motion to “denounce socialism in all forms,” so consider this our official denouncement of Ted Lieu. Lieu is also something of an artificial intelligence (AI) apologist, known for pushing back against proposals to restrict AI technologies such as ChatGPT. No recommendation.
Written by DSA Los Angeles
CA-37: Samantha Mota
CA-37 includes Mid City, some of West LA, and the northern portions of South LA. Incumbent Sydney Kamlager seems to be endorsed by every center-leaning and left-leaning official in the county – and basically all of organized labor. She’s likely to coast to victory. She’s done the baseline things a member of the Congressional Progressive Caucus ought to do, like co-sponsoring Medicare for All and even moving to cosponsor the Block the Bombs act, but has received an “F” on her scorecard from the US Campaign for Palestinian Rights, and has taken money from JStreet’s PAC as well as corporations like Blue Shield CA.
She faces another Democratic candidate Samantha Mota, who received an impressive 11.7% of the vote in the primary despite under $1000 in reported fundraising. In the General, she reports a little over $9,000 in fundraising. Mota’s left platform on Medicare for All, and Arms Embargo, and the abolition of ICE earned her a recommendation in our primary voter guide, and that position hasn’t changed for the general election. CA-37 should have a rep that will stand up to special interests and the war machine. Based on the fundraising and name recognition differential, we don’t think it’s likely to be this year, but you should still vote for Samantha Mota.
Written by DSA Los Angeles
CA-38: No Recommendation
With incumbent Linda Sánchez switching to run in the new CA-41 seat (thank you, Prop 50), the new borders of CA-38 span parts of the northern parts of Orange County, as well as Baldwin Park, Bell, Cudahy, El Monte, Maywood, parts of Pico Rivera, Rowland Heights, and West Whittier. In this majority-Latino district, after the primary, we have Democrat Hilda Solis facing Republican Pedro Casas.
You don’t really need to know much about Republican Pedro Casas. He’s anti-trans, wants to implement private school vouchers, and thinks our cities are dystopias rampant with crime and fentanyl.
Now onto HIlda Solis. After the maps established by Prop 50 passed, Solis declared her candidacy for this seat. Secretary of Labor under the Obama Administration, current Los Angeles County Supervisor, Solis is seeking to return to Congress where she served from 2001 to 2009. Solis has had a decorated tenure in public service, from being the first Latina in the CA State Senate, to being the Labor Secretary that would revitalize the office after the Bush-era and 2008 Recession, she’s held positions that put her on the political left when she first was in office, but have since become the norm in the Los Angeles Democratic Party.
Her campaign this time around rests on her name and her reputation, with zero platform to be found on her website, just her lengthy list of endorsements from the left wing of the status quo coalition, exemplified by her grab-bag of federal, state, and labor endorsements, which include three of DSA-LA’s Socialists in Office, Los Angeles City Councilmembers Jurado, Soto-Martinez, and Hernandez. In the primary election, Solis nearly hit 50% of the vote while running against two more Democrats, and there’s no reason to suspect that their votes don’t roll up to her in the general.
It’s annoying that Solis still doesn’t have a platform, but she’s likely to win against a Republican in a safe blue district. No recommendation.
Written by DSA Los Angeles
CA-39: No Recommendation
CA-40: No Recommendation
CA-40? More like CA-flop. After a total bust of three-way Dem vote splitting in the primary with a couple deeply unimpressive candidates (if you know, you know), incumbent Republicans Young Kim and Ken Calvert landed the top spots in the primary. Kim the current CA-40 rep, Calvert drawn out of his current seat in CA-41. Both candidates are trying to play moderate, but have repeatedly backed Trump to the hilt. Try again next time, this one’s a wrap. No recommendation.
Written by Orange County DSA
CA-41: No Recommendation
The 41st Congressional District is currently represented by the truly terrible Republican Ken Calvert, who has been in Congress for over 30 years. Proposition 50 essentially wiped Calvert’s district off the map, and the 41st District has moved from the whitest, wealthiest, and most Republican corners of Riverside County to largely Democratic Los Angeles and Orange County cities like Whittier, Downey, La Habra, Bell Gardens, Santa Fe Springs, and Lakewood.
The race is between the current 38th Congressional District Representative Linda Sánchez and Republican Mitch Clemmons. Sánchez is a shoe-in for the seat, and has endorsements from establishment Democrats, the California Democratic Party, and the California Labor Federation. She’s been a pretty poor congressional Democrat, taking money from AIPAC and Democratic Majority for Israel (DMFI).
It’s going to be a pleasure taking this seat away from the Republicans, but we can’t recommend AIPAC-supported Sanchez.
Written by DSA Los Angeles
CA-42: No Recommendation
This seat covers most of the city of Long Beach as well as parts of Southeast Los Angeles County. It’s been represented since 2022 by former Long Beach city mayor Robert Garcia, who had governed as a standard establishment semi-progressive certainly-neoliberal mayor. He’s taken $2,500 from JStreet’s PAC, and he’s come out in support of the Block the Bombs Act, which halts weapons shipments to Israel. He’s been very vocal in supporting Prop 50 and has become a figure in the liberal media spaces about fighting the far right in Congress.
Garcia got 56.5.% of the vote in the primary and is facing a Republican this November. He’ll sail to re-election; no recommendation.
Written by DSA Los Angeles
CA-43: No Recommendation
Maxine Waters is the incumbent in CA-43 which covers Inglewood, Hawthorne, and Torrance. She is considered an institutional progressive. It’s worth noting that Waters joined the call for an immediate (and unqualified) ceasefire in Gaza very early and is generally in the top 30 or 40 “most progressive” Congresspeople. In the primary, she beat the Republican facing her in the General election 63% to 16.9%. At 88 years old, it’s probably time for “Auntie Maxine” to be thinking about retirement and being replaced, but the strength of her South LA machine means she’s not going to be unseated any time soon.
Maxine has all the name recognition and institutional backing needed to take this again very easily and doesn’t need our recommendation.
Written by DSA Los Angeles
CA-44: No Recommendation
CA-44 covers San Pedro and the south LA County cities of Lakewood, Carson, Lynwood, and South Gate. Incumbent Nanette Barragán’s voting record leans among the more left-leaning in the House (again, the bar is on the floor). She’s reasonably but not extremely progressive, having launched her political career first in the Clinton White House, then as a lawyer, then as a Hermosa Beach City Councilwoman, campaigning against the oil industry. Her current congressional record for the 2025-27 cycle has her signing on as a sponsor to Medicare for All as well as the Block the Bombs act, which will limit the transfer of weapons to Israel. We encourage Congresswoman Barragán to take more courageous steps forward in the future.
The Republican challenger, Genevive Angel, is running on standard Republican anti-immigrant dreck. Barragán beat her by over 50 points in the primary.
Look, if Baby Annette was running, we would be enthusiastically endorsing in this race. But sadly, we’ve got Nanette instead. Angel is no angel, but we stick by our rule of not needing to recommend in cases of “generic boring Dem” versus fascist. You know what to do. No Recommendation.
Written by DSA Los Angeles
CA-45: No Recommendation
Welcome to CD-45, the congressional district where redbaiting 1970s anticommunist kayfabe remains the most effective bipartisan messaging tactic. Flipped by moderate Democratic army vet Derek Tran in 2024 by a margin of under 500 votes, the heavily conservative Vietnamese district including the enclaves of Garden Grove and Westminster has been redrawn into a D+3 by adding a tiny sliver of south LA County. Tran, to his credit, cosponsored the Block the Bombs Act…rationalized via his family’s values derived from “flee[ing] a war-torn country seized by a brutal communist regime” during the Vietnam War.
Uncontested, Tran won the primary’s Dems with 53% of the vote. His Republican opponent, Chuong Vo, was one from a laundry list of hardline anticommunist Republicans who won their side of the vote with a measly 15.3%. With +2.5 points added to the Democratic voter base in CA-45 by Prop 50 and a hard anti-Trump voting environment, Tran should skate by to re-election. No recommendation.
