By Los Angeles County Politics (LACP)
The June 2, 2026, primary ballot is shaping up to be one of the most consequential in a generation across Los Angeles County. A first-ever open seat on the Board of Supervisors, a nine-way brawl for county sheriff, a congressional map scrambled by voter-approved redistricting, and a city mayor’s race cracking open from the left are among the defining contests. Here is a race-by-race look at who is running and what is at stake — county-wide first, then congressional, then the City of Los Angeles, and finally the South Bay’s marquee contest.
I. LOS ANGELES COUNTY OFFICES
LA County Sheriff
The race to lead the largest sheriff’s department in the United States has nine candidates — and a rematch that is already generating enormous heat. Incumbent Sheriff Robert Luna faces a challenge from the man he ousted in 2022, former Sheriff Alex Villanueva, along with seven others: retired Division Chief Eric Strong, Sgt. Karla Carranza, retired Assistant Sheriff Brendan Corbett, retired Capt. Mike Bornman, Lt. Oscar Martinez, gang detective Andre White, and former senior deputy Sonia Montejano.
Luna is running on results — violent crime in LASD-patrolled areas has fallen each year under his watch, with homicides down 25 percent since 2023. He has framed the race around stability as Los Angeles prepares for the 2028 Olympics and 2026 FIFA World Cup. Villanueva returned to the ballot with a combative video declaration: “I’m running because families deserve safe neighborhoods, because deputies deserve leadership that has their back, because the truth matters.”
The former sheriff faces a steep climb, however. When he ran for county supervisor last year, Supervisor Janice Hahn defeated him by nearly 30 percentage points. The rest of the field has drawn little fundraising attention so far, leaving Luna and Villanueva as the likely top-two finishers — though with this many candidates splitting the challenger vote, anything is possible.
LACP has previously profiled Andre White, 34, the field’s youngest candidate and a Compton-raised detective with 11 years at the department, who is calling for a community-oriented generational shift in LASD leadership.
Board of Supervisors, First District (Open Seat)
For the first time in 12 years, voters stretching from Hollywood to Pomona — north to Azusa, south to Diamond Bar — will choose a new supervisor. Incumbent Supervisor Hilda Solis is term-limited and is instead running for the open 38th Congressional District seat. State Sen. María Elena Durazo (D-Los Angeles) is the heavy favorite, and she was considered so formidable that for months no credible opponent materialized.
That changed once the official filing period opened. Five challengers are now on the ballot: La Puente City Councilmember David E. Argudo; Elaine Alaniz, a disaster recovery specialist who previously ran for the Assembly; women’s health advocate Noel Almario; Annabella Figueroa Mazariegos, listed as an L.A. County employee; and James Aldana. None is expected to mount a serious challenge to Durazo, who brings decades of labor movement credibility and broad institutional support.
Durazo’s move to the Supervisors’ race opens her State Senate District 26 seat, setting off a separate crowded race for the Eastside/Koreatown district, with five candidates competing to succeed her in Sacramento.
Board of Supervisors, Third District
Incumbent Supervisor Lindsey Horvath is running for a second term representing large portions of the San Fernando Valley and Westside. She drew challengers after filing closed, the most notable being realtor Tonia Arey, who entered the race citing the wildfire response. “The Pacific Palisades fire and its aftermath were a breaking point for me — not just because of the devastation, but because of the irresponsible and negligent way it was handled,” Arey wrote on her website. Horvath remains the heavy favorite.
II. CONGRESSIONAL RACES — THE PROP. 50 SHUFFLE
The backdrop for every congressional race in Los Angeles County this year is California Proposition 50, the so-called Election Rigging Response Act, passed by 64.4 percent of voters in a November 2025 special election. The measure replaced the state’s independent redistricting commission maps with legislatively drawn ones, designed to offset a mid-cycle Republican gerrymander in Texas. In February 2026, the U.S. Supreme Court declined to block the new maps, clearing the way for a congressional ballot that looks dramatically different from four years ago.
For Los Angeles County, the result is a kind of political musical chairs — incumbents running in brand-new districts, open seats created where none existed before, and in one case, a district that was physically lifted out of the Inland Empire and dropped entirely into L.A. County.
