When Republicans moved to redraw congressional maps in Texas to maximize their advantage in the House, California Gov. Gavin Newsom responded with a counterpunch: Proposition 50, a California redistricting measure explicitly designed to eliminate up to five Republican congressional seats and offset Democratic losses elsewhere.
It was partisan hardball in the open, justified by Newsom and Democrats as a necessary response to GOP map-drawing in Texas and other states. It also had the added benefit of buoying Newsom’s national political capital with his party as he gears up for a likely White House run in 2028.
Newsom cast the move as fighting fire with fire, an unfortunate choice of words the same year as the Palisades and Altadena fires killed at least 28 people and leveled some of the most beautiful neighborhoods in Los Angeles County.
But on Tuesday, California voters appear to have poured at cold water on at least some of those plans.
With early primary returns now in, the grand gerrymandering plan looks like it’s unraveling – or at the very least, won’t deliver the sweeping seat eliminations Newsom and Democrats had hoped for in California where Republicans previously held only nine of the state’s 52 seats.
State Sen. Tony Strickland, who represents Huntington Beach, said the results “just tell you how out of step Newsom” is with voters across California.
Strickland also took aim at the measure itself, arguing it inverted the democratic relationship between voters and their representatives. Prop 50 “is fundamentally wrong,” he said, “because it allows politicians to pick their constituents, not the other way around.”
“Their goal was to try to make these seats as uncompetitive as possible, which I think is bad for the voters of California,” he told RealClearPolitics Thursday.
District by district, the picture emerging is one of Republican resilience – and in some cases, a surprising Democratic collapse in races Newsom’s allies had hoped to turn.
In CA-6, Newsom’s camp hoped that redistricting and anti-Trump energy might sideline Rep. Kevin Kiley, one of the governor’s sharpest critics. Instead, Kiley officially became an Independent, and voters there may be poised to advance him and Republican Michael Stansfield to the November general election – with Democrat Dick Pan, the former state senator who championed California’s strict childhood vaccine mandate legislation, left on the outside looking in.
It could wind up a clean Democratic shutout, although the vote difference between Stansfield and Pan was only 1,108 at last count Thursday night.
Kiley, who has made opposing all gerrymandering efforts nationwide a personal crusade, said the message voters sent Tuesday night is energizing his campaign and those efforts.
“We are not going to let self-serving politicians take away the area’s representation,” he told ABC News Thursday. “We’re fighting back against Newsom’s gerrymander in California, and then we’ll end this plague on our democracy nationwide.”
Meanwhile, longtime Rep. Darrell Issa’s retirement in a rewritten California 48th Congressional District in Eastern San Diego and Riverside Counties removed another scalp from Newsom’s target list entirely. But San Diego County Supervisor Jim Desmond, a popular longtime Republican and former Navy pilot, jumped into the race with strong party backing.
In Tuesday’s primary, Desmond emerged with a more than 20-point lead ahead of Democratic San Diego City Councilwoman Marni von Wilpert.
“Last night, voters across CA-48 sent a loud and clear message: They’re done with high taxes, they want a secure border, and they want to be able to afford to live here,” Desmond said in a post on X.com. “This was a big victory, but the real work starts now. I’m ready for it, and I hope you’re with me.”
The other Democrat in the race, Ammar Campa-Najjar, a Naval reservist, former Obama Labor Department official, and grandson of a Palestinian, has amassed only 9.7% of the vote so far. He was backed by San Diego Rep. Sara Jacobs’ billionaire grandfather, Qualcomm founder Irwin Jacobs, who poured at least $800,000 into the race.
It marked the fourth election loss in row after members of the Jacobs family bankrolled two prior runs for Congress and another failed campaign for mayor of Chula Vista.
Rep. David Valadao cruised to first place in Tuesday’s top-two primary in District 22, demonstrating once again why he remains one of the most durable incumbents in the country despite representing one of California’s most competitive districts.
With roughly 54% of the vote counted as of early Wednesday morning, Valadao stood at 44.5% with over 17,700 votes, easily outpacing both Democratic challengers. The result secured his spot on the November ballot well before the night was over.