Written by Orange County DSA
CA-46: No Recommendation
A unique product of Santa Ana politics, incumbent Democrat Lou Correa is probably going to die in this seat unless he runs for some higher office. The 46th district is majority Latino and Spanish speaking, comprising Santa Ana, Anaheim, slices of Orange and Fullerton, and slivers of Garden Grove, Placentia and Stanton. Correa is a conservative Democrat who grew up in Anaheim and has filled almost every possible role in CA government: supervisor, assemblymember, and state senator. He’s reached the point of his career where he no longer even puts a platform on his campaign website. He has introduced and supported a range of odious legislation though, like directing federal funding for local police drones, and has called “from the river to the sea” a “cry for the genocide of the Jewish people.” Unsurprisingly, he regularly takes large sums of money from AIPAC.
Correa’s perennial Republican opponent is UC Irvine European Studies professor David Pan. The editor of historical philosophy journal Telos, Pan is a philosophical descendent of Carl Schmitt—a fascist thinker who helped architect the legal code of the Third Reich. His campaign website states that his campaign proposals are “inspired by Charles Murray,” author of the pro-race science The Bell Curve. No recommendation.
Written by Orange County DSA
CA-47: No Recommendation
“Win with Min,” that’s incumbent Dave Min’s reelection campaign slogan, as spotted by Oliver Ma canvassers while both campaigns had concurrent canvasses at the same park in Irvine this May. For better or for worse, moderate Democrat Min will be retaining California’s 47th seat representing Irvine, Costa Mesa, and OC’s beaches from Seal all the way to Laguna. Min got spent against hard by AIPAC in his 2024 election for privately criticizing Netanyahu, but has also been endorsed by DMFI, but also cosponsored the Block the Bombs Act. He also voted to pass the Laken Riley Act and for a resolution to thank ICE, but has since condemned ICE on the House floor. Whether through incompetence or opportunism, Min’s track record doesn’t speak for much of anything, much less itself or the people it’s supposed to.
Failed 2021 recall gubernatorial hopeful Jenny Rae Le Roux, who has since gone on to head a strange Trump–Musk copycat group “Cal DOGE” (no relation to Steve Hilton’s proposal), is Min’s opponent after winning 25% of votes in the primary. She’s got no platform, but she’s got the OC Republicans’ endorsement.
Benefiting from Prop 50 reshuffling and no competitive opponent, Min will be winning his seat again this year despite a weak legislative track record. No recommendation.
Written by Orange County DSA
CA-48: No Recommendation
California’s 48th congressional district was re-districted to be a likely Democratic win with the passing of prop 50, but was unfortunately bungled by an insanely crowded democratic primary election, resulting in Democrat Marni Von Wilpert facing off against Republican Jim Desmond.
Von Wilpert, a Democratic San Diego City Council member and workers’ rights attorney, has emphasized labor rights, expanding the affordable care act and opposition to the Trump administration during her campaign. She is backed by the SEIU and California’s Teacher Association. Notably, though, she has taken millions in dollars from, and is backed by, pro-Israel PACs like DMFI and J Street and has vowed to continue strengthening the US’s relationship with Israel. She has also been an intransigent supporter of Flock cameras, repeatedly voting against cancelling the City of San Diego’s contract with Flock.
Desmond is everything you would expect from a hopeful Republican candidate backed by Trump. He has deep reverence and admiration for the work of DHS and ICE and is backed by every law enforcement agency in the region. While Desmond has not taken any money from pro-Israel PACs, he is undoubtedly someone who would proudly vote to continue arming Israel’s genocide, were he to be elected, were he to be elected.
Von Wilpert has a narrow opportunity to flip CA 48 from red to blue, and this race has national implications for whether Republicans maintain control of the House of Representatives, but she has shown throughout her campaign that despite being a champion for workers’ rights, she will be a loyal vote to continue the genocide in Palestine and endless wars in the Middle East using our tax dollars, exasperating the affordability crisis and killing countless more people in its wake.
We have no recommendation in this election.
Written by Inland Empire DSA and DSA San Diego
CA-49: No Recommendation
CA-49 stretches from south Orange County’s San Juan Capistrano, Ladera Ranch, and San Clemente, down the coast over Oceanside and Carlsbad, stopping just short of La Jolla in Del Mar and Rancho Santa Fe. Incumbent democrat Mike Levin sailed through the primaries unopposed on the Democratic side. Levin is a moderate who has aligned with many local environmental orgs for wanting to deal with environmental waste at the decommissioned coastal San Onofre Nuclear Power Station—but also declined to condemn Israeli strikes on Iran, did not cosponsor the Block the Bombs Act (unlike even Levin’s up-county neighbors Min and Tran), and voted in favor of the Laken Riley Act.
Levin’s opponent is 25-year Navy vet named Armen Kurdian, has picked up the endorsements of much of California’s Republican establishment and is running on the more traditional public-facing line: back the blue, school choice, no “special interests” (read: unions).
In a district where Dems eked out +4 points from Prop 50 and a rabidly anti-Trump voting environment, Levin seems set to win. No recommendation.
Written by Orange County DSA
CA-50: No Recommendation
CA-51: Sara Jacobs
The outcome of the race in the 51st Congressional District is not in doubt: Sara Jacobs is expected to cruise to an easy reelection over Ricardo Cabrera, a Republican mounting a purely symbolic challenge. Normally, we would not bother with a recommendation in a race like this, but Jacobs – while no socialist – has proven herself to be one of the more progressive members of Congress from California (and by far the most progressive from San Diego County). She introduced the Block the Bombs Act (H.R. 3565), is an original co-sponsor of the Medicare for All Act (H.R. 3069), voted against the GOP’s most recent red-baiting anti-socialism resolution (H.Res. 58 – she voted present two years earlier on a similar resolution, H. Res. 9), has voted for every War Powers Act resolution to end the illegal war against Iran, is an original co-sponsor of the Green New Deal (H. Res. 332), and –despite being one of the wealthiest members of Congress – introduced the LEGACY Act (H.R. 4330) to slash the federal estate tax exemption in order to fund childcare for working families.
There are places where she could be better. For one, she is not a co-sponsor of the Colleges for All Act (H.R. 3543) to pay for tuition-free public four-year colleges for working-class and middle-class students. And she has not come out in support of Prop. 40, the Billionaire Tax Act. (We’re hoping to have the opportunity to amend this writeup before election day – come on, Rep. Jacobs. It’s a moral issue.) Nevertheless, we think it is important to recognize she’s been closely aligned.
We recommend a vote for Sara Jacobs.
Written by DSA San Diego
CA-52: No Recommendation
State Senate
SD-2: Damon Connolly
SD-4: No Recommendation
SD-6: Sean Frame
The district, represented by Republican car dealer (maybe a redundant phrase) Roger Niello, has long been solidly Republican, trended to the left in recent elections. In today’s climate, who knows? Sean Frame is a solid progressive, a Sacramento DSA member, and an active leader of his union, which represents employees at the Sacramento County Office of Education. He also runs the Six PAC, which raises funds mostly to support progressive rural and school board candidates, mainly in California.
We recommend Sean Frame for California’s 6th Senate District.
Written by Sacramento DSA
SD-8: No Recommendation
The incumbent State Senator, Angelique Ashby, made headlines for running one of the most expensive legislature races in state history. In office, she’s been mostly a middle-of-the-road liberal and is at very little risk of losing re-election. She doesn’t need our recommendation.
Written by Sacramento DSA
SD-10: No Recommendation
We do not recommend anyone in this race. Scott Sakakihara is a moderate Democrat and is not going to push for progressive policy. He has a deep background in corporate tech, having worked in Palantir’s finance department and is awash in campaign donations from Uber, Meta, and the cryptocurrency PAC Grow California. He has been a leading voice in expanding the funding and militarization of the Union City police department and is endorsed by the California Association of Realtors. No amount of labor endorsements can erase the fact he is a corporate Democrat.