38th Congressional District (Open Seat — SGV/Southeast LA)
Under the Prop. 50 maps, the redrawn 38th District sweeps across Southeast Los Angeles County, taking in Bell, Commerce, El Monte, Diamond Bar, Hacienda Heights, Montebello, Pico Rivera, West Whittier and Yorba Linda in Orange County. The seat is open because incumbent U.S. Rep. Linda Sánchez — whose home in Whittier was moved into the new 41st District — chose to run there instead.
The frontrunner to fill the vacancy is LA County Supervisor Hilda Solis, who previously served in the House from 2001 to 2009 before becoming Secretary of Labor under President Barack Obama and joining the Board of Supervisors. Also in the race is Monica Sánchez, a Pico Rivera city councilmember whose last name has drawn notice from analysts, who point out that some voters accustomed to seeing “Sánchez” on the ballot may not immediately realize they are not voting for Linda Sánchez. Thomas Adams-Falconer rounds out the three-candidate field.
41st Congressional District (Brand-New Blue District)
Perhaps no seat on the entire California ballot illustrates the upheaval of Prop. 50 more starkly than the newly drawn 41st. The old 41st was a safely Republican Riverside County district. Under the new maps, that district number now covers an entirely different geography — Downey, Lakewood, Santa Fe Springs and Brea — heavily Democratic communities in southern Los Angeles County and a slice of Orange County.
As one political science professor put it, this one was “just wholesale picked up from the Inland Empire and moved to Los Angeles.” Rep. Linda Sánchez is the lone major declared candidate, having chosen this district because Whittier — where she lives — falls within its borders. She called the decision emotional but clear: “I chose home.”
26th Congressional District (Open Seat — Ventura/NW Los Angeles County)
Seven-term U.S. Rep. Julia Brownley announced her retirement in January 2026, opening up a seat that spans most of Ventura County and a slice of northwestern L.A. County including Westlake Village, Calabasas and Agoura Hills. Under Prop. 50, the district extends further east to Quartz Hill in the Antelope Valley, making the electorate slightly bluer — 43 percent Democrat, 28 percent Republican.
The early frontrunner is Assemblymember Jacqui Irwin (D-Thousand Oaks), who carries Brownley’s endorsement and is term-limited out of her Assembly seat. Irwin previously served as mayor of Thousand Oaks and has represented communities in both Ventura and L.A. counties. Republican Michael Koslow, a military veteran whom Brownley narrowly beat in 2024, is among the challengers, along with Democrat Chris Espinosa and several others, including State Senate President Pro Tempore Monique Limón.
III. CITY OF LOS ANGELES
Mayor of Los Angeles
The race to lead the nation’s second-largest city has evolved dramatically since the start of the year, and it is shaping up as a test of whether Los Angeles is a liberal Democratic city or something further left. Mayor Karen Bass is running for re-election with the advantages of incumbency, name recognition and a record she points to on homelessness — street homelessness decreased for two consecutive years under her Inside Safe program.
But two progressive challengers are now competing for votes to her left, and either one could drain enough support to deny Bass the outright majority she needs to win in June. City Councilmember Nithya Raman (4th District) entered the race at the eleventh hour in February — just hours before the filing deadline — after previously endorsing Bass. A policy wonk and former community planner, Raman is running on democratic socialist values and framing the race as a referendum on whether Los Angeles wants transformational change. Her strategy is explicit: hold Bass below 50 percent in June and force a one-on-one November runoff.
Running earlier and from a different base is Rev. Rae Huang, a democratic socialist, community organizer and ordained Presbyterian minister who has been in the race since November 2025. The deputy director of Housing Now California, Huang has been compared to New York City’s Zohran Mamdani — a first-time candidate using populist promises of housing for all, free buses and a prevention-focused public safety approach to build an online following. Her base is the city’s tenant movement and younger DSA-aligned progressives.
With roughly 40 candidates on the ballot in total — including entrepreneur and nonprofit CEO Adam Miller and reality TV personality Spencer Pratt, whose Pacific Palisades home burned in the January fires — the big field itself becomes a factor. Every vote Huang or Raman pulls is a vote that does not go to Bass.
