I think it’s all going to come down to turnout.

As always, it’s time to put our predictions down. Fill out Voice of San Diego’s 2026 General Election Contest for a chance to win lunch with us.

And, as always, I will accept no criticism about the lines I have chosen for the over/unders and they do not reflect anything about my personal beliefs. If they are very close to the final percentages, it’s because I’m very good at this. If they are not close, it’s bad luck.

The Money Races

Dispatch from Mason Herron: As we head into the final weekend before Election Day, the money flowing into local races tells us how campaigns and outside groups view the political landscape. Some races have attracted millions of dollars, while others that once appeared competitive have seen relatively little investment.

With just days remaining, here’s a look at how much money has been raised by candidates in some of San Diego’s most closely watched races, how much outside groups have spent trying to influence the outcomes, and what those numbers might tell us.

Candidate fundraising figures are current through Oct. 17. Outside spending figures are current through Oct. 28.

48th Congressional: Is the GOP Abandoning Desmond?

The 48th Congressional District was one of five Republican-held seats that Proposition 50 redrew to favor Democrats. Rep. Darrell Issa held the prior district but retired when the new one came out.

Running in his place is Republican County Supervisor Jim Desmond, who faces Democratic San Diego City Councilmember Marni von Wilpert.

After the redraw, national observers saw this as a true battleground. The amount of money raised by the candidates reflected that.  Since launching their respective campaigns, von Wilpert has raised $4.97 million compared to $3.18 million raised by Desmond (however, Desmond raised some of his money while he was running for the 49th district, prior to Proposition 50). Combined, the candidates have raised more than $8 million. But the fundraising gap has widened considerably since July 1, with von Wilpert raising $2,791,704 compared to just $919,136 for Desmond.

However, as the electoral environment continued to deteriorate for Republicans across the country, the spending patterns of national Republican groups suggest they may have become less optimistic about their chances in the district.

The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC) has spent $1,220,643 in coordinated spending on behalf of von Wilpert, compared to $1,351,950 spent by the National Republican Congressional Committee (NRCC) for Desmond. But despite spending more overall, the NRCC appears to be pulling back. Of that total, $1,018,579 was spent in September, compared to just $333,370 in the first half of October.

The disparity is even more pronounced in independent expenditures. According to Federal Election Commission (FEC) filings, outside groups have spent $7.4 million helping von Wilpert, compared to just $535,623 helping Desmond — a nearly 14-to-1 difference. Since Oct. 15, $1.11M has been spent helping von Wilpert compared to just $13,931 helping Desmond. It would appear that Republican outside groups have essentially cut bait on the 48th.

County Supervisor District 5: Jones Takes Command

Prior to the primary, this was seen as a relatively wide open race. That field featured San Marcos Mayor Rebecca Jones, Vista Mayor John Franklin, and Kyle Krahel, an aide to Congressmember Mike Levin. While other candidates ran, these were the main contenders, and for most outside observers it was unclear who might prevail and by how much.

The primary results were fairly definitive: Jones received 38.3 percent, Krahel received 22.1 percent, and Franklin received 18.2 percent. Despite facing a tough intra-party battle with Franklin, Jones still managed to get nearly 40 percent of the vote, well ahead of Krahel.

If fundraising and outside spending are indications of how political donors view a candidate’s viability, it’s clear that the primary results deflated whatever enthusiasm may have existed for Krahel.

Since July 1, Jones has raised $343,907 in monetary contributions compared to Krahel’s $25,285. Outside groups have spent $132,738 helping her, compared to just $2,390 for Krahel.

San Diego City Council, District 2: Bailey Underdog on Demographics, Leader on Resources

Ever since Richard Bailey entered the race for this open seat, District 2 has been expected to be an expensive battleground. The spending in this race has certainly met — if not exceeded — expectations.

Since launching their campaigns (Crosby opened her committee in 2025, Bailey in 2026), Richard Bailey has raised $366,781 compared to $102,010 for Nicole Crosby. Since July 1, Bailey has raised $89,759 compared to just $29,147 for Crosby, maintaining his substantial fundraising advantage heading into the general election.

As far as outside money is concerned, Bailey has been the beneficiary of $568,499 in support of his campaign and $294,905 in opposition to Crosby in the general election. Conversely, Crosby has benefited from $286,380 supporting her and $219,500 opposing Bailey.

Most of Bailey’s outside support in the general traces back to a single donor, Steven Richter, who has put $700,000 into the main committee backing him, with the Lincoln Club and the Regional Chamber filling in much of the rest. Crosby’s support comes from labor, led by the Laborers and the Municipal Employees Association, along with a separate committee funded by unions and the Democratic Party that has spent against Bailey.

San Diego City Council, District 4: Big Money, Toss Up

While this district was not seen as competitive before the primary, Martha Abraham’s strong performance changed that dynamic, and money has flooded into the district.

Through June 30, Henry Foster had raised $112,142 while Martha Abraham had raised just $45,122. Since July 1, Abraham has raised $42,646 compared to Foster’s $17,094.

In the general election, groups aligned with Foster (primarily the Municipal Employees Association and Laborers Local 89) have spent $281,933 supporting him and $12,003 opposing Abraham. Meanwhile, Abraham has received $291,013 in support with $76,717 opposing Foster. The two groups who have spent in support of Abraham are United Nurses Associations of California / Union of Health Care Professionals PAC and San Diego City Fire Fighters, Local 145 PAC. The California Apartment Association Housing Solutions Committee has been responsible for the money in opposition to Foster.

San Diego City Council, District 6: Sleepy City

This race is the sleepiest among all the other Council races. Incumbent Kent Lee has raised $127,722 dating back to Jan. 1, 2025, while Mark Powell has raised $96,503 dating back to Jan. 1, 2026. Since July 1, however, Powell has outraised Lee by approximately $33,000 to $12,000.

Outside groups aligned with Lee have spent $55,679 supporting Lee and $11,272 opposing Powell in the general election. There have not been any filings in support of Powell or opposed to Lee. In the primary, Lee received 58.8 percent of the vote compared to just 41.2 percent for Powell. Consequently, organizations aligned with each candidate likely see the race as uncompetitive, leading to minimal spending.

San Diego City Council, District 8: Somehow the Most Expensive

The race between Democrats Antonio Martinez and Gerardo Ramirez for the open District 8 Council seat has attracted more outside spending than any other City Council race.

Both candidates have raised similar amounts since launching their campaigns: $123,414 for Ramirez and $125,862 for Martinez. Since July 1, however, Ramirez has outraised Martinez $34,620 to $28,192. Both campaigns have been dwarfed by outside independent expenditures.

Groups supporting Ramirez or opposing Martinez have spent $803,886 supporting him and $302,050 opposing Martinez. Meanwhile, Martinez’s allies have spent $239,087 helping him and $146,598 opposing Ramirez in the general election.

Ramirez is backed mostly by building trades and city employee unions, along with a statewide committee called LCCC PAC. Martinez’s support comes from the county Labor Council, the union representing city firefighters and the hotel workers union.

San Diego County, Measure B

Our Lisa Halverstadt did a deep dive on this one. Measure B, labeled the San Diego County Health & Safety Act, is a 0.5 percent sales tax increase that would be implemented countywide. The committee leading the effort to pass it, “San Diegans for Health and Safety,” has raised $2,274,266 in contributions plus a $500,000 loan, and has spent $4,417,953. A large proportion of that spending went toward qualifying the measure for the ballot at the beginning of the year. Since July 1, the committee has spent $2.3 million, nearly all of it on digital advertising, though $1.85 million of those ad bills hadn’t been paid as of its Oct. 17 filing. Combined with the $500,000 loan, the committee’s outstanding obligations totaled $2.37 million.

As far as outside spending is concerned, $181,468 has been spent in opposition compared to just $1,166 in support. The Yes on B campaign is funded by a mix of local health systems, SEIU and a handful of major individual donors. The opposition has come almost entirely from Rebecca Jones’s ballot measure committee, “Prosperity for San Diego with Rebecca Jones – No on Measure B.”