Written by Silicon Valley DSA
SD-12: No Recommendation
SD-14: No Recommendation
SD-16: No Recommendation
SD-18: No Recommendation
SD-20: Caroline Menjivar
In the 20th State Senate district we have Caroline Menjivar, a young queer Latina veteran. She’s a progressive with Democratic establishment backing, likely to cruise to re-election. Her district covers much of the East and Northeast San Fernando Valley and is a heavily working class Latino district.
Caroline faces Republican Tony Rodriguez, who is running on a standard Republican platform of “more money for police” and “rooting out corruption”. Most of his campaign funds come from self-loans. Rodriguez got 32% of the vote in the primary and is unlikely to improve much on that.
During her first term, Caroline Menjivar has sponsored legislation to add specialized mental health crisis services for LGBTQ+ youth on the 988 Crisis Hotline, fought to keep our undocumented neighbors on Medi-Cal in the face of Gavin Newsom’s cuts, and introduced legislation that would permanently ban ICE officials from being police officers in the state of California. Menjivar has built a legislative record aligned with working class, immigrant communities, and LGBTQ+ issues, with backing from labor and progressive organizations like the Working Families Party.
Given her incumbency and broad coalition support, she’s not at real risk of losing, but her terms so far have been good enough for you to vote for Caroline Menjivar. ☆
Written by DSA Los Angeles
SD-22: No Recommendation
Senate District 22 is currently held by “Mod Squad” Democrat Susan Rubio, who is facing a Republican challenger, but is extremely safe in this seat. This district covers parts of Los Angeles and San Bernardino counties, including Chino, La Verne, Montclair, Ontario, Pomona and San Dimas. Rubio was formally undocumented becoming a citizen in 1994. She served as a public school teacher for 17 years before being elected to the California state legislature. In 2025, Rubio was reappointed to the senate standing committee on insurance, despite a possible link in a federal bribery probe where she denied wrongdoing and no charges were filed against her. Rubio easily took 60% in the primary and will likely hit that threshold again.
Republican challenger Mike Netter’s campaign website paints California as a state overrun with crime and lawlessness, amongst some vile anti-trans platform points.
Susans Rubio’s donors include California Real Estate PAC, gambling site Kalshi, and corporations like Uber, StubHub, and Meta. Yeesh. She’ll continue to represent the money interests instead of the working class of her district, but the alternatives are no better - no recommendation.
Written by DSA Los Angeles
SD-24: John Erickson
With Ben Allen vacating his seat in pursuit of the State Insurance Commissioner position, an open-seat race is unfolding in SD-24. SD-24 is a hysterical combo of random parts of Los Angeles – it starts in Malibu, before going through Agoura Hills and Calabasas, before following down the coast all the way to the ports. It then also goes all the way east through Beverly Hills and West Hollywood and Hollywood before ending just short of Los Feliz.
Despite representing some of the city of LA’s few Republican precincts and socialists in Franklin Village, SD-24 is quite a progressive Senate District, but impact and aftermath of the Palisades Fire still looms large in the psyche of voters.
After a crowded primary election, we see a race between Brian Goldsmith and John Erickson.
Brian Goldsmith has emerged as a serious contender with over $1 million raised, with nearly half of that coming from himself and large dollar donors, including union-busting billionaire Wonderful Company owners the Resniks, disgraced former mayoral candidate Rick Caruso, and the California Apartment Association PAC . He has endorsements from Nancy Pelosi, Hillary Clinton, Democrats for Israel - Los Angeles, and the Los Angeles Police Protective League. His platform states that he will “fight BDS and all attempts to break the bonds between California and Israel.”
In the progressive lane is John Erickson, current West Hollywood city councilmember, long time operative and advocate on gender equity and LGBTQ+ issues. Erickson has already earned support from the California Federation of Labor and other labor organizations, and has raised over $300,000, enough to be competitive in a crowded field. On policy, Erickson has built a record on promoting housing production while still safeguarding housing affordability, tenant protections, and local climate action. He touts himself as a potential leader in healthcare access and public education investment. While Erickson is solid on most issues he also calls to invest more in “21st-century crime prevention tools for first responders that can stop crimes in the first place”.
This general election very clearly puts the billionaire class up against the workers. We recommend you vote for John Erickson, the clear progressive choice. ☆
Written by DSA Los Angeles
SD-26: Sarah Rascón
SD-26 is a slightly more coherently-designed district than SD-24, with Griffith Park and Eagle Rock up north (skipping over Glendale), then goes down through Los Feliz and Koreatown to Pico-Union, before dividing downtown LA and claiming everything north of West 4th, and finally jutting down to Vernon and through to Highland Park and East LA.
With longtime local labor leader turned politico Maria Elena Durazo opting for a run to replace Hilda Solis on the County Board of Supervisors, there’s another open seat in SD-26, where we have a two Sara(h) face-off in the general: Sarah Rascón and Sara Hernandez. Sarah vs Sara. H, not confusing at all.
An attorney, LACCD Board President, and former teacher, Sara Hernandez has tried to portray herself rhetorically as a “progressive” candidate, but in fact represents a deeply pro-capital, Status Quo Coalition establishment politics. She has maximum donations coming from housing developers, property investors, landlords, illegal betting “futures” firm Kalshi, alongside the County Labor Fed and an array of unions. Crypto-billionaire founded PAC Grow California, Google- and Meta-funded “California Leads”, and the “Housing Providers for Responsible Solutions” (the landlord lobby) are funding $2 million in independent expenditures for her. And multiple of Hernandez’s maxed out donors are also significant funders of AIPAC, relationships that date back to a 2018 trip Hernandez took with AIPAC to tour Israel.
Electoral newcomer Sarah Rascón has taken a progressive angle in the race. An El Sereno native, Rascón’s career spans community organizing, state legislative work, Latino civic participation initiatives, and most recently environmental equity at the Mountains Recreation Conservation Authority. Though she has worked for various Status Quo Coalition politicians including a brief term in the Bass administration, she is running a clean-money campaign. Her platform rejects “corporate PACs” and “PACs representing foreign governments”, alongside calling for “the full liberation of Palestine.” In more state-government-specific items, she supports single-payer healthcare via CalCare, repealing the Ellis and Costa-Hawkins Acts, and reforming Proposition 13.
Since her surprise primary performance in which she beat out former Assemblymember Wendy Carrillo, Rascón has won endorsements from Carrillo and perennial lefty candidate Maebe Pudlo, union endorsements from the California Faculty Association (CFA), National Union of Healthcare Workers (NUHW), Communication Workers of America (CWA), several ILWU locals, DSA-LA Socialists in Office Ysabel Jurado, Eunisses Hernandez, and Hugo Soto-Martinez, and current seatholder Maria Elena Durazo.
The choice is clear: vote for Sarah Rascón. ☆
Written by DSA Los Angeles
SD-28: Lola Smallwood-Cuevas
Incumbent Lola Smallwood-Cuevas isn’t facing a realistic challenger in this race and will win reelection easily against Republican Joe Lisuzzo. SD-28 covers Culver City, Palms, Mar Vista, West Los Angeles, Crenshaw, Leimert Park, South Los Angeles, parts of Mid-City, the neighborhoods surrounding USC, and parts of Downtown LA. Chair of the Senate labor committee, she’s been a reliable champion of pro-labor legislation in the State Senate, putting forward bills to require employers to report use of surveillance tools on their workers, strengthen enforcement for price gouging, creating regulations on large grocery store chains in replacing workers with self checkouts. Smallwood-Cuevas has been a reliable cross-endorser of our socialists in office and Shake Up City Hall slate, and is a member of the South LA Working Families Party-endorsed squad in the California legislature.
Smallwood-Cuevas took 74% of the vote in the primary against an NPP candidate and Joe Lisuzzo. Lisuzzo, an HR director running on a generic Republican platform, is unlikely to break 25% in the runoff.
A reliable representative of the left-labor movement in the CA State Legislature, we recommend you vote for Lola Smallwood-Cuevas for another term. ☆
Written by DSA Los Angeles
SD-30: No Recommendation
SD-30 covers much of the Southeast LA and Gateway Cities region, including Downey, Norwalk, Whittier, Bellflower, Montebello, Pico Rivera, and surrounding cities. Incumbent Democrat Bob Archuleta is no friend to socialists. According to finance filings, he’s received maximum donations from the real estate lobby, Chevron (broadly evil as a fossil fuel company but even more so as a profiteer on the genocide in Gaza), and a handful of gambling corporations.