Los Angeles City Council District 3 (Open — Blumenfield Termed Out)
Term limits end Bob Blumenfield‘s run representing the western San Fernando Valley communities of Woodland Hills, Tarzana, Reseda, Winnetka and Canoga Park, opening up one of the most competitive open council races of the cycle. Five candidates are in the running: Jon Rawlings, a Tarzana Neighborhood Council member and VP of Centra Companies; Timothy Gaspar, founder of Gaspar Insurance; Lehi White, a small business owner; Barri Worth Girvan, who served as Director of Community Affairs for County Supervisor Lindsey Horvath; and Christopher Celona, a media executive. LACP has been tracking this race.
Los Angeles City Council District 9 (Open — Curren Price Termed Out and Indicted)
This open seat comes with an extraordinary backdrop: Councilmember Curren Price, 75, is facing a dozen felony public corruption charges — including grand theft by embezzlement of public funds, conflict of interest and perjury — and was ordered by a judge to stand trial. He has pleaded not guilty and remains free on his own recognizance. The District 9 seat, covering downtown and South L.A. neighborhoods including Exposition Park, USC, and the L.A. Live complex, has drawn 12 candidates. Price has endorsed his own chief of staff, Jose Ugarte, as his preferred successor.
Los Angeles City Council District 11
The race to represent the Westside — Pacific Palisades, Venice, Brentwood, Mar Vista, Playa del Rey and Westchester — has three candidates: incumbent Traci Park, Faizah Malik and Jeremy Wineberg. Post-wildfire accountability is the defining backdrop for a race covering one of the hardest-hit communities in L.A. history.
Los Angeles City Council District 13
Incumbent Hugo Soto-Martinez is running for a second term in Hollywood, Silver Lake, Echo Park and Atwater Village, and he faces what the Los Angeles Times called a genuinely unusual race dynamic: his primary challenger, Colter Carlisle, is the vice president of the East Hollywood Neighborhood Council — and also Soto-Martinez’s upstairs neighbor in the same apartment complex. Dylan Kendall and Rich Sarian also filed.
IV. STATE LEGISLATIVE RACES
Assembly District 65 (Open — Gipson Departing for Board of Equalization)
Assemblymember Mike Gipson is not termed out — he is voluntarily leaving the Assembly to run for a seat on the California Board of Equalization, making AD-65 an open contest covering Carson, Compton, Wilmington, Harbor City, Harbor Gateway, Watts and San Pedro. Five candidates are running: Dr. Ayanna Davis, a Compton Unified School District Board trustee and Gipson’s hand-picked successor with a massive endorsement list; Fatima Iqbal-Zubair, who ran against Gipson twice before; Lamar Lyons; Dr. Vinson Eugene Allen; and Magali Sanchez-Hall.
Davis has drawn endorsements from the California Legislative Black Caucus, the California Democratic Legislative Women’s Caucus, Supervisor Janice Hahn, Long Beach Mayor Rex Richardson, State Controller Malia Cohen, State Treasurer Fiona Ma and Superintendent of Public Instruction Tony Thurmond, among others. Born and raised in Compton, Davis holds a doctorate from USC and spent more than 30 years as a teacher, principal and union leader. A candidate forum is set for 1 to 3 p.m., Saturday, March 14, Veterans Park, Carson. For information, email carsonnetwork@gmail.com or call (310) 617-3886.
V. LONG BEACH MAYOR
Mayor of Long Beach
Incumbent Mayor Rex Richardson is running for a second term with a commanding financial advantage — more than $336,000 raised, while none of his four challengers had reported raising any money as of filing’s close. His donors include labor and business groups, Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass, LA County Sheriff Robert Luna and two sitting Long Beach council members.
Richardson’s four challengers are: former Marine and National Guardsman Joshua Rodriguez; nonprofit worker Lee Goldin; Rogelio Martinez, who drew notice for calling on gangs to push back against ICE enforcement; and childcare specialist Terri Rivers, the only challenger who has formed a campaign fundraising committee. Political analysts say the incumbent’s financial and structural advantages make an upset extremely unlikely, though the race bears watching for LACP readers in Long Beach, where Richardson points to 4,100 new jobs, the city’s first decline in homelessness in a decade, and a 20-year low in overall crime.
The June 2, 2026, primary election is the first major electoral test for Los Angeles County officeholders since the region’s catastrophic wildfire season, the Prop. 50 redistricting upheaval and mounting fiscal pressures on city and county government alike. LACP will continue covering these races in the weeks ahead. The deadline to register to vote is May 18, 2026. Mail ballots go out May 4.