Guys, Remember Election Central? I Think It’s Back

Our office has this giant annex wing that opens to the patio at 401B St. It’s right around the corner from the House of Blues where the Democrats will be and just down the street from the U.S. Grant where the Lincoln Club’s regular party will be. We have confirmed KPBS, inewsource, NBC San Diego, ABC 10, CBS 8 and we’re working to confirm a few more reporters who are planning to be here when the first numbers come out Tuesday.

Election Central was a truly unique tradition for San Diego. I still haven’t found another city where candidates from all parties, journalists from all outlets and every person who loved democracy and elections gathered on Election Night.

The last one was March 3, 2020 …

So if you’re a candidate or work with a candidate or you just love democracy, drop me a note and we’ll plan on having you. My goal is just to get the minimally viable version of it (media centrally located) so that in 2028, we make it happen at a proper, large location where the entire region can once again come together on Election Night.

To jog your memory, here’s some memorable Election Central moments.

If you remember Election Central fondly or have any feedback or ideas for the Politics Report, send them to scott.lewis@voiceofsandiego.org.

The post Elections Contest! Plus, the Money Totals appeared first on Voice of San Diego.

Election Day is almost here and the podcast crew draft their picks for the most interesting races to watch. 

But first! The podcast crew reviews Nathan Fielder’s new documentary on Elizabeth Holmes, “You Can See Everything.” Spoiler alert: Our hosts talk about their favorite weird moments in the doc. 

Each host picks two races to watch, and host Bella Ross brings out her tarot cards to assist. In San Diego City Council District 4, both Councilmember Henry Foster and challenger Martha Abraham are keeping their distance from the mayor, and the crew says it’s something they’ve never seen in 25 years of covering local politics.

In District 2, Richard Bailey and Nicole Crosby supporters are fighting a bitter mailer battle and some mailers included misleading information. The picks also include a  fight between two Democrats, candidates trying to turn social media likes into votes, South County mayor races, Measure B (the county’s half-cent sales tax increase), and Proposition 40, the billionaire tax.

Come see us record the show on Nov. 10 at Soda Bar! Go to voiceofsandiego.org/events to get your tickets.

Watch or Listen to the Podcast Below!

The post VOSD Podcast: Greatest Election Preview Podcast Ever appeared first on Voice of San Diego.

Sacramento Report Countdown

4 days until the November election

This post has been updated.

Down ballot, amid the cross-hairs of a fierce U.S. House fight is another political battle in San Diego where Democrats are wagering nearly $1 million to flip a California Senate seat. As one of the more expensive statehouse races in the state this November, Democrats are hoping to boost their 30-10 advantage in the chambers.

With just four days to Election Day, here’s what to know about the other electoral battle brewing in San Diego.

The Big Picture

North County voters have a meaningful decision to make. Longtime incumbent state Sen. Brian Jones, a Republican who represents Senate District 40, terms out at the end of the year after serving the Escondido area for 12 years in Sacramento.

Party registration among Democrats has risen in the district since Jones began his Senate term in 2018 and throughout his ascent as Senate Minority Leader. Thirty-five percent of voters are now registered as Democrats, up from 29 percent in 2018. Republican voter registration dipped from 36 percent to 34 percent over the same period.

Who’s On the Ballot

Former San Diego City Attorney Mara Elliott, a Democrat, is jockeying to replace Jones in her first legislative race against Republican challenger and former Assembly candidate Kristie Bruce-Lane.

Elliot’s prosecutorial career spans two decades in San Diego, where she served as deputy counsel for the county before spending 15 years with the city making her way up from chief deputy to city attorney, the first woman and Latina to do so in the city’s history.

After she termed out in 2024, she threw her hat in the ring to run for office about 14 months ago, when congressional candidate Marni von Wilpert withdrew her candidacy and set her sights on California’s 48th House District.

Bruce-Lane previously served on the Olivenhain Water Board and twice ran for the Assembly district that overlaps with the state Senate one, which Assemblymember Darshana Patel, a Democrat, now represents.

With no other Democratic primary challenger, Elliott advanced first in June with 44 percent of the vote. Meanwhile, the Republican ticket was split between Bruce-Lane and San Marcos City Councilmember Ed Musgrove, who was backed by Jones and Rep. Darrell Issa. He lost by about four percentage points to Bruce-Lane, who captured 28% of the vote in California’s top-two primary.

Where the Candidates Stand

Elliot has leaned into her experience as a longtime prosecutor to make her case as a moderate Democrat who is concerned about wasteful spending and public safety. Her biggest priorities in the state Legislature would be to support stricter auditing of state programs to remediate federal funding cuts. She also wants to allocate more funding for rehabilitation and shelter beds under the 2024 voter-approved Proposition 36.

In an interview, she said she’d also support policies that’d help people with severe mental illnesses enter conservatorships, similar to bills (some successful, others not) introduced by Encinitas state Sen. Catherine Blakespear to reform California’s CARE Court mental health program. 

Blakespear faced stiff pushback from disability rights opponents earlier this year against her failed proposal, Senate Bill 1016, which would have created a path for people who are too sick for CARE Court to be referred to conservatorships. Critics said forcing people into involuntary treatment was a harmful and coercive approach.

As far as how she’d overcome similar political winds, Elliott said she’d plan to continue having conversations with special interests groups and provide anecdotal evidence from her time as a city prosecutor to make the case for why more people need to be entered into involuntary programs.

“There’s no good feeling in prosecuting someone who needs an elevated level of care,” she said. “I don’t understand why there’s so much resistance,” to placing those with a severe mental illness in involuntary treatment programs instead.

We also talked about where she falls on the billionaire tax, which she appeared to support in May in an interview with the San Diego-Union Tribune. She said then she’d back the one-time, five percent wealth tax on California’s billionaires, but later back-tracked during an August NBC 7 interview where she said she’s against Prop. 40, the billionaire tax ballot measure.

“I’m against it,” Elliott said. She said she changed her mind upon learning more about its potential downsides, such as lost income taxes from wealthy residents and businesses potentially leaving the state and its specific use for healthcare services.

As far as the measures to counteract the billionaire tax, Propositions 41 and 42, Elliot said she’s a ‘no’ on those, too.

Bruce-Lane did not respond to an email, phone call and voice message seeking an interview. Her campaign messaging, though, has highlighted her support for lower taxes by maintaining property tax limits under Prop. 13, stripping Senate Bill 54, California’s sanctuary state law, and tighter voter restrictions with Prop. 39, the measure to require voter ID at the polls.

Money and Endorsements

Elliott is overwhelmingly favored by Democratic power brokers and labor groups, who have all endorsed her. She benefits from plentiful spending from teachers, health care, public employees and other labor unions who have spent more than $1 million to support her.

Bruce-Lane, who’s affiliated with right-wing group Reform California, has received more than $300,000 in support from a state GOP-affiliated PAC. The district’s purple bent and Jones’ departure has made it a Democratic target and one of California’s more expensive statehouse races this cycle, pulling in $2.5 million total from outside groups. 

What’s at Stake

With Republicans expecting to face headwinds nationally next week, Democrats are betting on flipping back two of the three statehouse seats they lost in 2024, as well as picking up others, such as in San Diego, to widen their already hefty command over the state Legislature when it’s time to reconvene in January.

And: A Controversial Tactic Proliferates in Legislative Races

Earlier this month, a reader emailed me, confused about why her California assemblymember, Darshana Patel, was appearing in campaign ads funded by Google and Meta, despite rules limiting how corporate donors can coordinate with candidates.

That sent my colleague Kate Wolffe and me down a rabbit hole of campaign websites.

We found more than a dozen legislative candidates’ pages chock-full of B-roll footage, high-resolution photos, and even explicit instructions seemingly meant for special interest groups to use on their behalf.

Experts and watchdog organizations we spoke to say this appears to flout the state’s campaign finance laws, which prohibit coordination between big spenders and candidates.

Michael Soneff, Patel’s campaign manager, did not return calls, voice messages and texts seeking comment for this story.

Read our latest CalMatters story on how some campaigns are testing the limits of California’s campaign finance rules before Election Day.

In Other News: Campaign Stumping

Gubernatorial favorite Xavier Becerra and Blakespear are expected to stump for von Wilpert in San Diego at the Oceanside Democratic Party headquarters two days before Election Day.

What I’m Reading Now

What’s going on with Prop. 45 and critics’ concerns that it’s all about data centers? CalMatters breaks down what’s true, what’s not and what we don’t know about the controversial ballot measure to streamline housing and other infrastructure projects.