Additionally, he is funded by law enforcement interests like Peace Officers Research Association of CA and California Correctional Peace Officers Association, and one of his top individual contributors is Spencer Tien, who peddles tactical gear to law enforcement and military personnel. In 2021, a former staffer sued him for sexual harassment.
Archuleta is facing a challenger in Republican Araceli Martinez. Campaign highlights include fighting against paying 10 cents for a plastic shopping bag and posting AI slop on Instagram. Average Republican.
Archuleta is going to coast to victory. We cannot recommend a vote for Bob Archuleta.
Written by DSA Los Angeles
SD-32: No Recommendation
SD-34: No Recommendation
Hoping to fill Board of Equalization frontrunner Tom Umberg’s D+9 North Orange County seat are two candidates: Avelino Valencia and Rhonda Shader. Shader, the Republican, has very little in the way of a platform—so it’s unclear to which element of the CA GOP platform her longshot run will be most odiously attached. Avelino Valencia, a moderate Democrat who’s vacating AD-68 to move up the ladder, comes out of the Santa Ana political machine …but legislates more like he’s representing Silicon Valley. Valencia is excited to tell everyone about his passion for AI, crypto, and blockchain (yes, he’s still repping blockchain in 2026)—he even carried legislation for “Satoshi Action Fund,” a Trumpworld pro-crypto group. Valencia is a shoe-in, despite his more-than-questionable funders. No recommendation.
Written by Orange County DSA
SD-36: No Recommendation
Covering Orange County’s conservative beach cities and Vietnamese enclaves, Republican incumbent Tony Strickland won his special election in 2025 outright in the primary after Janet Nguyen moved to the OC Board of Supervisors. This cycle will be the first regularly scheduled election in the new boundaries after 2024 redistricting, but the special’s returns don’t look promising for moderate Dem challenger, former San Clemente Mayor Chris Duncan (who also touts his former job as a 97% conviction rate US Customs and Border Protection prosecutor as a badge of honor). While some rate this as a competitive seat, it’s not receiving much attention and lacks a strong challenger. No recommendation.
Written by Orange County DSA
SD-38: No Recommendation
SD-40: No Recommendation
State Assembly
AD-1: No Recommendation
AD-2: Chris Rogers
Write up coming soon!
AD-3: No Recommendation
AD-4: No Recommendation
AD-5: Neva Parker
In this red district based in the suburban foothill portions of Placer and El Dorado Counties, incumbent Republican Joe Patterson has one opponent, Democrat Neva Parker, who challenged him last cycle. Parker is thus backed by the Democratic Party, but also by progressives such as Sean Frame and Tyler Vanderberg, candidates we have discussed elsewhere on this guide. We recommend Neva Parker.
AD-6: No Recommendation
Though this district, consisting of north Sacramento, downtown, and Arden-Arcade, contains strong potential for progressives, it’s sadly represented by a staunch centrist: Maggy Krell, the only member of the State Assembly to endorse quasi-conservative Matt Mahan’s gubernatorial campaign. Krell won the open seat in 2024 after progressives were split between three candidates and locked out of the runoff. Her only opponent, Jagtar Singh, has no campaign presence, and we couldn’t find any information about him. We therefore issue no recommendation.
AD-7: No Recommendation
AD-8: No Recommendation
AD-9: Matthew Adams
Matthew Adams is the Democratic candidate in this Republican district. While it’s unclear how progressive Adams is as his platform is pretty sparse, he clearly calls out special interests and the influence of money in politics, supports Medicare for all, and is running on protecting local water rights. That’s worth something.
We recommend Matthew Adams in Assembly District 9.
AD-10: No Recommendation
AD-11: No Recommendation
AD-12: Jackie Elward
Write up coming soon!
AD-13: No Recommendation
AD-14: Mark Rendon
Write up coming soon!
AD-15: No Recommendation
AD-16: No Recommendation
AD-17: No Recommendation
AD-18: No Recommendation
AD-19: No Recommendation
AD-20: Liz Ortega
Write up coming soon!
AD-21: No Recommendation
No recommendation. Diane Papan is a centrist Democrat and we have no interest in supporting her.
Written by Silicon Valley DSA
AD-22: No Recommendation
No recommendation. Marc Berman is a quintessential moderate who refuses to take meaningful stances to solve homelessness and the housing crisis. We have not supported him in the past and have no intention of doing so for his swan song in the Assembly.
Written by Silicon Valley DSA
AD-23: No Recommendation
AD-24: Alex Lee
We recommend sitting assembly member Alex Lee. While some of Lee’s stances over the past few years have diverged from ours—his opposition to the anti-caste discrimination legislation being one of the more recent incidents—he is still one of the most progressive members of the Assembly and the leading voice on expanding public housing.
Written by Silicon Valley DSA
AD-25: Ash Kalra
We recommend sitting assemblymember Ash Kalra. He has been the champion of a state-level single-payer healthcare program for the last half decade, writing several bills to establish Medicare-for-All, including the current version AB-1900. He stood with the Amah Mutsun people in their protection of Juristac (aka Sargent Ranch) near Gilroy and has been a staunch progressive champion in the legislature for years.
Written by Silicon Valley DSA
AD-26: Patrick Ahrens
We recommend the incumbent Patrick Ahrens. As a member of the State Assembly Health Committee, he has been a reliable advocate for universal healthcare coverage for all Californians. Ahrens supports the CA Billionaire Tax Act, reallocating the budget to remove cost-barriers to higher education by making it more affordable, and replicating the successful efforts to allocate funds for affordable housing he spearheaded while president of the Foothill-De Anza Community College District Board.
Written by Silicon Valley DSA
AD-27: No Recommendation
AD-28: Gail Pellerin
We recommend Gail Pellerin. Pellerin is quietly one of the more progressive legislators in the Assembly, receiving a 97/100 from Courage California. There are some concerns with her taking a decent amount of money from law enforcement and real estate PACs, and we hope that she is ready to prioritize housing for people instead of profits for landlords when the votes come up.
Written by Silicon Valley DSA
AD-29: No Recommendation
AD-30: No Recommendation
AD-31: No Recommendation
AD-32: No Recommendation
The only candidate for this ruby-red district surrounding Bakersfield is the incumbent Republican. No recommendation.
AD-33: No Recommendation
Incumbent GOP Assemblymember Alexandra Macedo’s challenger is former mayor of Lindsay, CA: Hipolito Angel Cerros. Cerros was the youngest elected official ever in Lindsay when he was elected to city council in 2020 and was subsequently elected mayor by his colleagues in 2022. However, allegedly due to his inexperience, alleged overstep of his power, and high levels of staff turnover in city hall, the council removed him from his position in 2024.
We have no recommendation on this race.
AD-34: Randall Putz
While most of this district is in San Bernardino County, AD-34’s got a liiiiittle bit of Lancaster and Palmdale, so we’re going to do a write up. Hello to everyone reading this in Lancaster and Palmdale! Any good recommendations for Date Shakes?
Republican Assemblymember Tom Lackey is termed out, so we got a face-off between a Democrat and Republican. Democrat Randall Putz narrowly took first place with 37.7% of the vote against three Republicans. If you’re doing your math, that means that the top Republican, Charles Hughes, is probably favored to win by 20+ points. With voter sentiment towards Republicans in free fall though, a blue wave might, just might, make this winnable for Putz.
He’s running on some solid points, such as renter protections, ensuring corporations pay their fair share of taxes, and holding polluters accountable. In other words, Putz is not a total putz. Even a middling Democrat would be better than his Republican opponent, vote for Randall Putz. ☆
Written by DSA Los Angeles
AD-35: No Recommendation
AD-36: No Recommendation
AD-37: No Recommendation
AD-38: No Recommendation
AD-39: No Recommendation
AD-39 includes Palmdale, Lancaster, and parts of San Bernardino County, including Victorville. A Latino-majority district, Juan Carrillo first won this seat against a Republican challenger in 2022 and he most likely will handily win this seat against the same Republican challenger four years later. A member of the Mod Squad, he conveniently abstained from some consequential votes on environmental conservation and pro-worker legislation. He has large donations from real estate, oil, and the cops.
