When I moved to Orange County in 1987 to write editorials for the Orange County Register, all county supervisors and U.S. representatives were Republicans. Now three of five supervisors are Democrats.
And with the passage of Proposition 50 Tuesday, after the 2026 election the new, gerrymandered congressional districts could reduce the GOP House delegation from the current two of six seats to one of eight. The new maps split cities and look like a Rorschach test designed by someone on LSD.
“The Yes campaign was brilliant and bold,” former Republican state Sen. John Moorlach told me. “It was a shrewd political move by Newsom and his Democratic consultants.”
Orange County Republican Party Chairman Will O’Neill said he’s optimistic Republicans not only will keep Rep. Young Kim’s 40th District, but gain seats. A good way to measure partisan leaning is Inside Elections’ Baseline metric, which combines all federal and state election results over the past four election cycles into a single number. It calculates the 40th will go from +9 points Republican to +17.
Unfortunately for Republicans, the current 41st District of Rep. Ken Calvert will flip from the current Republican +7 to Democratic +16. This is exactly what Democrats intended when they put Prop. 50 on the ballot.
I asked O’Neill about rumors Calvert will challenge Kim in the new 40th District. But O’Neill said, “I’m sure that there will be discussions by many people, because both of them are well-respected Republican members of Congress. But Kim is our endorsed candidate at the OC GOP.” The state party also endorsed her.
On Wednesday, Calvert announced he was going to challenge Kim. “Californians in the newly drawn 40th District deserve a proven conservative they can trust and a fighter who has delivered results for Riverside and Orange County for decades,” he said.
One of the more interesting shifts slides Democratic Rep. Robert Garcia’s 42nd District down the coast partly from liberal Long Beach to reactionary Huntington Beach, then to Costa Mesa. It goes from an insurmountable +38 Democratic to +10.
While not committing to a run, Costa Mesa resident Moorlach said, “The Democrats’ strategy could backfire. My being moved into the 42nd District means I can run against Robert Garcia in an area that I’ve represented for some 26 years,” including as county treasurer-tax collector and supervisor.
Moorlach said he’d have preferred a rematch against Democratic Rep. Dave Min, to whom he lost a state Senate seat in 2020. But Min’s 47th district no longer includes the City of the Arts. Instead, it moved away from Huntington Beach and Costa Mesa, adding areas to the southeast of Irvine, where I live. Registration will go from +2 to +6 Democratic. But O’Neill said he thought Min’s voting record was more liberal than district sentiments.
In 2024 in the 45th District, Democrat Derek Tran barely won against Republican incumbent Michelle Steel, 50.1% to 49.9%. In 2026, the district shifts away from OC and further into liberal areas of Los Angeles. It goes from +1 to +5 Democratic. O’Neill said it’ll remain competitive.
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Aside from all these shifts, nationally in the Tuesday election the big theme was affordability. An AP Election Day poll of 17,000 voters in New Jersey, New York, Virginia and California “suggested the public was troubled by an economy that seems trapped by higher prices and fewer job opportunities.”
If President Trump and the Republican majorities in the House and Senate don’t start paying attention to the cost of hamburger and the paucity of decent jobs, next Nov. 3 it won’t matter what Orange County districts look like. Voters will be out for revenge.
John Seiler is on the SCNG Editorial Board
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