There’s also a lot going on with the U.S. Justice Department aiming to throw out thousands of California ballots days before Election Day. Some of the information federal authorities are using appears outdated, though, CalMatters explains.

Democratic candidate for governor Xavier Becerra widens his leads as voters focus on Trump, new polling from UC Berkeley’s Institute of Governmental Studies shows, from the Los Angeles Times.

Correction: This post has been updated to correct that Elliott wants to allocate more funding for rehabilitation and shelter beds under the 2024 voter-approved Proposition 36. We also corrected that Bruce-Lane previously served on the Olivenhain Water Board.

The post What to Know About San Diego’s Swing Senate Race appeared first on Voice of San Diego.

It’s no secret the city of San Diego is short on cash – and the backlog to fix critical infrastructure keeps growing.  

That backlog includes basic infrastructure like stormwater channels, roads, streetlights and more. According to an IBA analysis of the city’s capital outlook, the city needs $12.8 billion for infrastructure needs over the next five years.  

But city officials have only identified $5 billion to fund the need, leaving a capital funding gap of $7.8 billion. Currently, stormwater needs make up 65 percent of that gap.  

The City Council already had to make deep cuts to balance this year’s general fund budget. How they’ll tackle infrastructure funding – especially after public backlash over other revenue-generating measures like trash and parking fees — remains a key question for the city’s fiscal stability. 

The makeup of the City Council could change with the upcoming elections, so I asked candidates what they would do to secure money for the city’s infrastructure backlog and whether they’d support any new taxes. 

New taxes definitely aren’t popular among the candidates. Several candidates proposed applying for state and federal grants to plug the gap. Some candidates also proposed independent audits on the city’s budget and contracts to understand where the city’s current money is going. One candidate said the city needs to spend the taxes it already collects more efficiently. 

Former Republican Richard Bailey said he wouldn’t support any new tax or fee increases. Bailey is running against Nicole Crosby to represent District 2, which runs from Pt. Loma to Clairemont.  

“The city brought in an all-time high record amount of tax revenue this fiscal year, so it’s not a question of whether we need higher taxes but rather spending the taxes we already collect more efficiently,” he wrote over text.  

He didn’t detail how he would ensure City Hall spends existing taxes more efficiently.  

Crosby, said the city needs to tap into state and federal dollars – an idea she says Bailey consistently calls a waste. 

“My opponent is always saying — asking the state or federal government for assistance on infrastructure is a waste, but it’s absolutely not a waste because we as California taxpayers pay huge sums to the state and federal government,” she said.  

She said the city should rely on that money to improve infrastructure.   

I went back to Bailey to get his response on Crosby’s comments. He said a plan that relies on federal and state governments to bail out the city is no plan at all.  

“Expecting the state and federal government to bail out the city’s gross financial mismanagement demonstrates a fundamental misunderstanding of how local, state, and federal tax dollars are typically allocated,” he wrote.  

Democrat Gerardo Ramirez is running against fellow Democrat Antonio Martinez to represent District 8, which includes southern neighborhoods like Barrio Logan, Tijuana River Valley, San Ysidro and Nestor.  

He’s on the same page as Crosby and supports tapping federal and state grants. He said an audit on the city’s grants program in 2025 found the city could be getting more money.  

“We gotta make sure we’re not leaving those [grants] behind because again, we’re just leaving money at the table,” he said.  

Martinez said he would also pursue federal and state grants and work with the county to close funding gaps on infrastructure projects.  

Candidates are generally hesitant about a new tax and would consider other options to solve the city’s budget gap first.  

Crosby added that she wouldn’t consider a new tax until the city has done full audits on its contracts, brings all its real estate leases to fair market value or gets millions more in grant money. 

“We should not be rubber stamping contracts,” said Crosby. “We need to figure out what kind of due diligence is done.”  

Ramirez also thinks overspending on contracts, particularly for emergency repairs, is an issue and he would like to push for an audit. Ramirez said in 2024 alone the city spent more than $50 million on emergency repairs on storm drains.  

He said the city needs to create a maintenance plan on the city’s storm drains and storm pipes to ensure city officials know what areas need maintenance.  

“Not just waiting until an emergency happens, but trying to be proactive and prevent some of those emergency breaks,” he said.  

Ramirez said a new tax would be one of the main ways to fix the infrastructure backlog, but he said the city needs to be more efficient with what it already spends before he supports that.  

Martinez said before considering a tax, he would want an independent audit on the city’s budget.  

“The reality is what the city needs to do is know they have to prove – and really this takes time and communication – that they’re fiscally responsible in managing the budget now before we even think about a tax measure,” he said.  

Democratic Councilmember Henry Foster represents District 4, which covers southeastern San Diego neighborhoods like Encanto, Skyline, and Emerald Hills. He did not respond to a request for comment.  

In an interview at Politifest 2026, Foster talked about how during his tenure he’s secured federal loans for stormwater infrastructure. He said specifically in Chollas Creek, they have over $190 million available to fix deficiencies. 

“My role at this present time is to make sure that we move in a streamlined fashion, work out our inefficiencies, and that we actually complete our designs in a timely fashion,” he said. “And that we get to work in the actual construction phase as quickly and as efficiently as we can.” 

Foster’s opponent Democrat Martha Abraham did not respond to a request for comment.  

Democratic Councilmember Kent Lee, who’s district runs from University City to Scripps Ranch, declined to comment. Lee’s opponent, Republican Mark Powell did not respond to a request for comment.  

The post How Candidates Plan to Solve San Diego’s Bonkers Infrastructure Backlog  appeared first on Voice of San Diego.

In early September, a video of El Cajon mayoral candidate Alexander Kraft outlining a new vision for Parkway Plaza – set to The Cure’s “Friday I’m in Love” – got more than 90,000 views on Instagram. 

This kind of attention is invaluable for a candidate like Kraft, a local socialist with a measly campaign budget running to unseat a Republican incumbent. There’s perhaps no faster and cheaper way to capture the hearts and minds of potential voters.

“I’m really curious to see if that will translate into votes,” I told Kraft over the phone on a recent afternoon.

“You and me both, sister,” he replied.

Views don’t win elections – votes do. And El Cajon only has about 38,000 registered voters, fewer than half of the number of people who saw Kraft’s video. The city’s partisan split is nearly 50-50, with a slight edge to the right.

“I’m really popular with like middle schoolers and high schoolers,” he laughed, “which is great, but they’re just not old enough to vote.”

Kraft isn’t the only candidate fighting it out in the feed. Just look at San Diego City Council candidate Richard Bailey, who’s amassed almost 27,000 followers with his simple public policy explainers, or the cinematic frames and warm color grading of Martha Abraham’s videos out of southeastern San Diego.

These candidates are pulling from the blueprint of New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani, whose underdog campaign was carried, in no small part, by short, friendly, direct-to-camera videos.

But, how much of it was really about the videos? Can this strategy actually help more underdogs overcome the incumbency advantage, or rise to power from the minority party?

This election, San Diego will get a unique look into the effectiveness of the Mamdani method through four very different local candidates.

It’s not as sure of a bet as it may seem.

Results are mixed

TikTok has been ubiquitous for more than half a decade, but campaigns – especially local ones – took a while to catch up.

“Generally, I would say political campaigns are two to four years behind the rest of society,” said Ryan Clumpner, a Democratic political consultant.

Think back to 2024. Even the famous (albeit, unsuccessful) Kamala HQ account on TikTok didn’t attempt to make casual, direct-to-camera videos – at least not the way we know them now. The videos were more like fancams: clips set to trending audio, snippets of speeches, celebrity testimonials and a lot of coconut memes. 

This lag isn’t entirely generational. Research suggests the link between social media clout and voter mobilization is mixed at best. The potential complications are endless: accounts are siloed into echo chambers, metrics distort a candidates’ appeal and digital engagement satisfies voters’ participatory impulses before they ever make it to the polls.

Yet it’s also true that social media has been a boon to local candidates facing unlikely odds, including the political influencer of political influencers: Zohran Mamdani.

Everybody is trying to have their Mamdani moment.

