{"id":344084,"date":"2026-06-03T04:48:13","date_gmt":"2026-06-03T04:48:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/344084\/"},"modified":"2026-06-03T04:48:13","modified_gmt":"2026-06-03T04:48:13","slug":"fuentes-takes-early-lead-for-fresnos-district-1-council-seat","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/344084\/","title":{"rendered":"Fuentes Takes Early Lead for Fresno’s District 1 Council Seat"},"content":{"rendered":"

With just over 13% of votes counted, the race for Fresno City Council District 1 has two candidates pulling away from the pack.<\/p>\n

Civil rights attorney Rob Fuentes took an early lead against Naindeep Singh, executive director of the nonprofit Jakara Movement, with 39.32% of votes to Singh\u2019s 33.49%.<\/p>\n

Candidates Monte Forkas and Joe Hinojosa are fighting for third and fourth place with 13.51% and 13.35% of votes, respectively.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

With the backing of the Fresno City Hall establishment, including Fresno Mayor Jerry Dyer and incumbent Annalisa Perea, Fuentes has at times taken a more moderate approach<\/a> than Singh.<\/p>\n

Perea chose not to run in what would have been her first reelection campaign for the seat, opting instead to run for state Assembly, replacing Esmeralda Soria.<\/p>\n

Fuentes also boasted endorsements from many unions, as well as Fresno City Councilmembers Tyler Maxwell and Nelson Esparza.<\/p>\n

Singh, who claimed endorsements from the Working Families Party and Valley Voters Political Action Committee, said he would take on corruption at Fresno City Hall.<\/p>\n

The city\u2019s Southeast Development Area also became a regular talking point, with both candidates opposing the plan to develop 9,000 acres in that part of town. Fuentes has taken a softer approach to the plan, saying he opposes the current version.<\/p>\n

Singh outraised Fuentes, pulling in more than $96,000 for the year by the May 16 reporting date, driven in large part by donations from the Sikh community.<\/p>\n

Singh also outspent Fuentes, $132,272 to $91,235 during that period.<\/p>\n

\"FresnoFresno District 1 Map (fresno.gov)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"With just over 13% of votes counted, the race for Fresno City Council District 1 has two candidates…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":344085,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[31],"tags":[112,114,113],"class_list":["post-344084","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-fresno","tag-fresno","tag-fresno-headlines","tag-fresno-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/344084","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=344084"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/344084\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/344085"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=344084"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=344084"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=344084"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}