Carrillo got almost 60% of the vote in the primary against Republican Paul Marsh, whose top priority is “supporting our officers”. The General should look the same.
This district is ripe for more progressive, and dare we say, socialist, representation. Until we get that, no recommendation from us.
Written by DSA Los Angeles
AD-40: Pilar Schiavo
Pilar Schiavo was elected to this district that covers Santa Clarita and the northwest San Fernando Valley, including Northridge and Granada Hills in 2022. Her win was deeply helped by a redistrict that swung the district in her favor to eke out a 50.2% win over a Republican. In 2024, she won by a slightly larger margin, 52%. She repeated that number in the primary, taking her to the general against Republican Rickey Hayes II, who is endorsed by Los Angeles City Councilmember John Lee (boo! hiss!).
Schiavo’s donations reflect the backing of the Southern California class of state legislature incumbents and labor unions. During her first term in office, she fought to shut down the Aliso Canyon gas facility in the face of the utility commission’s approval to ramp up its production, fought against anti-abortion practices in the state, and has supported pro-worker,social housing, and CalCare bills in the Assembly. Since then, she’s moderated, abstaining from votes on several criminal justice reform bills. She’s also received donations from groups that should take a long walk off a short pier, like the Los Angeles Police Protective League, several other police orgs, and corporations like AirBnB, DoorDash, and FanDuel.
Hayes' website doesn’t even include a policy page, and his social media is barren besides the occasional AI selfie.
It’s likely that Schiavo will once again win this race by the same 4-6 points she won in 2024, but this one is close. Close enough that despite our disappointment with the way she’s moderated, you shouldn’t stay out of this one. Vote for Pilar Schiavo.
Written by DSA Los Angeles
AD-41: No Recommendation
AD-41 covers Pasadena and heads east and north into the foothills of the San Gabriel Mountains. A heavily Democratic district, freshman incumbent John Harabedian is running against a no-chance Republican challenger named Adam Vena, who has no digital campaign presence other than a Facebook page where he posts his attendance at Charlie Kirk vigils and a private Instagram that links to his story about losing custody of his daughter for refusing to accept her transition. (If you’re Vena’s ex-, daughter, or family, our solidarity is with you.)
John Harabedian used to work in the LA District Attorney’s office and was on the Sierra Madre City Council. His website lists endorsements from various elected officials, unions, including the California Nurses Association, and California Environmental Voters. Yet, his campaign donations reveal maximum donations from the California Apartment Association, a handful of corporations (like Meta and Uber), and real estate interests. In office, he’s been a solidly middle-of-the-road California Democrat – neither Mod nor progressive, and has particularly focused (understandably) on bills about Eaton Fire recovery, with which he’s done reasonably well and bought a lot of goodwill in the district.
Nobody is unseating him this cycle, Republican or otherwise. No recommendation.
Written by DSA Los Angeles
AD-42: No Recommendation
Current officeholder Jacqui Irwin is vacating this seat, which includes the wealthy homeowner-dense communities Malibu, Agoura Hills, Calabasas, and parts of Ventura County in order to run for congress. The Democratic candidate, Deborah Klein Lopez, is a former Agoura Hills city councilmember and backed by California organized labor unions, status quo politicians like Adam Schiff, and Democratic clubs, like Democrats for Israel. Her platform is a standard Status Quo Democrat, running on disaster preparedness, increasing funding for the police, increasing housing supply, and cutting red tape. She received 54% of the vote in the primary election against two Republicans.
Lopez is facing Republican Ted Nordblum, whose platform includes classic GOP talking points such as “being tough on crime” and “tax cuts.” As of this writing, his most recent post on Instagram is from two months ago, where he promoted an AI graphic for a casino fundraiser where you win big by having the roulette ball stop on your lucky numbers Π or ζ, throw some non-euclidean dice, or win a round of cards by drawing a much-needed θ of ☙.
There’s no reason to believe Klein Lopez will lose votes in the general election. For a status quo Democrat, no recommendation.
Written by DSA Los Angeles
AD-43: No Recommendation
Celeste Rodriguez is the incumbent in this northeastern San Fernando Valley district. While her legislative record her first term is inoffensive (her signature bill was about supporting immigrant families facing deportations), her campaign donations raise concern, listing money from AirBnB, corporations like McDonalds and Amazon, FanDuel, Peace Officers PAC, and Netflix CEO Reed Hastings. Prior to election, Celeste worked in the Garcetti administration and was mayor of the independent SFV city San Fernando. In the Assembly, she has been fast-tracked for CADEM leadership, being appointed Assistant Speaker Pro Tempore as a freshman.
Celeste is coasting towards re-election against Ricardo Benitez, a perennial candidate Republican with no fundraising and no website. His campaign Facebook page has been dormant since 2022. We have no recommendation.
Written by DSA Los Angeles
AD-44: Nick Schultz
AD-44 covers Burbank, Sherman Oaks, North Hollywood, Studio City the tippy-top of Glendale, and the Warner Bros. Studio Water Tower Autonomous Zone (soon to be Skydance Studios Water tower??? Will they evict the Animaniacs????). Nick Schultz won his first term in 2024 and is facing Republican Carolyn Daniels.
Schultz is current chair of the Assembly Public Safety Committee and is running on an affordability agenda, universal healthcare, and protecting renters. He’s worked with criminal justice reform organizations such as Initiate Justice while on the Public Safety Committee. He’s fought against ICE in the levels of state government, including the ban on ICE wearing face masks, and supported ending AI from hiring decisions in the workforce. He’s worked closely with DSA-LA Socialist in Office Konstantine Anthony while he was on the Burbank City Council and supports our endorsed candidates.
A progressive left vote in the Assembly, he’s endorsed by every big labor union in the state.
Schultz is going to coast to re-election, and he’s been decent in Assembly - we recommend you vote for him. ☆
Written by DSA Los Angeles
AD-46: No Recommendation
Assembly District 46 covers a big chunk of the West Valley – Encino, Reseda, and Canoga Park. In the General, Jesse Gabriel is heading to a rematch with Republican Tracey Schroeder, who he beat by 25 points in 2024, in this safe blue district. Schroeder describes herself as a “granddaughter of a first generation immigrant”, which literally just means “not an immigrant”.
Current chair of the state budget committee, where he will oversee budgeting within a deficit, Gabriel’s taken money from the California Apartment Association, private insurance companies, and AirBnB. Gabriel’s not generally one of the most pro-business Assembly dems, but he’s no progressive.
He’s not really providing the state with any sort of vision, so we have no recommendation.
Written by DSA Los Angeles
AD-47: Leila Namvar
With an incumbent Republican in a swing district spanning Coachella Valley and the outer limits of the Inland Empire, Leila Namvar, former Chapter President of SEIU 721, is the clear choice of labor in the district and promises to be a strong pro-union vote in the Assembly.
We recommend Leila Namvar for Assembly District 47.
AD-48: No Recommendation
This district covers the eastern San Gabriel Valley – Azusa, Covina, Baldwin Park, Glendora and Irwindale. The seat has been held by Blanca Rubio, a former Baldwin Park school board member, since 2016. Rubio is the convenor of the infamous and informal “Mod Squad” – that collection of Democratic legislators that works reliably and assiduously for oil, business, pharmaceutical companies, police, landlord, and various other corporate interests. She’s also the center of a family-based political machine that put her sister Susan in the State Senate and tried to impose her formerly-Republican sister Sylvia on Whittier, where she was beaten by another machine dynasty candidate in Lisa Calderon. The Rubio sisters’ power in their own bailiwick isn’t impregnable, however – the region is heavily Latino, API, and working-class, and has historically elected more liberal (albeit non-socialist) candidates like Judy Chu and Hilda Solis. This Rubio is running against a Republican for this seat.