While his golden retriever-like disposition and populist policies made for great content, the social strategy didn’t end there. Mamdani’s digital team also successfully employed novel methods for recruiting volunteers that didn’t require them to leave Instagram, effectively converting social media followers into door knockers and phone callers.

San Diego’s most prolific political posters are employing similar strategies to navigate a familiar set of electoral challenges. Kraft and Abraham face the notoriously difficult task of unseating an incumbent, and then there are the conservatives – Bailey and La Mesa mayoral candidate Laura Lothian – building up digital clout in Democratic strongholds.

And it’s not just a matter of being on social media – you have to be able to pull it off. Good politicians don’t always make good influencers.

“It’s not a great idea if that’s not who you are,” Clumpner said. “If you were never holding a tiny microphone and talking about any other subject to any other audience on social media before being a candidate, then you should think very, very carefully about whether that is an authentic medium for you to choose.”

The Breakout Stars

Abraham from southeastern San Diego is no comrade, but her task is similar to that of Kraft from El Cajon: generate as much attention as possible to disrupt the status quo.

“An incumbent benefits from nobody paying attention,” Kraft said. “Somebody trying to unseat an incumbent needs as much attention as possible.”

With that, two vertical video stars were born: Kraft in the backrooms-esque corridors of Parkway Plaza, and Abraham in the parking lot of a small market that city documents classify as a “grocery store” (which seems much more like a liquor store with a few produce baskets by the door).

Abraham did not respond to Voice of San Diego’s interview requests for this story.

Needing to make big waves on a small budget, Kraft said he felt he had no choice but to go all in on social – on top of a healthy regime of phone banking and door knocking.

His videos are doing well, but it’s impossible to tell how much of that is local and how much is the result of a larger socialist wave in the wake of Mamdani’s win.

“The real pitfall with organic social media as compared to paid social media is that the algorithm is constantly going to direct your content to the people who already agree with you, which is counterproductive in most campaign contexts where your goal is to expand your support to persuade people,” said Clumpner, the political consultant.

As with most human endeavors, face-to-face remains the gold standard.

“Research is pretty clear that a face-to-face conversation is the most likely way to get somebody to vote who wouldn’t otherwise or to persuade them on how to vote,” Clumpner added. “It’s also really hard to do at a large scale.”

The Video Veterans

La Mesa Councilmember and mayoral candidate Laura Lothian is no stranger to social media.

If you don’t recognize Lothian by name – or by the pictures of her plastered across La Mesa banners and benches advertising her real estate business – you may recognize her videos. She’s been posting for a while now, and her look is consistent: curly hair tucked into a visor, clipboard in hand.

On a Tuesday afternoon in La Mesa, the councilmember picked up trash on the side of the freeway with a community member while her videographer, a 19-year-old community college student, filmed her with an iPhone attached to a handheld gimbal.

“Every post gets thousands of views,” Lothian said. “Every single post.”

“If we get 2,000 or 3,000, that’s like mild. As soon as we hit four or five to 6,000, it starts to feel pretty good. And then we get a lot of 10,000 or 20,000 – a lot of those – and a few hundreds of thousands.”

Lothian is a registered Republican, but she packages herself as nonpartisan and generally avoids controversial topics, such as immigration enforcement. Bailey in District 2 has struck a similar tone, ditching the Republican party earlier this year to register as an independent, and doggedly avoiding reporters’ attempts to prod his feelings about the president.

Part of the reason for this is explicitly partisan: these are two right-leaning individuals running in jurisdictions where Democrats outnumber Republicans by nearly 2-to-1.

It also changes how they’re perceived by the community: less as politicians, and more like journalists. 

“I have found that most San Diegans care about what’s going on locally, of course,” Bailey said. “They just need it to be made accessible and digestible to fit into their day-to-day lives.”

Local journalism is struggling, and politicians aren’t the only ones who’ve identified the clout-building potential of filling local information gaps. San Diego Police recently called out a group of local community accounts for spreading misinformation on Instagram with their news posts, and many of the talking heads on local feeds that viewers may assume are journalists are actually realtors.

And then there are the so-called “slopulists,” political influencers who tap into populist disaffection with content that is often more entertaining than it is enriching. San Diego has many.

A few days after meeting with Lothian, she tagged me in an Instagram Reel featuring clips from our interview. In my quest to make content about people making content, I’d been turned into content. Go figure.

Not everybody is a fan of Lothian’s style, which recently included her rendered in AI as a member of the “Ghostbusters.” But the visible comments on this video were plentiful, and overwhelmingly positive.

“I have a sneaking suspicion we disagree about who we voted for on the top of the ticket,” one user wrote, “but I can’t help but like Laura and how passionate she is about her community.”

Lothian, too, is holding out on a definitive answer to the social media question.

“We will know – not on election day, because it’s gonna take a month to count – but we’re going to know if social media was the right platform to communicate your persona and your work,” Lothian said.

The post These Candidates Are Stars on Social Media. Can They Turn Their Views Into Votes? appeared first on Voice of San Diego.

In the lead-up to next Tuesday’s election, millions of dollars have been pouring into local campaigns.

We teamed up with our Public Matters partners at KPBS to come up with a list of this campaign season’s top donors and spenders.

Among the top political spenders: the California Democratic Party, Republican Assemblymember Carl DeMaio’s campaign committee and the campaign behind Measure B, a proposed countywide sales tax increase.

Among the top donors: the Laborers International Union of North America Local 89 PAC, the California Association of Realtors and Sharp HealthCare.

Read the full story here.

More on Measure B: Our Lisa Halverstadt listed the top donors behind Measure B, which aims to fund health care, Tijuana sewage solutions and more. 

Read up here.

ICYMI: You can also catch up on the fine print on the measure here. We’ve also got a great, no B.S. guide to many more ballot items and candidates in our voter guide. Check that out here. 

Understanding a Council Candidate’s Interactions with Police

For some time now, people on social media have been accusing San Diego City Council candidate Martha Abraham of using police and the justice system to “terrorize” her neighbors. 

Abraham is running against Councilmember Henry Foster. She denies these claims.

One post took the candidate’s slogan of “People first, always” and changed it to read, “Calling the cops on people first, always.” 

Our reporters dug into the available evidence.

Abraham has had disputes with two different neighbors and has made calls to police. But there isn’t any clear evidence suggesting Abraham used the police to terrorize her neighbors. Two community members came to her defense and one said a man she was seeking a restraining order against was “mean” and “not a good neighbor.”

Here’s what our reporters found.

Inside San Diego’s Growing Democratic Socialist Movement

In the past two years, membership in San Diego’s Democratic Socialists of America chapter has nearly tripled. What’s less clear is whether the movement can develop the political firepower to deliver electoral wins a la New York City’s Zohran Mamdani.

Our Jakob McWhinney explored the current political winds within San Diego’s DSA movement, its history and tensions with the local Democratic Party. McWhinney also spoke with members about what could be next, including DSA member and possible San Diego 2028 mayoral candidate Sean Elo-Rivera.

Read the full story here. 

Congress Could Give San Diego More Say Over a Data Center

San Diego’s Congressional Democrats announced Thursday that they’ll introduce legislation to require local support of a controversial data center before it could be built on federal land downtown.

Right now, San Diego definitely does not support such a project. 

Our MacKenzie Elmer revealed earlier this month that Manchester Financial Group was mulling a 400-megawatt data center on Navy land called NAVWAR. That triggered outrage from the community and the San Diego City Council passed an emergency ban on data centers on Tuesday (though that ban wouldn’t apply to federal land). 

By Thursday, Reps. Sara Jacobs, Scott Peters, Mike Levin and Juan Vargas announced their bill.

Read more here. 

Elo-Rivera: SDPD Flouting Required Notification of Presence at ICE Raids

In a social media post, San Diego Councilmember Sean Elo-Rivera accused the police department’s leadership of flouting a city law meant to inform the public about instances in which officers responded to the scene of Immigration and Customs Enforcement arrests. 

The law in question is the city’s Due Process and Safety Ordinance. It requires San Diego Police Department officials to release public-facing notifications disclosing the details of officers’ engagement at the scene of immigration enforcement actions.

According to Elo-Rivera, Police Chief Scott Wahl hasn’t released a single public-facing notification since the law took effect in May. 

“Chief Wahl is ignoring the law. The public is being left in the dark,” Elo-Rivera’s post reads.  

