Prop 50 radically redrew Rep. Kevin Kiley’s previous congressional district. He’s now running in the 6th District, and will face Democrat Richard Pan.
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Gov. Gavin Newsom’s bid to help Democrats take control of the House faced its first major test this month in the state’s primary elections, which determined the candidates who will face off in the November midterms. With all of the races called, it’s clear: The maps are working as Democrats intended.
California voters endorsed Newsom’s strategy in a special election last year, scrapping the state’s previous congressional districts drawn by an independent commission and approving new ones drawn by Democrats to give their candidates an edge.
Democrats hope to flip five seats currently held by Republicans to Democratic control under the new maps while boosting their incumbents in what were formerly swing districts.
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When Prop 50 passed, it was one of several efforts underway by Democrats to counter redistricting efforts begun by Republicans to shift more congressional seats in their favor. Now, the calculus has shifted, after efforts by Democrats in Virginia and New York have fallen short and more redistricting bids in Republican-led states have succeeded, in part thanks to a Supreme Court decision gutting the Voting Rights Act. That means there’s even more riding on California’s congressional districts.
Here’s a look at how those races are shaping up after the primary:
District 1
One of the most audacious moves of Prop 50 was to carve up the heavily Republican rural north state and lump its voters in with liberal cities and coastal communities hundreds of miles away. Rep. Jared Huffman, D-San Rafael, is now poised to represent a new district that stretches all the way from Marin County to the northeastern corner of California. And this open seat, which cuts from Santa Rosa through Chico to the Nevada border, looks set to elect a Democrat in what was once the territory of the ultraconservative Rep. Doug LaMalfa.
Rep. Jared Huffman meets with tribal leaders in his newly redrawn district in Burney on Jan. 27, 2026. Prop 50 expanded Huffman’s district to include much of the upper northeastern portions of the state.
Carlos Avila Gonzalez/S.F. Chronicle
Republican Assembly Member James Gallagher — a protege of the late LaMalfa, who died unexpectedly in January from a heart condition — won a special election to serve out the remainder of LaMalfa’s term under the old lines. But he’s an underdog in November, when he’ll face Democratic former state Senate leader Mike McGuire. Gallagher received 44% of the vote in the primary, as of Tuesday, while McGuire and fellow Democrat Audrey Denney, who finished third, combined for more than 54%.
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District 6
Cracking apart Rep. Kevin Kiley’s sprawling district along the eastern border of California allowed for the creation of two new Democratic-leaning seats that unfurl from the Sacramento suburbs.
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Rep. Ami Bera, D-Sacramento, jumped into the elephant head-shaped 3rd District. He advanced out of the primary ahead of several Democratic challengers — they collectively combined for more than 55% of the vote, as of Tuesday — and will face Republican Robb Tucker, a Nevada County supervisor, in November.
After a reality show-esque deliberation about where to run, Kiley, who dropped his Republican affiliation in March, settled on the 6th District, which includes his home base of Rocklin (Placer County). Early primary results showed the crowded Democratic field at risk of a lockout, splitting the vote and potentially allowing independent Kiley and Republican Michael Stansfield to advance. But former state Sen. Richard Pan has since pulled ahead of Stansfield as more votes were counted. The five Democrats account for nearly 54% of the vote, as of Tuesday, putting Pan in a good position to deny Kiley another term.
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District 22
For more than a decade, Democrats have tried to take out Rep. David Valadao, the Bakersfield Republican who has (mostly) defied a Democratic voter registration advantage to hold onto this seat in the southern Central Valley. (After narrowly losing in 2018, he won it back two years later.) So Prop 50 added a section from Fresno County that tips the partisan lean even more Democratic.
That didn’t stop the party from fighting over how to beat him. House Democrats’ campaign arm intervened in the primary to boost the more moderate Assembly Member Jasmeet Bains, infuriating progressives who backed Randy Villegas, a community college political science professor running as a populist outsider. Villegas ultimately prevailed.
Republicans will surely now attack him as too liberal for the district as he tries to oust Valadao in November. But there are flashing warning signs for Valadao, who received less than 41% of the primary vote, as of Tuesday, compared with more than 59% for the Democrats. In 2024, under the old district lines, Valadao and another Republican candidate combined for nearly 55% in the primary, before he beat his Democratic opponent by almost 7 percentage points that November.