So far this cycle, Rubio’s Mod Squad has joined Republicans to kill bills regulating AI-driven “algorithmic pricing” and surveillance of workers by businesses as well as a bill that would have assessed new financial penalties to greenhouse gas-emitting businesses. Rubio has almost never faced a serious challenger to her left, with 2024’s WFP-affiliated Brian Calderon Tabatabai the only exception. This November, she’s heading to a rematch with Vietnamese-American law-and-order Republican Dan Tran, who she beat by 20+ points in both the 2024 general election and the 2026 primary election.
No recommendation.
Written by DSA Los Angeles
AD-49: No Recommendation
Assemblymember Mike Fong has been serving this San Gabriel Valley district since 2022 and is the current chair of the Higher Education Committee in the Assembly. He’s facing Republican Long Liu, who has no shot in this safe blue district, where Fong won the primary by nearly 30 points. Liu’s website prominently features events in honor of Charlie Kirk, and uses the tag line “Make California Golden Again.” You won’t believe this, but he also hates immigrants, taxes, and trans people.
Fong’s voting record is fairly in line with the progressive wing of the Assembly, and he’s authored bills that allow undocumented students to access state financial aid and expand gun control regulations. However, like many Democrats in the California state legislature, he has accepted large donations from real estate, cops, Big Tech, and good ol’ PG&E.
Fong will win easily. We’ve got no recommendation for you here.
Written by DSA Los Angeles
AD-50: No Recommendation
AD-51: Colin Hernandez
AD-51 covers Santa Monica, West LA, Beverly Hills, West Hollywood, the Hollywood Hills, Hollywood, and Hancock Park, a large district that mixes renters and some of the most wealthy areas of the city.
Over the course of his two years in the State Assembly, Rick Zbur has demonstrated why he remains one of the more odious establishment power brokers in both the region and the state. While trying to appear “progressive”, he continues to vote in lockstep with the wishes of his megadonors, such as tax-dodging corporations well-known for crushing organized labor (Uber, Walmart, and Amazon) or public utilities (PG&E and Edison International). The latter was successful in pushing Zbur to back down from supporting limitations on lobbying and advertising by investor-owned utilities (AB 1167)! He also co-authored AB 715, a bill that was advertised as a defense against antisemitism in California public schools, but was specifically designed to censor public education and protected speech regarding Israel and Palestine.
Democratic Socialist Colin Hernandez is the only candidate running from Zbur’s left. A 9th-generation Californian, Hernandez’ platform includes CalCare, Housing for All, walkable cities, climate justice, and taxing the rich. His platform prioritizes building social housing and the repeal of the Costa-Hawkins and Ellis Acts, clearly naming private equity and corporate landlords as our class enemies. Colin calls for a “California that is against imperialism and Colonialism,” drawing a clear distinction between anti-Zionism and antisemitism, and opposes AB715.
With an unquestionably Democratic Socialist platform, vote for Colin Hernandez. ☆
Written by DSA Los Angeles
AD-52: No Recommendation
AD 52 covers Northeast LA, East LA, and parts of the San Gabriel Valley which includes Eagle Rock, Elysian Park, Echo Park, Los Feliz, Silverlake, Montecito Heights and other neighborhoods. Jessica Caloza took this seat in 2024 becoming the first Filipina elected to the state legislature. Before getting elected, she served as deputy chief of staff to Attorney General Rob Bonta, was appointed commissioner to the board of public works by Mayor Garcetti, and served as an education policy advisor to President Obama.
In her first term Caloza has served on the budget, housing, and health committees. The district is one of the most progressive districts in the state, including LA’s socialist hotbeds of Highland Park, Echo Park, and Silver Lake, but Caloza is solidly in the establishment party, being appointed Assistant Majority Whip as a freshman. She’s no “Mod Squad” member, but takes plenty of lobbyist money alongside her Labor support and is not aligned with or endorsed by California Working Families Party or the CADEM Progressive Caucus.
Caloza is entirely safe in this seat, earning more than 82% of the vote in the primary against her challenger, Republican Andrea Lee Anderson, who touts that she comes from a family who worked in public service - her mom was a Girl Scout. She’s a standard modern Republican with all the dreck that includes.
Caloza doesn’t need a recommendation from us.
Written by DSA Los Angeles
AD-53: No Recommendation
AD 53 covers Pomona, Chino, Montclair, Ontario, and Upland, where we have incumbent Michelle Rodriguez, an establishment Mod Squad pro-business democrat running against Republican Rafaela Romero.
Rodriguez won this seat last cycle when her Mod Squad husband, Freddie Rodriguez, was termed out. This is a heavily Latino cross county district historically dominated by trade unionists. The Republican challenger is not a serious candidate in a district this blue, and is running a campaign mostly complaining about trans women and making Indiana college volleyball memes.
We are going with no recommendation.
Written by DSA Los Angeles
AD-54: No Recommendation
Mark Gonzalez is the incumbent running in AD-54, a district that covers Boyle Heights, Lincoln Heights, Westlake, Downtown Los Angeles, Koreatown, Pico-Union, Chinatown, Little Tokyo, Historic Filipinotown, and the cities of Vernon, Montebello, and Commerce. He was the only candidate for a while, but then a last-minute Republican qualified as a write-in candidate to get 0.3% of the primary vote, so here we are.
Mark Gonzalez is now continuing from his time as chair of the Los Angeles Democratic Party as whip of the Assembly majority, the centerpiece of the Angeleno Status Quo Coalition. The legislation he’s sponsored thus far is fine-to-YIMBY, seeking to expand access to street medicine, make it easier to build “affordable” housing on certain lots, and expand the CA Child Tax Credit. While his biggest donors are SEIU locals, he lists significant donations from the Los Angeles Police Protective League and real estate PACs. If he gets less than 80% of the vote, it’ll be a shock.
This district deserves better representation. No recommendation.
Written by DSA Los Angeles
AD-55: Isaac Bryan
Incumbent Isaac Bryan is expected to handily win this race, as he faces a challenger who has no reported campaign contributions in this safe blue district that covers Culver City, Palms, Mid-City, West Adams, Crenshaw, Baldwin Hills, Ladera Heights, Leimert Park, Jefferson Park, West LA, Westwood, and Century City. He has one of the strongest progressive records in the State Assembly, advocating for decarceration and policing reform, workers’ rights, social housing, and a California single payer healthcare system. Bryan is broadly seen as a rising star on the progressive wing of the Assembly Democratic Party, and is one of a new generation of leaders that have emerged across South LA in recent years.
He’s continued this focus, which launched after he co-chaired the Measure J alternatives to incarceration funding campaign alongside Socialist in Office Eunisses Hernandez, through his recent terms. Bryan is likely to be a fixture of the progressive Angeleno political scene for cycles to come.
He’s facing school social worker Ashley Brown, who got 19% of the vote in the primary. Her website features some uncanny AI images and only two organizational endorsements: from “Inglewood's 1st and only wine bar” and the California Rifle & Pistol Association.
Isaac Bryan should win handily, but he’s still good enough to vote for and for our recommendation. ☆
Written by DSA Los Angeles
AD-56: No Recommendation
We got yet another status quo-Dem vs. Republican in AD-56, which covers much of east Los Angeles County, including South El Monte, Pico Rivera, La Puente, Whittier, and Diamond Bar.
The incumbent, Lisa Calderon, has been in this seat since 2020. She’s your garden-variety California Democrat, with basically every statewide politician and organization endorsing her. Will it surprise you that she has a whole lotta money from real estate, SoCal Edison, Chevron, and Uber? Nah. We got nothing else for you then.
She’s facing a former Whittier city councilwoman, Jessica Martinez, who emphasizes that she is a Christian who will “protect us from THE MARCH TOWARDS SOCIALISM!”. Calderon beat Martinez by 20 points in the primary and should have a similar or larger margin in the general.
Calderon doesn’t need our recommendation.