Read the entire story here. 

Where Things Stand on South Bay Mayoral Races

Just days away from Election Day, our Jim Hinch has a pre-election review of three very different South Bay mayoral races.

In his latest South County Report, Hinch runs down the political knife fight playing out in National City, the mayor’s race that isn’t in Chula Vista and the complexities of the Imperial Beach contest.

Read the full South County Report here.

Another Live Podcast, Coming Right Up

Meet our journalists and get a download of the election results at our Brews & News Live Podcast. Join CEO and Editor-in-Chief Scott Lewis, Managing Editor Andrea Sanchez-Villafaña, and reporters Bella Ross and Jakob McWhinney. 

The crew will be joined by special guests Julie Roland, political director at IBEW 569,  and political consultant Mason Herron for this live recording. 

It’s all going down on Tuesday, Nov. 10, at 6:00 p.m. at Soda Bar. 

To get your tickets and learn more about the event here.  

In Other News

• The Encinitas City Council voted Thursday to take steps to develop an immigration enforcement public reporting system, bolster resources for impacted communities and consider laws to limit federal agents’ use of city property and enforcement near schools. (inewsource)
• The county is urging flu shots after two children died of influenza-related causes. (KPBS)
• The family of a man who died last week at the Otay Mesa Detention Center says he was misidentified by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. (KPBS)
• U.S. Rep. Mike Levin has a plan to move nuclear waste from the San Onofre plant amid concerns about sea level rise and coastal erosion. (KPBS)
• The city of San Diego is setting the stage to evict a watercraft rental business from Mission Bay. (Union-Tribune)
• San Diego Pride is losing its seventh executive director in three years and could be forced to dramatically dial back the July events it’s best known for. (Times of San Diego)
• The San Diego Pro Chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists is raising money for an annual prize honoring former Voice contributor and Union-Tribune reporter Kelly Davis, who passed away this summer, and fuel more work like hers. (Union-Tribune)

The Morning Report was written by Lisa Halverstadt, Jakob McWhinney and MacKenzie Elmer. It was edited by Andrea Sanchez-Villafaña.

The post San Diego’s Top Political Power Players appeared first on Voice of San Diego.

This story is part of a series from Public Matters, a reporting project in collaboration with KPBS. Read more stories here.

A nonprofit pushing for bolstered child care access, local health care organizations, labor unions and two wealthy San Diegans are fueling the Measure B campaign. 

Measure B is a proposed countywide half-cent sales tax that would fund health care, child care, Tijuana River sewage solutions, public safety and food benefits. 

Here’s a breakdown of the major funders of the campaign, which has reported pulling in more than $3.4 million through Oct. 28. 

Children First San Diego – $670,000 

This 501(c)4 nonprofit is focused on increasing child care options, supporting providers and child development. The nonprofit’s primary funder is the Bay Area-based Heising-Simons Action Fund. 

Mel Katz – $579,252 

Longtime San Diego power player Mel Katz chairs the San Diego Foundation. Early this year, Katz gave the Yes on B committee two loans totaling $500,000. Separate from those loans, he and his staffing company Manpower have also donated $79,252 to the committee. Katz is also a donor to Voice of San Diego. 

Irwin Jacobs – $325,000 

Irwin Jacobs is the co-founder of Qualcomm and a longtime local philanthropist. He is also a donor to Voice. 

Sharp HealthCare – $305,000 

The local health care juggernaut is among the hospital groups across the region worried about how federal Medicaid cuts could impact patient care and operations. Measure B is designed to help address those concerns. 

Service Employees International Union Local 221 and affiliated committees – $256,378 

The county’s largest labor union has been a leading champion behind Measure B. 

San Diego Foundation – $250,000 

The philanthropic organization has been a key backer of Measure B. 

United Domestic Workers of America Action Fund – $250,000 

This committee is affiliated with the union for home health care workers, a line item supported in the proposed sales tax measure. 

Scripps Health – $100,000 

Like Sharp, Scripps is worried about the impact of federal Medicaid cuts that Measure B is designed to help address locally. 

The post Who’s Funding the Measure B Campaign? appeared first on Voice of San Diego.

On a muggy Friday evening, dozens of people funneled into a courtyard of the Rolando-area headquarters of the United Domestic Workers of America. The local chapter of the Democratic Socialists of America had partnered with the environmental advocacy group San Diego 350 to throw a climate town hall. 

Many wore DSA-burgundy-colored hats or t-shirts. They chatted next to a DSA sign-up booth, some grabbing snacks from fold out tables bearing Oreos, fruit and homemade sandwiches. 

Jean Valcin, an engineer, stood chatting at a water cooler. He’d never viewed himself as a socialist, but amid this wild political moment he’d started looking for new ways to get politically involved. He’d attended some ACLU meetings, but that wasn’t doing it for him. Then he found the local DSA chapter.  

“DSA is the one organization doing things that feel responsive,” Valcin said. “I have a [DSA] card, so I guess I’m a socialist now,” he added with a laugh. 

Socialism has been a political boogeyman in American politics for generations, but in recent years some of the stigma has begun to wear off. The ideology has infinite permutations and interpretations. Broadly speaking, it often refers to a political system with more equal distribution of resources.  

To some, that means collective ownership of major elements of production, like land, factories and corporations. For many people, it’s as simple as higher taxes for the wealthy and government-provided healthcare – two proposals that have surged in popularity. 

The organization had gotten some big names to fill the space – San Diego City Councilmember Sean Elo-Rivera and County Supervisor Paloma Aguirre. That two rising stars in San Diego Democratic politics would appear on a flyer alongside the word “socialists” was a coup in and of itself.   

Aguirre isn’t a DSA member, but she’s the kind of dynamic politician they’d like to recruit. Some members even canvassed for her during her 2025 campaign for supervisor. It was clear why. 

When asked if she supported public power, she responded, “Yes, I support public everything.” It elicited big cheers from a crowd interested in public takeovers of corporations and utilities. 

When conversation reached a recent decision by the Air Pollution Control District to not regulate diesel emissions from large emitters like warehouses and instead rely on voluntary incentives to cut down on pollution, Aguirre took aim at fellow Democrats who held a majority on the board. 

“It was a betrayal to the people of National City and our entire region,” she said.  

Decisions like that were why it was so important to “get the right people in office,” she said. 

When it was his turn to speak, Elo-Rivera built on Aguirre’s condemnation. Unlike Aguirre, he is a DSA member – by far the most high-profile one locally. Though he hasn’t necessarily shouted it from the rooftops, it also hasn’t been a huge secret. 

Over the past 20 years, the county has shifted from red to purple to blue. Now, the city of San Diego was completely blue – nine Democratic councilmembers, Elo-Rivera said. 

But that complete control may just let people off the hook. Relying solely on incentives to stop polluters was “neoliberal shit that we just can’t do anymore,” he said. 

That’s why it was so important to get everyone engaged, he said. It was also why it may be time to flex a new, more DSA-aligned form of political power. 

“There are still people who have a very purple mentality,” Elo-Rivera said. “But then I’m looking at the red DSA shirts in the room, like, ‘Hey, let’s do a different version of purple.” 

For years, DSA chapters across the country were relegated to shadow boxing on the margins of American politics. That was especially true in places like San Diego, where conservative politics long dominated. 

But now entirely new groups of people, often disenchanted with mainstream political offerings, have swelled the size of DSA chapters in cities around the country. 

San Diego’s chapter is no different. In less than two years, its membership has nearly tripled. But while some local chapters have built muscular electoral machines – harnessing legions of eager doorknockers to help propel socialists like Zohran Mamdani to the mayorship of America’s largest city – the same hasn’t been true in America’s Finest City. 

A new crop of DSA activists is working to change that. 

‘Everything that We Had Hoped For’

San Diego’s DSA chapter didn’t just appear out of thin air.  

San Diego County Office of Education Trustee Gregg Robinson first began attending local DSA meetings in the early 1990s. Back then, it was mostly a reading group.  

Like Berkeley-educated Robinson, the couple dozen people who attended were bookish intellectuals and academics in their 60s. They were bright and charismatic, he said, but lacked connections to working people. 

“We hungered for that,” Robinson said.  