Districts 40 and 41
To create another Democratic seat in Southern California, the new maps pack many of the Republican voters in the suburban Orange County 40th District represented by Rep. Young Kim, R-Anaheim, and the Inland Empire-based 41st District represented by Rep. Ken Calvert, R-Palm Desert (Riverside County), together into a new 40th District. Prop 50 created a new District 41 that includes Democratic voters in Eastern Los Angeles County and Northern Orange County.
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Rep. Young Kim, R-Anaheim Hills, was part of a Republican delegation that met with President-elect Donald Trump ahead of his inauguration. She’s pictured here chairing a roundtable on U.S.-Taiwan relations at Santiago Canyon College in Orange, California, on Sept. 6, 2024. (Jeff Gritchen/Orange County Register/TNS)
Jeff Gritchen/TNS
That gambit appears to have worked. Kim and Calvert are now locked in a battle for District 40, having both advanced to the general election. Calvert enters the general election as an apparent favorite, having secured 35% of the vote compared with Kim’s 21%.
In District 41, Democrat Linda Sanchez appears to have a clear advantage over Republican plumber Mitch Clemmons. Sanchez, who currently represents District 38, and two other Democrats garnered about 64% of the vote in the primary.
Democrats are also primed to retain District 38, where three Democratic candidates are also winning about 64% of the vote. The leading Democrat, Los Angeles County Supervisor Hilda Solis, will face Republican Pedro Casas, a retired Army colonel, in the general election.
District 48
Rep. Darrell Issa, D-Escondido (San Diego County), opted not to run for reelection after Proposition 50 shifted the demographics in his district to favor Democrats. He endorsed San Diego County Supervisor Jim Desmond in the race. Desmond, a Republican, will face San Diego City Council Member Marni von Wilpert, a Democrat, in the general election.
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Von Wilpert won the second spot in the race amid a crowded field that included nine Democrats. Together, the Democrats in the race won 53% of the vote.
Districts 9, 13, 27 and 49
The Proposition 50 maps also aimed to make several seats held by Democrats easier contests.
District 13, held by Rep. Adam Gray, D-Turlock, is a target for Republicans, who have been attacking Gray over his votes against President Donald Trump’s immigration policies. Gray was a staunch moderate in the state Legislature, and has continued in that vein since being elected to Congress in 2024. In Congress, he has joined the Blue Dog Coalition of moderate Democrats and recently wrote an op-ed in the Washington Post criticizing his party for not paying enough attention to financial problems facing people in his district.
After winning his seat by just 187 votes in 2024, Gray appears on an easier path to victory this year. He and another Democratic candidate in the race garnered nearly 57% of the vote as of Wednesday. His general election opponent, former Stockton Mayor Kevin Lincoln, and another Republican candidate won 43%.
In District 49, incumbent Rep. Mike Levin, D-Oceanside (San Diego County), was winning 56% of the vote as of Wednesday morning. That’s a significant improvement on his showing in the 2024 general election, when he won 52%. Similarly, Rep. Josh Harder, D-Stockton, was winning 60% of the vote Wednesday, compared with 52% in 2024.
Reps. David Min, D-Costa Mesa (Orange County), and George Whitesides, D-Santa Clarita (Los Angeles County), both advanced to the general election in their districts alongside Republican challengers. They each won smaller percentages of the votes in this year’s primary than they did in the 2024 general election because other Democrats also ran in the primary, cutting into their vote share. But Democrats in Min’s district were winning a combined 53.7% Wednesday compared with 50.1% Min won in 2024, and Democrats in Whitesides’ district were winning 59% of the vote Wednesday compared with Whitesides’ 51% in 2024.
Rep. Derek Tran, D-Cypress (Orange County), was winning 53.7% of the vote Wednesday compared with 50.1% in 2024.
Political consultant and California voting expert Paul Mitchell, who helped draw the new maps to benefit Democrats, said he’s planning to do a deep analysis of the numbers once more votes are tallied. But he says so far, the results from the primary suggest the maps are working as Democrats intended.
“There’s all these great signs looking at the primary data,” he said of the Democratic candidates in the target districts. “They’re performing extremely well.”