Here Are the 5 Republican Seats at Risk in California’s Redistricting

Some Republicans could face substantially bluer districts in 2026.

California Gov. Gavin Newsom speaks to reporters in Los Angeles on Aug. 14, 2025. Mike Blake/Reuters

Five California Republicans are poised to potentially lose their seats in the U.S. House of Representatives in upcoming elections as the California State Legislature moves forward with an effort to redraw the state’s maps.

This week, the Legislature returned to Sacramento, California, for a special session called by Gov. Gavin Newsom to respond to ongoing efforts by Texas to add five Republican seats to the U.S. House.

The California proposal does the same for Democrats, targeting five Republican seats by pouring new Democratic voters into the districts.

Newsom has proposed—and is encouraging the passage of—a new referendum to temporarily bypass the state’s nonpartisan districting commission and allow the voting public to approve the Democrat-proposed maps. It would go through the California Legislature as the Election Rigging Response Act.

Here are the Republicans who would be affected by the newly drawn congressional map.

Kevin Kiley

The Third Congressional District, which currently covers Death Valley, would be shifted to include parts of Sacramento, which is a Democrat-run city.

The district went to President Donald Trump in the 2024 presidential election by just 3 percentage points.

Rep. Kevin Kiley, who was first elected in 2022, criticized Newsom for trying to effectively oust him from Congress.

“Newsom ... gerrymandered my district in the shape of an elephant,” he wrote in an Aug. 16 post on X. “The ’trunk' captures as many Democrat voters as possible. Like all his attempts, this will fail. We’ll keep beating him at the ballot box and the Capitol.”

Kiley has introduced legislation that would prohibit mid-decade redistricting, including efforts by his party in Texas.

Rep. Doug LaMalfa (R-Calif.) speaks on the House floor in Washington on Sept. 13, 2023. House of Representatives/Screenshot via NTD

Doug LaMalfa

Trump won the First Congressional District by double-digit percentage points in the 2024 election. Under the newly drawn map, it would have gone to then-Vice President Kamala Harris by double-digit percentage points.

Rep. Doug LaMalfa has decried the newly drawn map, including his redrawn district.

“If you want to know what’s wrong with these maps—just take a look at them,” he said in an Aug. 16 post on X. “How on earth does Modoc County on the Nevada and Oregon Border have any common interest with Marin County and the Golden Gate Bridge?”

“Voters took this power from Sacramento for just this reason,” he said, referring to the creation of California’s independent redistricting commission.

“This is naked politics at its worst. Mid-Decade redistricting is wrong, no matter where it’s being done. Defying the voters voice is wrong.”

Rep. Ken Calvert (R-Calif.) speaks at a news conference in Santa Ana, Calif., on June 16, 2023. Brad Jones/The Epoch Times

Ken Calvert

Under the proposal, the 41st Congressional District of Rep. Ken Calvert would be placed in Los Angeles County, making it a Latino-majority district. This would offer the Democrats an opportunity to pick it up.

Like his colleagues, Calvert decried Newsom’s redistricting effort.

“A bipartisan majority of Californians oppose efforts to eliminate our Independent Citizens Redistricting Commission,” he wrote in an Aug. 15 post on X. “It only adds insult to injury to ask taxpayers to pay hundreds of millions of dollars on a special election power grab that would wipeout the Commission’s work.”

He has called for the state’s independent redistricting commission to be respected.

Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.) speaks in San Diego on April 22, 2025. John Fredricks/The Epoch Times

Darrell Issa

Rep. Darrell Issa in the 48th Congressional District is also vulnerable to incursion by Democrats.

After retiring from Congress in 2018, Issa returned to his seat in the eastern San Diego County district in 2020. In his most recent reelection, Issa won by double-digit percentage points.

The redrawn map would move voters from the Coachella Valley into his district, changing it from a safely Republican district to one with a slight Democratic registration advantage.

According to CalMatters, flipping this seat may be “the biggest reach” for Democrats in their redistricting efforts.

David Valadao

The Central Valley’s 22nd Congressional District, represented by Rep. David Valadao, is another of the Democrats’ targets.

However, like Issa’s district, it is far from a guaranteed win for the Democrats.

According to CalMatters, although Democrats already enjoy a numerical voter registration advantage in the district, it often leans conservative.

The Cook Political Report’s analysis of the redrawn maps states that the seat held by Valadao—who won reelection by about 7 percentage points in 2024—would be “the most tenuous for Democrats to flip.”