They weren’t entirely politically impotent, but when they tried to connect to labor movement figures, they didn’t get far. Sometimes a member would stand outside a factory, handing out lefty newspapers. 

“It was pretty pathetic, but we did our best,” Robinson said. 

Over the years, Robinson lost some connection to the chapter. But then he was hit with the one-two punch of President Donald Trump’s re-election in 2024 and Mamdani’s win in New York. The former inspired rage; the latter inspired hope. Both pushed him back to DSA. What he saw floored him. 

At the chapter’s most recent convention, most of the nearly two hundred people who filled the room looked to be in their 20s. And it wasn’t just academics this time, it was working class people and people of color.  

Over just the past two years, the chapter’s membership has grown from about 500 to nearly 1,400. That growth has outpaced even the sharp increase nationally, where membership has more than doubled to more than 125,000. 

“I felt like crying. I thought ‘This was everything that we had hoped for,’” Robinson said. “It wasn’t just old farts talking about this important book and how growing economic equality needs to be recognized, this was a room full of young people who feel it in their guts and were hungry to do something.” 

‘The Antidote to Despair’ 

Under an unrelenting September sun, about 40 people milled around the back patio of the College Area-bar Majorette. Over pickle beers, corn ribs and chicken sandwiches, they chatted about Abdul El-Sayed’s recent primary win in Michigan. They were almost universally young, sporting tattoos and baseball caps. Many dutifully donned time-worn Bernie gear.  

They were there for a fundraiser for two of the chapter’s endorsed candidates this cycle – Kenneth Zuniga, a DSA member running for mayor of Vista, and Alexander Kraft, a non-member running for mayor of El Cajon. 

Chapter co-chair Connor Bennett stood at the back of the patio, microphone in hand. Bennett is a 33-year-old naval architect who designs electric ferries – a textbook example of the young professionals DSA often attracts. Bearded, bespectacled and wearing a DSA baseball cap, he launched into his stump. 

“We know that our positions are popular in San Diego… We know that working people are fed up, and they want more affordable housing. They’re fed up [with] the way that we keep funding our police departments rather than funding community services like bathrooms and schools and rec centers,” Bennett said into a microphone. “This movement… is the antidote to despair in San Diego.”

It sounds great, but what does the antidote to despair actually mean? 

“Imagine taking a day off from work in a future without capitalism,” a webpage for the national DSA organization reads. “You have no debt. You don’t need health insurance. You don’t pay a mortgage or have a landlord, because comfortable housing is a human right. Your retirement is publicly funded. Food, education, energy, medicine, and transportation aren’t for-profit businesses; they are common goods and utilities.” 

To get to that utopic vision, DSA proposes a slew of changes, from establishing a universal healthcare system and a Green New Deal, taking public ownership of the largest corporations and industries and reforming the electoral system by abolishing the electoral college and U.S. Senate. 

“DSA has written this program for ending capitalist oligarchy and creating a real democracy. Some of these demands may be won under our current system, but we know complete victory will require building a new society from the ground up,” the webpage reads. 

But even landing on that utopic vision was a procedural matter. Members vote on everything, from what committees to establish, what local priorities to pursue, what politicians to endorse and even who should represent local chapters to vote on issues nationally, like that policy framework.  

But the group isn’t actually a political party. It doesn’t have its own ballot line, meaning its candidates don’t run as DSA members. Instead, they generally run as Democrats, often against more establishment incumbents. They’ve succeeded from Colorado to Washington D.C. and, of course, New York.  

That’s sparked fierce animosity from members of the Democratic establishment. Drawling Democratic grand vizier James Carville labeled the organization a “pack of fools.” One Atlantic columnist described DSA as a “parasite” putting the Democratic Party at risk of being “overrun by extremists who will poison the party’s national brand.” The national organization’s fierce criticism of Israel’s destruction of Gaza has also put DSA at odds with some establishment figures. 

That uneasiness cuts both ways. Many DSA members aren’t comfortable with Democrats either. They often hope to crack the calcified political duopoly and spin out a new party altogether. For others, the goal is to shift the Democratic Party’s internal politics to be more in line with their views. 

“As DSA members – and I think this is a feeling felt among a lot of Democrats – we don’t think that the Democratic Party represents our values in practice, even if they, in theory, represent them a lot of the time,” Bennett told me.  

In the group’s parlance, DSA is a “multi-tendency socialist organization” that contains a dizzying world of factions duking it out over priorities.  

Some, like the Commie Caucus, prioritize grassroots base building through tenants and labor unions over electoral politics. Others, like the more moderate North Star caucus, view electoral politics as the path to a more socialist future.    

That variation is a draw for many members. DSA is often just one of a constellation of activist groups members are a part of – from ones advocating for transit to urbanism to immigration to environmentalism.  

That energy can be funneled into chapters’ working groups focused on issues like migrant rights, environmentalism or electoral politics. Those bespoke spaces have made some feel the foundational changes they’re pushing are more attainable. 

Tajhay Banks helps lead DSA San Diego’s electoral working group. Like many members, the recent college graduate has been active in Democratic spaces for years, serving as president of SDSU’s College Democrats, a delegate to California Democratic Party’s convention and an intern to San Diego Councilmember Stephen Whitburn.  

Despite that heavy involvement, disappointment with the Democratic establishment drew Banks to DSA. He doesn’t want a “return to normalcy” in whatever post-Trump world emerges. For him, that means not being able to afford a home, corporations’ continued domination of the electoral system and evermore wars waged overseas.  

“I don’t find that acceptable, which is why I’m in an organization that hopes to end those things,” Banks said. “DSA has given me genuine hope for the future and the belief that things can change for the better.” 

‘Starting Small’ 

When chapter co-chair Ryan Hill, a union organizer, arrived in San Diego a year ago, he was fresh off the high of starting an entirely new DSA chapter in Sonoma County. Over the years, it’s exploded in size, becoming the fastest growing chapter in the country.  

In San Diego, Hill expected to find a muscular chapter that had helped a handful of elected officials into office.  Instead, he found a chapter that had largely stayed out of politics – even voting against endorsing Bernie Sanders’ presidential runs in 2016 and 2020.  

“It was a little bit of disappointment,” Hill said. “From my understanding, there was kind of a long history of anti-electoralism in this chapter – people who didn’t think elections were worth participating in or just thought that the chapter wasn’t strong enough to participate in elections.” 

For years, the chapter preoccupied itself more with grassroots endeavors than electoral ones. They helped operate community farms, worked with migrant rights groups to organize immigration enforcement watches and tried to organize a tenant’s union.  

Starting in 2024, though, that began to change. With the help of the California chapter, DSA San Diego stood up its electoral working group, which had previously disbanded due to inactivity. The local chapter also endorsed and canvassed for a pair of statewide rent control acts.  

The effort was small, drawing just 16 canvassers who knocked on about 1,100 doors over about 38 shifts. Voters ultimately rejected the measure handily.  

The chapter also engaged in something of an experiment that cycle – endorsing a member running for local office. Erin Evans, a tatted, hardcore-music-loving sociology professor at Mesa College, ran for the board of the San Diego County Office of Education.  

She said the decision to ask the chapter for an endorsement was a “no-brainer.” She was already a DSA member, had locked down labor’s backing and, critically, wasn’t looking to move up in office. That meant she wasn’t concerned with the possibility that a DSA endorsement made her less electable long term. 

But the local chapter hadn’t fully developed its endorsement process, which for DSA can be pretty elaborate. It usually requires candidates to secure signatures from dozens of members, after which the endorsement is voted on by a chapter’s electoral working group. Oftentimes, local membership of local chapters then get their own vote. 

“It felt like I was a teaching tool. Like, I was helping them cultivate their process and that foundation that you need to build support for candidates,” Evans said. 

Evans won her race, notching an early success for local DSAers. She’s currently the only DSA-endorsed office holder countywide. 

To DSA members, endorsements are serious business. They function as a commitment that the chapter will put significant energy into getting a candidate elected — often through canvassing – and mobilize around their political priorities while in office. That may mean members will show up en masse to a meeting to advocate for a policy proposal. 

But the commitment goes both ways. The organization expects endorsed candidates to continue to work with a chapter while in office. Chapters have even created Socialists in Office committees to coordinate with their elected officials.  

