Crawling from the wreckage of the successful California redistricting vote that will likely make Golden State GOP representation in Washington, DC, almost extinct, Politico’s Jeremy White reported Monday that party leaders in the state are desperately looking for a path forward.
In response to President Donald Trump setting in motion redrawing of district boundary lines in Texas in order to acquire more Republican seats in the House in the 2026 midterms, California Gov. Gavin Newsom returned the favor with Prop. 50 that did the same for the Democrats in his already liberal state.
Voters in California backed him by a stunning 64 to 35 percent margin, the report noted, adding that GOP campaign consultant Dave Gilliard admitted, “I’m sure Gavin Newsom and the Democrats are sitting back laughing and enjoying the havoc they’ve wreaked on the Republicans in California.”
Politico’s White wrote that imperiled GOP lawmakers are “fighting each other for scraps” after an election day blow which left them “demoralized,” feeling “massacred” and see the results as an “obliteration.”
“The infighting began almost immediately. Less than 24 hours after Proposition 50 passed, Rep. Ken Calvert announced he’d run for one of the few remaining red seats, after his own Southern California district was redrawn to favor Democrats. He was followed quickly by Rep. Young Kim, who announced a $3.5 million ad buy that would begin in April of next year — an unusually long runway that looked like an effort to dominate the airwaves and drive up ad rates before Calvert could,” the report states.
Longtime California Rep. Darrell Issa (R) has even toyed with moving to Texas to run for a seat there before backing off.
Republican Rep. Doug LaMalfa, stated, “I was really hoping there’d be some type of agreement worked out that we wouldn’t have Republicans pitted against Republicans. That’s counterproductive and all it does is waste resources.”
With Republicans pointing fingers, fundraiser Anne Dunsmore warned, “I don’t want people to lose hope, but everyone needs to wake up and deal with this. Everyone needs to go back to their corners and reassess. We can’t go back to the battlefield in the same way — we’re almost completely gone.”
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