Written by DSA Los Angeles
AD-57: No Recommendation
Incumbent Sade Elhawary received 83% of the vote against her Republican challenger in the primary for this Southeast and South Central LA seat. After one term in office, Elhawary has been a fairly progressive voice in the Assembly, another member of the South LA Working Families Party cohort. She’s sponsored bills to protect workers against surveillance technology that bosses use, make it easier to convert vacant office buildings into housing, and increase accountability to law enforcement. Locally, although she initially backed Elmer Roldan in the LA City Council District 9 primary against DSA-endorsed Estuardo Mazariegos, she has come around post-primary and endorsed Estuardo. Good move, Sade.
However, there are gaps in Elhawary’s progressivism. Elhawary has accepted money from organizations like the California Correctional Police Officers Association PAC, the California Real Estate PAC, and California New Car Dealers Association PAC, as well as companies like AirBnB and CVS. This is a new development – when she first ran for this seat in 2024, those interests backed another candidate. But once elected in California’s Status Quo Coalition, capital interests show up to influence you.
She’s definitely going to win, and we don’t see it necessary to recommend her.
Written by DSA Los Angeles
AD-58: No Recommendation
AD-59: No Recommendation
The 59th assembly district, spanning the northeast border of Orange County up to Chino Hills, has been held by the charismatic moderate Republican Phil Chen since redistricting in 2022. Chen’s grip on the district is so strong that in 2022 Dems didn’t field an opponent allowing a 500 vote write-in candidate to advance to the general and take 30% of the vote by default. In 2024 they took a shot, but landed just shy of cracking 40% – this failure left the district uncontested by Dems in this cycle, with the only opponent on the ballot former Green Party candidate Victor Hernandez. Hernandez’ site only lists his issues as rent control and ranked-choice voting. This race will be a test to see whether, in an extremely anti-Republican voting environment, voters take former Green Party candidates more or less seriously than straight up independents (like the 30%-getter in 2022). Chen is highly likely to retain his seat. No recommendation.
Written by Orange County DSA
AD-60: No Recommendation
AD-61: Tina McKinnor
AD-61 covers the Los Angeles neighborhoods of Venice, Marina del Rey, Westchester, Inglewood, Hawthorne, and Lawndale.
Tina McKinnor faces a write-in Republican candidate who got 1.4% of the primary vote. She’s going to win easily.
But we’d like to note that she’s endorsed a lot of our Shake Up City Hall slate and is yet another part of the WFP State Squad here in LA. A friend of labor, McKinnor has been a reliable presence at picket lines and has co-authored legislation allowing legislative staff the right to form a union as well as ensuring all apartments for rent come with a refrigerator and stove.
As a strong and consistent progressive voice in the Assembly, we recommend that you vote for Tina McKinnor. ☆
Written by DSA Los Angeles
AD-62: No Recommendation
AD-62 covers the heavily Latino Southeast Los Angeles cities of Huntington Park, South Gate, Lynwood, Paramount, Bellflower, and Lakewood.
Incumbent Jose Solache faces the same Republican he faced in 2024 and if the primary is any indication, he will likely beat him by the same large margin as before. After one term in the Assembly, Solache totes significant campaign contributions from the California Real Estate Political Action Committee and the California Apartment Association (bad). On the other hand, he’s held the line on defending Californians from ICE, getting tear gassed outside of the Paramount Home Depot (good!) He’s going to win.
With the status quo to fall back on, we’re not issuing a recommendation here.
Written by DSA Los Angeles
AD-63: No Recommendation
AD-64: No Recommendation
If you live in Bell, Cudahy, Bell Gardens, Downey, Santa Fe Springs, Norwalk, La Mirada, or La Habra, you’re a proud resident of the 64th California Assembly District. Your current Assembly representative is Blanca Pacheco, who took over the seat in 2022. Pacheco takes a whole lot of money from oil, real estate, and police interests. Blanca Pacheco is way out of touch with her district, but her only opponent is anti-trans rights Republican Raul Ortiz Jr., who she beat by 25 points in both the 2024 general and the 2026 primary.
For that reason, we can’t really recommend anyone in this race.
Written by DSA Los Angeles
AD-65: No Recommendation
Assembly District 65 is a South LA and South Bay district that includes Watts, Compton, Harbor City, Willowbrook, Wilmington, parts of South Central, and San Pedro. It’s been held by Mike Gipson, who’s now running for State Board of Equalization, since 2014.
Ayanna Davis is the Democratic contender and Mike Gipson’s pick. She represents more of the traditional establishment and has backing from powerful state politicians including Mark Gonzalez, Tina Mckinnor, Tony Thurmond, Fiona Ma, Malia Cohen, and heavy hitter labor locals including ILWU Southern California District Council, Smart Local 105, Teamsters Joint Council 42, and California Democratic Legislative Caucus among others.
She faces Republican Lydia Gutierrez, who beat out progressive challenger Fatima Iqbal-Zubair by one percentage point.
Davis is expected to coast to victory and be another status quo vote in Sacramento. No recommendation.
Written by DSA Los Angeles
AD-66: Sara Deen
With Al Muratsuchi terming out after an unsuccessful go at State Superintendent for Public Instruction, Assembly District 66 (covering much of the South Bay) sees two Democrats on the ballot in the General.
Rancho Palos Verdes Mayor Paul Seo entered the primary as a pro-business, law and order candidate, and has consolidated the Status Quo Coalition in the general with endorsements from Labor Fed and California SEIU. His top priorities are increasing law enforcement hiring and funding, which earned him primary LA Police Protective League (LAPPL), California Fraternal Order of Police, and the Association for Los Angeles Deputy Sheriffs (ALADS) support.
He faces dentist, urgent care facility owner, and Palos Verdes School Board President Sara Deen. Deen’s platform is relatively sparse and nondescript, talking about “access to healthcare,” and reducing the “influence of special interests in our political system.” Which special interests, Sara? Presumably you don’t mean the American Medical Association, for whom you dropped your past advocacy in favor of single-payer healthcare. Anyway, Deen has the endorsement of progressive unions like NUHW and California Nurses Association (CNA), as well as progressive grassroots organizations like Indivisible, California Women’s List, South Bay Forward, and a couple YIMBY organizations.
This general election has gotten extremely nasty, with Deen, a Pakistani American, getting attacked by various Seo-supporting business PACs for being “a radical Muslim”. Deen responded by… condemning DSA-LA for recommending her in the first place, claiming that our (honestly, very tepid) recommendation “misrepresents [her] values” and equates Muslim Americans with socialism. We didn’t say you were a socialist, Sara, we just said you were the better candidate in the race. If you want to go ahead and make the case for why you are a worse candidate to vote for than Seo, you have our email. Until then, we’re going to keep recommending the best candidate in every race.
Vote for decidedly non-socialist but still lesser-of-two-evils Sara Deen.
Written by DSA Los Angeles
AD-67: No Recommendation
The highest spending Assembly race in the primary—flooded with around $10 million from crypto PAC “Grow California,” the CA hotel lobby, and others—AD-67 has calmed since the unfortunate defeat of UNITE HERE 11 co-president Ada Briceño. This solidly blue district straddles the LA/OC border: encompassing the LA gateway cities of Artesia, Cerritos, and Hawaiian Gardens; OC gateways of La Palma, Buena Park, and Cypress; as well as swaths of the population centers of Anaheim and Fullerton.
Against a Republican, this district will go to moderate Democrat Mark Pulido in the general election. Pulido, a longstanding member of Cerritos City Council, doesn’t have much of a platform to speak for—but it doesn’t matter! His opponent Paulo Morales has under $1,500 cash on hand and six endorsements (all from his colleagues in Cypress municipal government). This race is locked up for Pulido. No recommendation.
Written by Orange County DSA
AD-68: Jessie Lopez
After a nailbiting finish days after election day, in AD-68 (which covers Santa Ana, Orange, and parts of Anaheim) we’re down to two Democratic candidates aiming to move up from Santa Ana City Council: David Penaloza and Jessie Lopez.
From the establishment side, in the lineage of hard Zionist Lou Correa and crypto sycophant Avelino Valencia, is Penaloza. Working in employer-side regulatory compliance (bad), Penaloza is a candidate DSA members absolutely should not vote for. He supports Flock cameras. He’s backed by (lots of) cops. He called protesters during the George Floyd uprising “animals destroying our city.”