DSAers have publicly debated not only about whether to endorse candidates, but how best to ensure their elected officials don’t stray from the organization’s ideals. In the LA mayor’s race, national DSA leaders are currently threatening to revoke the DSA LA’s recent endorsement of chapter member Nithya Raman. 

In 2025, DSA San Diego threw in for Proposition 50, the Democratic effort to gerrymander California congressional districts in response to a similar Republican effort in Texas. For many members, this felt like something of a coming-of-age experience. In prior campaigns, they’d relied on printed materials and maps from partner organizations. This time they created those things on their own.  

“With each one of those campaigns, we grew the number of people out canvassing, the number of people with the skills to do that sort of organizing and the number of doors knocked,” Bennett said. 

They ultimately knocked on about 1,900 doors over 69 canvassing shifts. 

Mamdani’s election in New York City late last year energized the chapter’s electoral focus even further. In conversations with DSAers, the mayor’s name comes up again and again. Even advertisements to prospective members refer to him: “How can San Diego get our own Zohran Mamdani?” reads one flyer for a DSA 101 meeting the group regularly holds at the Malcom X Library in Valencia Park. 

Mamdani’s election also brought in a flood of new members, many of whom were more veteran political operators eager to be part of an organization that was gaining traction. That included Aidee Mariscal, a union organizer with SEIU Local 221, which represents public sector workers in San Diego County. She runs some of the chapter’s DSA 101 sessions and said attendees bring up Mamdani up at every single one. 

“Seeing somebody go up against the Democratic establishment and win was really inspiring,” Mariscal said. “It felt like something good was happening even while things are falling apart.” 

In February, members voted to adopt electoral work as one of the chapter’s two priorities alongside continued efforts to push back against Immigration and Customs Enforcement activity locally.  

Shortly after, San Diego Councilmember Elo-Rivera approached members about supporting Measure A. The initiative began as an effort to tax Airbnb rentals and empty second homes, but Elo-Rivera later narrowed it to a tax on only second homes with no fulltime resident, after a council committee rejected the initial proposal.  

It felt like a vote of confidence in the chapter, Bennett said. Proof that they’d begun to mature and were being taken seriously. 

The chapter endorsed the measure and functioned as a primary door knocking force for it, mounting 100 canvassing shifts and knocking on more than 2,800 doors in just a month. While still comparatively small in a city of 1.4 million people, it was a meaningfully larger effort than DSA had ever mounted. Despite Measure A losing by six points, local DSA leaders – and Elo-Rivera – view it as powerful growth.  

“To see DSA members who, with their hearts, felt the purpose behind Measure A and were willing to put boots on the ground and talk to members of the community about it, that was really important not just for DSA being a bigger, stronger chapter, but for achieving electoral success on progressive efforts in the future,” Elo-Rivera said. 

With local candidates Kraft and Zuniga, DSA has embarked on its most ambitious effort yet – simultaneously backing two campaigns in different corners of the county. The chapter’s also guaranteed to double its number of elected officials thanks to a late endorsement of a member running unopposed for the board of the MiraCosta Community College District. 

Alongside the near-weekly social events, like book club meetings, movie nights or gardening events, the chapter’s calendar is clogged with fundraisers, canvasses and phonebanks. Members have knocked on thousands of doors throughout the county – a greater number than ever before. 

It may work. It may not. Both candidates are long shots. But if nothing else, Bennett said, they’ll have even more experience for whatever’s next. 

“Starting small and then growing is what the DSA advises,” Bennett said. “New York City DSA did not start with Zohran running for mayor. They started with small assembly districts in Queens and Brooklyn and grew from there to a field campaign that was capable of running a mayoral campaign.” 

So far, it’s been a story of small successes so far. But the chapter hopes its Zohran-moment is coming. 

‘Political Maturity’ 

While tensions between the DSA and the Democratic Party have exploded nationally, they’ve been less explosive locally.  

Will Rodriguez-Kennedy, the chair of San Diego County’s Democratic Party, acknowledged DSA is a “growing force,” but said the organization is still dwarfed by the larger party. There are more than 800,000 registered Democrats in the county, to say nothing of the powerful labor unions that play an outsized role in local politics.  

“There are parts of my party that have significant concerns about the DSA’s platform, but I’m sure… a DSA member would have some significant concerns about people in other parts of the party,” Rodriguez-Kennedy said. “There are some leaders who might want to, like, purge or stop DSA from participating, and that’s not my approach.”            

Rodriguez-Kennedy himself has been at the center of some tension. During a panel at the Progressive Labor Summit in April, Bennett, the DSA co-chair, referred to some elected Dems as “corporate Democrats.” 

Rodriguez-Kennedy was offended and called the term a “slur.” The story still inspires chuckles among people in DSA circles. It also highlights the central tension: What Democrats see as a slur is foundational to DSA’s worldview.  

It’s particularly chafing to Rodriguez-Kennedy, who grew up in the South Bronx congressional district currently represented by DSA alum Alexandria Ocasio Cortez. The district is one of the poorest in New York. 

“There are members of the DSA who may not have a high view of me because they don’t know me. They certainly don’t know my background, and they probably aren’t from the same class of people that I am from,” Rodriguez-Kennedy said. He was unsubtly hinting at the common criticism that DSA is filled with people who, themselves, aren’t as working class as their policy proposals would suggest.  

But not all local Dems think DSA members should be welcome. 

Chris Pearson is the chair of the La Mesa-Foothills Democratic Club. He’s spent half a century in Democratic politics working as everything from a campaign manager to a national delegate. His condemnation of DSA is unequivocal.  

“They’re a batshit crazy fringe group just like MAGA, and I base that on their platform,” Pearson said. 

Though he doesn’t think the group’s growth is that spectacular, it doesn’t surprise him. People are pissed off with the Democratic party’s inability to stand up to Trump. Even Pearson’s felt that anger. Seeing endless pictures of Chuck Schumer in his “goddam Granny glasses” makes him want to “smack him on the side of the head.” 

But he insists DSA isn’t the right answer to those frustrations.  

“I’m a results guy. I want somebody who can figure out how to write the legislation, line up the votes, and stop this shit,” Pearson said. “The DSA doesn’t have the capability to do that. These are folks that can protest and wave flags, but they can’t govern.” 

That criticism – the these just aren’t serious people view of the DSA – has persisted for years. Even some DSA members harbor concerns. 

Much of that seriousness question will depend on whether the chapter can build necessary relationships with labor power players. But Robinson, the old-school DSA member, said his chief concern is about discipline. Can leftists resist the urge to become consumed with infighting and splinter? Can they avoid wasting energy on alienating issues? 

“We need to be the left wing of the possible,” Robinson said, quoting DSA founder Michael Harrington, who espoused a more pragmatic approach to pitching socialism. “So, yes, DSA can play a huge role – the enthusiasm, the young people out there – if there is a political maturity.” 

‘A Progressive Movement’ 

So far, the local chapter hasn’t overly focused on national politics.  

Their advocacy has long revolved around local issues, like the removal of Flock cameras and embraced efforts to municipalize the local electricity grid that would drain some of the power from corporate entities like San Diego Gas & Electric. These issues have divided Democrats locally. 

The San Diego City Council voted unanimously against putting a municipalization effort on the ballot in 2024. But last week, buoyed by a new anti-Flock majority on the Council, the budget committee advanced an effort to cancel a contract with the controversial surveillance corporation.  

Those kinds of developments make Bennett think public opinion is tipping toward DSA. 

“There are signs that even if we don’t have… X number of DSA politicians or X number of ballot measures we’ve won, shifting that Overton window and pulling even mainstream Dems that don’t call themselves socialists toward our positions is still a huge win,” Bennett said. “We’re not scary. Our ideas aren’t that crazy,” he added with a laugh. 

San Diego was never going to be an immediate slam-dunk for DSA. For generations, it was a Republican stronghold. To Richard Nixon, San Diego was his “lucky city,” to Ronald Reagan it was his “good luck city.” Barack Obama was the first Democratic presidential candidate to win a majority in San Diego County since Franklin Delano Roosevelt in 1936. 

That’s meant coaxing local politicos to wave the DSA banner hasn’t been easy. Some still hide their affiliation. 

“There’s a lot of folks who are members who probably don’t tell people we’re members,” said one labor leader who is a member but asked not to be identified. 