His two challengers split the Democratic vote with progressive Randy Villegas holding second place at roughly 29.8% of the vote, while Assemblywoman Dr. Jasmeet Bains trailed at 25.7%. If Villegas holds on to his second-place finish he could consolidate the Democratic vote to make the fight for control of the seat incredibly competitive.
Yet, it’s unclear whether the Central Valley voters would back such a liberal Democrat against Valadao, a GOP centrist who voted to impeach Trump in 2021, come November.
“I would never bet against Valadao,” Strickland remarked.
The CA-40 Southern California district, which Democrats intentionally created as a Republican district, will stay true to that form, although it could be held by a more Trump-aligned congressman. Rep. Ken Calvert, a MAGA-aligned incumbent first elected to Congress in 1993 had his old district essentially dissolved by Proposition 50’s gerrymandering. Calvert relocated and ran in the new CA-40, created from a big portion of the one previously held by Rep. Young Kim, a more moderate Republican representing the area since 2021.
Early returns show both Republicans in the top two positions, with Calvert leading Kim 35.9% to 21.3%. Instead of trying to out-MAGA Calvert, Kim could shift left and court Democratic crossover voters to try to beat Calvert in the general, but it will be difficult.
The broader picture was further complicated by the death of Republican Doug LaMalfa, who represented CA-1 since 2013. LaMalfa passed away unexpectedly before the election – leaving a vacancy dynamic that scrambled any clean strategic read on California’s north.
Republican state Assemblyman James Gallagher is running for that seat. He won a special election to claim the House seat with 62.4% of the vote outright, knocking out Democratic State Sen. Mike McGuire, who serves as the highest ranking and most powerful member of the state Senate but is term-limited out of that seat. Another Democrat, Audrey Denney, received 18% of the vote.
As of Thursday night, Gallagher was also leading the Tuesday primary with 46.6% of the vote to McGuire’s 38.4%, with Denney running far behind at 13.1%.
Strickland sees a ready-made line of attack against McGuire, who he said drew a map to benefit himself personally and predicted it would backfire.
“The voters aren’t going to be all excited that he tried to pick his own district,” he said.
Gallagher thanked voters Tuesday night and highlighted McGuire’s role in the gerrymandering process.
“In November we will be running in a new district, drawn not by an independent citizens commission, but in a backroom by my opponent Mike McGuire and other Sacramento politicians,” he said. “The results tonight indicate that we will do well, as voters are fed up with Gavin Newsom and his chief lieutenant Mike McGuire, whose policies have made California unaffordable and unsafe for too many families.”
McGuire for his part focused on the positive – that he too will advance to the general, albeit without the wave of support he was expecting in the redrawn district.
“When good people come together, they can accomplish extraordinary things – and today we’re on the road to take America back,” he said. “It means the world to us, and we are honored to be on this journey with you. Now – onto November. Let’s win this thing!”
McGuire’s statement was far more subdued than his words during the Prop 50 fight last fall.
“This is about more than drawing lines on a map; it’s about drawing a line in the sand to stop Texas and Trump from rigging the election,” he said when introducing the amendment to the state constitution that became Prop 50.
What’s clear from early returns is that Newsom’s Prop 50 gambit is not poised to deliver the clean set of five GOP seat eliminations he, McGuire, and state Democrats envisioned and successfully sold to California voters. Several of the Republican incumbents he sought to neutralize are advancing to the general election, with other popular Republicans jumping in to aggressively compete for control of the newly created districts.
Yet primary elections are low-turnout affairs, with Republican voters often playing an out-sized role. Also, roughly half of all ballots remain to be counted, and California’s slow vote-counting process means the final picture could shift meaningfully in any of these races.
Still, the congressional map emerging after Tuesday’s primary and its similar mix of blue and red seats, at least as it stands today, is not the one Sacramento Democrats drew up and intended as a death blow to Trump’s midterm chances to maintain House GOP control.
National Democrats will likely be forced to channel far more money and effort than previously planned if they want to regain momentum over the summer in these hotly contested district battles.
Susan Crabtree is RealClearPolitics’ national political correspondent.