Lopez, Working Families Party cadre by comparison, helped pass rent control and opposed raises for police during her tenure—votes which precipitated a failed recall effort against her (one DSA helped defeat). She’s running on CalCare and other progressive positions, and would be a solid addition to the Assembly Progressive Caucus. Notably, AD-68 has been inundated with over $4 million in crypto money from billionaires Tim Draper and Chris Larsen’s group “Grow California”—in an attempt to both defeat Lopez and elect Penaloza. For DSA members, Lopez is the easy pick here.
We recommend Jessie Lopez for Assembly District 68.
Written by Orange County DSA
AD-69: No Recommendation
The 69th Assembly District includes parts of Long Beach, Carson, and Signal Hill, as well as the Catalina Island community of Avalon.
Incumbent Josh Lowenthal has represented the district since 2022, and his sole opponent, Democrat Carolyn Essex, has not managed to mount much of a campaign. Or, indeed, a coherent website. Lowenthal’s parents are both former Democratic Party electeds from the area, and he is endorsed by major Democratic Party groups and electeds, as well as labor unions and local newspapers—he is a bog-standard California Democrat. His campaign website touts support from the LA chapter of Democrats for Israel. This 76% Latino district would probably be better served by someone else, but Lowenthal will sail to re-election.
We have no recommendation in this race.
Written by DSA Los Angeles
AD-70: No Recommendation
The 70th district is an idiosyncratic one. Anchored by conservative Vietnamese immigrant enclaves in Westminster and Garden Grove which still fly the South Vietnamese flag, AD-70 has been a challenge for Democrats to crack in the Assembly since 2022 redistricting reshaped and paved the way for Republican Assemblymember Tri Ta to pick up the seat.
Ta, who immigrated from Saigon as a refugee to the U.S. in 1992, is an extreme anti-communist who recently went sub-viral for an unprompted video condemnation of Hasan Piker. Ta handily defeated Vietnamese Democratic opponents in both previous election cycles, and this cycle he faces Paula Swift—previously running in CD-40, Swift touts all the major D endorsements, but they feel more like afterthoughts than commitments. Her policy platforms are also nothing special. Ta is strongly favored to win it all, Swift is a late-supported moderate. No recommendation.
Written by Orange County DSA
AD-71: No Recommendation
Encompassing suburban Temecula and Murrieta in southwest Riverside County as well as Mission Viejo and its surroundings in Orange County, AD-71 is a Republican stronghold overseen by Asm. Kate Sanchez. Her only opponent, Democrat JJ Galvez, the treasurer for the Silverado-Modjeska Recreation and Parks Board has little to show for platform, endorsements, or money. This race is safe for Sanchez. No recommendation.
Written by Orange County DSA
AD-72: Chris Kluwe
Former Minnesota Vikings Punter and pro-LGBTQ activist Chris Kluwe’s main election isn’t in the primary, but the outcome this June will shape the race in anticipation of November. Assembly District 72 includes much of OC’s most notorious conservative strongholds, spanning many of the county’s beach cities (Seal, Huntington, Newport, and Laguna), as well as the slightly inland renter/white collar dominated Costa Mesa, and the South County inland suburbs of Aliso Viejo, Laguna Woods, and Lake Forest. In many ways, AD 72 represents much of what people imagine Orange County to be: MAGA flags over boardwalks, old money stucco malls, faux mediterranean suburbia – but Orange County isn’t what it once was, and 2026 is the first opportunity since 1992 where this district may swing left in an extremely anti-Trump year with no incumbent (it only voted against Prop 50 by 0.3%).
Kluwe, who extolled the virtues of democratic socialism in the New York Times just weeks ago, was born in Seal Beach and now lives in Huntington. Kluwe has become the darling of the local Democratic clubs after being arrested in an act of civil disobedience in Huntington Beach City Council last year when the council attempted to place a MAGA acrostic plaque on the local library—Kluwe calling it racist, transphobic, etc. A longtime activist, he was previously fired from his NFL career for standing up to a homophobic coach, and more recently called for an end to the genocide in Gaza at the 2025 CA Dem convention. If elected, he would easily be one of, if not the most progressive member of the State Assembly. Due to Kluwe’s national celebrity status assisting in fundraising, as well as his local grassroots support that earned him the backing of almost every possible state group (from the CA Dems, to CA WFP, to the CA Labor Federation), Kluwe is in an extremely good position to flip this seat.
With the slow collapse of the OC Republican Party fully in motion, Kluwe’s opponent is Gracey Van Der Mark. Van Der Mark calls herself HB’s “Latina MAGA Mayor.” She has promoted Holocaust denial conspiracy theories, cavorted with Proud Boys, called Black people “colored,” banned pride flags and pride celebrations on city property, and more!
With extreme MAGA candidate Van Der Mark backed by the OCGOP, overwhelmingly anti-Trump polarized voter sentiment, and a district which has been shifting dramatically blue over the past decade—AD 72 seems like a potential pickup for the Left in the Assembly this cycle.
We enthusiastically recommend Chris Kluwe for Assembly District 72.
Written by Orange County DSA
AD-73: No Recommendation
Irvine, Costa Mesa, Tustin: the liberal PMC heart of Orange County. This safe blue district is currently held by Cottie Petrie-Norris who is cruising to win her third term. She’s a Zionist and an establishment moderate, notably for DSA members she penned a 2019 letter (when she represented AD-74) opposing the then-proposed CA Ethnic Studies curriculum because it promoted “negative stereotypes of […] Israel” and “the inclusion of, and support for, the Boycott, Divest and Sanctions (BDS) movement.” Her sole opponent is Urson Russell: a Republican who is the president of a vote-restriction advocacy group called “Patriot Force California” and whose policy platform features such literary flourishes as “ensuring domestic tranquility.” Petrie-Norris will retain her seat. No recommendation.
Written by Orange County DSA
AD-74: No Recommendation
Comprising the beautiful beaches from conservative south Orange County to more liberal Oceanside, AD-74 is a purple seat which suffers from a lack of engagement from the CA Dems. Currently held by moderate Republican Laurie Davies, the district went for Prop 50 by almost 3 points – that’s 4 points up from the 2024 cycle when Davies held her seat by 0.8% of the vote. This cycle, it seems highly possible that this district could be a gain for Dems, however Davies has managed to keep the support of much of organized labor: she was endorsed by the California Federation of Labor, but (as of the writing of this guide) does not list it on her site. This deprives her opponent, Sergio Fairas, of much needed field and financial resources to flip the seat. A former mayor of San Juan Capistrano, Farias, for his part, has no platform and little endorsement support. This may unintentionally be a race to watch—but, unless things change, it looks like Davies will retain her seat. No recommendation.
Written by Orange County DSA
AD-75: No Recommendation
AD-76: No Recommendation
AD-77: No Recommendation
AD-78: No Recommendation
AD-79: LaShae Sharp-Collins
Assembly district 79 covers the southeastern portion of San Diego County, including La Mesa, Lemon Grove, parts of El Cajon, and parts of the city of San Diego itself. It is currently represented by LaShae Sharp-Collins, who initially won election as a progressive member of the Democratic Party in 2024 over two more moderate challengers. Her platform has focused on confronting corporate influence and systemic inequity in government, with an emphasis on community-centered police oversight and criminal justice reform. She has expressed support for the “Tax the Rich” ballot measures (Prop 3 and Prop 40), and supports using the additional funding to improve social safety nets. She is backed by labor groups, the Working Families Party, and CAIR Action.
Her Republican opponent Andrew Larson is running as a conservative who supports deregulation, cutting taxes on the wealthy, and further privatizing public services in education and healthcare. He additionally seems to spend a large amount of time posting on Twitter to defend Donald Trump’s inflationary tariffs, unjustified war with Iran, and unconstitutional ICE raids.
The choice here is clear: we recommend a vote for LaShae Sharp-Collins.
Written by DSA San Diego
AD-80: No Recommendation
