IN SUMMARY
While Democrats retain a supermajority, experts say Republican victories — and an increasingly diverse Republican caucus — indicate possible shifts in sentiment among nonwhite voters.
Read this story in English
The Republican bloc in the California Legislature is becoming more diverse as Latino and Asian American candidates appear to have won three Democratic-held seats, including unseating a sitting Democratic senator for the first time in a presidential election since 1980.
When new lawmakers are sworn in next week, Democrats will still control a supermajority in the Legislature. But the three seats that have flipped have made Republicans hopeful that California’s reputation as an enclave liberal state is changing. They point out that Latino and black voters are helping Donald Trump reach the White House for a second term.
“As Californians become increasingly frustrated by the failures of Democratic leadership, they are turning to Republican solutions,” Senate Republican Leader Brian Jones said in a statement. “Republican senators are not only growing in number, but also in diversity.”
According to the CalMatters digital democracy database, the Republican bloc is on track to have at least 50% nonwhite members for the first time. As it stands, according to unofficial results, 13 of the 27 legislative Republicans are non-white. The bloc could eventually have more than half nonwhite members, depending on the outcome of two pending special elections in solidly Republican districts. Two Asian American Republicans, Sen. Janet Nguyen and Assemblyman Vince Fong, won election to other offices earlier this month, leaving their seats vacant.
Jones’ statement noted that six of the 10 Senate Republicans are women and three of them are Latinas.
Jones submitted his statement on Monday, the same day that Democratic Orange County Sen. Jose Newman gave up his seat to Republican Steven Choi, a former Korean-American Assembly member. It was the first time since 1980 that Republicans unseated a sitting Democratic senator in a presidential election.
The other two seats that were flipped were in the Assembly. In California’s majority-Latino Imperial and Coachella valleys, Republican Jeff Gonzalez defeated a Democrat to win Assembly District 35, where Democrats had a 14 point lead in registration and the population is 70% Latino.
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And in the state’s closest legislative race, Republican Leticia Castillo He had an advantage of 568 votes on Tuesday over Clarissa Cervantes for an Inland Empire seat vacated by Cervantes’ sister, Sabrina Cervantes, a Democrat who won a state Senate seat. The Associated Press has not officially declared the outcome of the race.
If the results are confirmed, it will be an impressive victory for Castillo. Thanks to his sister, Cervantes had a much more recognized name than Castillo in his sister’s old district. Cervantes also raised more than $1 million for his campaign, compared to Castillo’s $78,000.
However, Democratic leaders say the results are not exactly a groundswell of support or a referendum against their party, which continues to hold all state elected offices along with a supermajority in the Legislature. They point out that, aside from Newman, none of the dozens of other Democrats up for re-election this year have lost.
“In a difficult year for Democrats nationally, our members fought and won some extremely competitive races,” Democratic Assembly Speaker Roberto Rivas said in a statement. “It is clear that Democrats have maintained our supermajority and the parliamentary bloc has maintained its historical diversity and strength.”
Learn more about legislators mentioned in this story.
Experts like election analyst Paul Mitchell said it’s also worth keeping in mind that the party that lost nationally in a presidential election almost always wins again in midterm elections. If that happens in 2026, he said, Republicans could see the legislative gains they made in this election disappear.
Will Republicans regain power in California?
Still, experts say Democrats would do well not to dismiss Republican victories as anomalies, and they expect the California GOP to continue making gains among nonwhite voters even if Republicans have a long way to go to regain power. politician in California.
“It’s not like (the Legislature) is going to become a Republican majority, not even close to that,” Mitchell said. “They probably won’t do it in our lifetime. But if you are a Latino Republican and you can capture votes from Latino voters as a complement to a Republican base that may be shrinking… then it is a powerful combination.”
Part of the change is that Republican-dominated districts are becoming more diverse, reflecting California’s population as a whole. The whites represent only 35% of California’s 39 million residents.
And there are other signs that change may be afoot.
Christian Grose, a political science professor at the University of Southern California, said surveys of nonwhite voters in urban California still show them to be solidly Democratic. But in rural or suburban areas, he said there has been a shift toward the Republican Party by nonwhite voters, particularly men and people without college degrees, that could have a notable impact on future elections.
“In California, the winning strategy for a Republican in these districts would be to run candidates who are ethnically diverse and represent their communities,” he said. “But the Republican coalition is probably made up of a majority of white voters in many of these districts, like the Central Valley, plus some Latino voters.”
Mike Madrid, a long-time Republican consultant and expert on Latino politics, went further. Madrid called the election a “five-alarm fire” for Democrats. He sees the election as a sign that the racial identity politics that defined the political affiliations of the previous generation are disappearing.
“The idea that race and ethnicity are cornerstones of our political beliefs will become an outdated concept,” Madrid said. “It was definitive for the past generation, and now it will be a relic of the past. … The most important problem that the Democratic Party must understand here is that there is a class problem and that… a multiracial and (multi)ethnic working class is emerging in the country.”
For their part, legislative Republicans say California voters – of all races – made a clear statement during the election that they were fed up with Democratic policies. They rejected progressive ballot initiatives to raise the minimum wage, allow cities to block rent increases and ban unpaid prison labor. And they resoundingly approved a ballot initiative to impose harsher sentences for crimes, even though Gov. Gavin Newsom and progressive leaders opposed it.
Assemblymembers Bill Essayli, left, and Kate Sanchez, right, listen to Assembly Republican Leader James Gallagher speak during a news conference at the state Capitol in Sacramento on Dec. 5, 2022. Photo by Rahul Lal, CalMatters
But after his recent victory in the Imperial and Coachella valleys, incoming Republican Assemblyman Gonzalez believes his victory was mainly due to the state’s high costs.
He said his district is close enough to the Arizona border that it’s easy for voters to see that gas is cheaper across the state line. Voters, he said, are smart enough to realize that Democratic policies are what make California more expensive.
“California has become unaffordable not only for Latinos, but for the average person,” González said.
Assemblywoman Kate Sánchez, R-Rancho Santa Margarita, said the election showed that Latinos like her “feel invisible and ignored by the current majority in the state.”
She said it’s no coincidence that Governor Newsom has been touring majority-Latino counties since the election, promoting his economic policies.
“I think he sees what’s coming and realizes that California is a new dawn,” he said. “This is a new chapter in California history and politics, and he wants to look good with it. However, we have all had to deal with the consequences of his administration and extreme policies, so I don’t think people will believe it.”
- This article was originally published in English by CalMatters.
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