In recent years, San Diego has become one of the bluest metros in the nation. That’s opened up space on the party’s left flank for more DSA-aligned politics, said Elo-Rivera. 

“It also changes what people think is possible, and an essential element of effective organizing is the belief that you can win and that things can change,” Elo-Rivera said. “Hopelessness is a very, very bad ingredient for effective organizing.” 

Since his election to San Diego’s city council, Elo-Rivera has become the region’s lefty darling. It’s also a poorly kept secret in San Diego politics is that he’s eyeing a run for mayor in 2028. It will likely put him up against one of the godfathers of Democratic politics in San Diego – Scott Peters.  

To come out on top, Elo-Rivera will likely need the kind of ground game and grassroots backing DSA has mustered in other cities. And he seems to think the organization will be more of an asset than a liability. 

“Any office that I’m seeking, I would want to have a conversation with [DSA] and would likely seek their endorsement,” he said. “Whether it’s supporting a candidate, me or otherwise, or supporting issues, I think as a progressive movement in San Diego, we only stand to win when DSA is engaging in that sort of real electoral work.” 

Shauna McKenna, who helps run donor communications for the University of California, San Diego is one of the chapter’s few veteran members, having joined nearly a decade ago. She’s seen firsthand the organization’s peaks and valleys.  

To her, Elo-Rivera’s willingness to openly identify as a DSA member speaks to how far the chapter has come. This isn’t a leftist school board member with no higher aspirations, this is a councilmember in America’s eighth-largest city with mayoral ambitions.  

“It’s no longer a political dead end to align with and be a part of DSA as the driver of your political future. So, many more of those folks from left electoral politics are not just joining DSA, but getting active in our spaces,” McKenna said. 

While some political campaigns end after elections, DSA’s aspirations are big – “transform our political economic system” big, she said. 

“Are we at a point where people are taking us seriously? I think we are, and that’s fantastic,” McKenna said. “But there’s a lot of work that that we have to do as an organization. We want to bring many, many, many more people in. We need masses in order to achieve the kinds of transformations that we want to achieve.” 

Correction: San Diego DSA voted to adopt electoral work as one of its priorities in February.

The post Is It Time to Take San Diego’s Democratic Socialists Seriously? appeared first on Voice of San Diego.

This story has been updated.

The fight for southeastern San Diego’s City Council seat has been one of the most intense of this election season. Martha Abraham, a nurse and housing activist, is running against incumbent Henry Foster. Abraham finished just 12 votes behind Foster in the primary. 

Among all the mud that’s been slung, one accusation has surfaced again and again on social media: Abraham has weaponized cops and the justice system against her neighbors. 

One post distorted her slogan of “People first, always.” It read, “Calling the cops on people first, always.” 

A Voice of San Diego analysis of available evidence shows that Abraham did have disputes with neighbors on both sides of her home. In both cases, she made some calls to police and in one case she tried to get a restraining order that was rejected by a judge. 

But both cases are messy. In neither case is there any clear evidence that Abraham used the police to “terrorize” her neighbors, as one social media post put it.

Related to the restraining order, multiple other neighbors said the man Abraham tried to get the restraining order against had been a bad neighbor. One person called him “mean.” His former landlord called him “petty.” 

The former landlord said none of the blame lies with Abraham and that his previous tenant had instigated the confrontations. 

Abraham and her campaign consultant initially responded to questions about the incidents and said she would be willing to provide video evidence related to them. After partially explaining her side of the story, she stopped responding to requests for comment and never provided the evidence she said she would make available.

In the restraining order case, Abraham said she accepted the court’s decision, but fully stood by the facts she presented to a judge. In the other case, which ended with several community members in handcuffs, she said she did not call police to the scene. A report obtained by Voice, however, does show a woman at Abraham’s house called the police later that day. 

“We suspect the claim against Martha [that she made a call to police, which led to arrests] is an intentional lie and not merely a misguided suspicion,” wrote Abraham’s campaign consultant Jared Sclar. 

Sept. 4, 2025

The most recent, and frequently cited, dispute took place on Sept. 4, 2025. 

In that case, cops detained and charged a mother and daughter at a house next door to Abraham’s. The mother Ayisha Williams says she and her daughter were both quietly studying under a pop-up canopy in the front yard. Police showed up and told her the canopy was encroaching on the public sidewalk. The event escalated and cops arrested Williams’ daughter. They charged Williams herself with resisting arrest. Williams says they also handcuffed her son and girlfriend.

Williams says she and Abraham never got along. She adamantly believes Abraham made a complaint to police, which ultimately led them to show up that day. 

Williams says she saw Abraham talking to an officer for a long time near the edge of her yard earlier in the day. She also says she saw Abraham point in her direction while talking to the officer. (A picture on social media does indeed show Abraham talking to an officer. Abraham did not comment on whether she spoke to an officer that day.) 

In her statement to Voice, Abraham was adamant she didn’t call the police.

“As for the allegation that Martha called the police on her neighbors on September 4, 2025, that is completely false,” Sclar wrote in a statement. 

Abraham didn’t respond to requests for comment about the accusation that she made a face-to-face complaint to an officer.  

What the Evidence Shows

The police record for Sept. 4 begins at 4:23 p.m. with an officer logging a “field event.” Three minutes later the record shows a call for “cover now,” which is essentially a call for backup. 

Let’s break down what that means. When an officer logs a field event that means they are responding to something or having an interaction in the field. 

Williams says the officers first approached some other nearby neighbors and then approached her. She says they had received a call that her canopy was blocking the sidewalk. She says that she offered to take down the canopy, but that the event quickly escalated. That escalation is likely what led to the call for back up. 

Since the police department doesn’t comment on specific cases, it’s impossible to know what led to the field event being logged. 

Abraham’s consultant Sclar wrote that the call log suggests the event “was entirely police-initiated.” 

We asked department spokesperson Ashley Nicholes if that’s the right way to interpret a field event in a call for service log. Nicholes, per department policy, declined to comment on the specific case. But field events, in which no reporting party is listed, aren’t necessarily officer initiated, she said.

Generally speaking, field events can be initiated by officers after the officer witnesses something — or after a community member has made a call to an officer they know, she said. 

That means a neighbor might have made a call or officers might have simply been driving by and decided to stop. 

“Martha was asleep when these events began and only learned that police were outside after officers were already on scene. Martha often works evenings and that day had returned home the prior morning, and she was sleeping before her next night shift. A neighbor woke her and told her what was occurring,” Sclar wrote. 

Abraham’s neighbor Kymberlee Reels verified this version of events. She said she could tell something was going on outside on the street, but couldn’t see from her window. She called Abraham to get her to take a look. She says she had to call multiple times and eventually was able to wake up Abraham. 

About that earlier conversation with police: Reels said it is her understanding that Abraham did speak with an officer in the morning, long before the dust-up with police started around 4:23 p.m. She said she understood that to be a getting-to-know-you conversation with an officer that was new in the neighborhood. Here Reels’ recollection conflicts with Williams. 

Williams says that Abraham spoke to the officer in the morning. The officer then sat in his car for a long time and as soon as he drove away in one direction, another police car drove up from the other direction. Williams acknowledges the conversation happened relatively early in the morning. If so, the officer would have had to sit there for many hours before driving off and the other officers pulling up around 4:23 p.m. 

Reels says she remembers very clearly that she came home around 1:15 p.m. The original officer was already gone at that point and Williams and her daughter were hanging out by the canopy. All was quiet, she said.  

A Later Call to Police

The record shows no evidence at all that Abraham made the initial complaint to police. But another call for service at 5:46 p.m. did come from Abraham’s residence. 

Abraham did not comment on that call. The call notes indicate the caller was a woman. The caller reported that people were outside her door acting menacing. 

“Approximately 10 subjects outside reporting party’s door yelling profanity into front camera,” the call log reads. “Subjects believe reporting party was the one that called PD earlier… Reporting party advises officers detained some of the subjects that are shown on her camera.”

Williams says that she does not know of anyone approaching Abraham’s residence after the incident with police. She says it certainly was no one connected to her. Williams said it’s impossible to reach Abraham’s front door, because she has a gate. 

“No one could go into Martha’s yard,” Williams said. “If someone was in her yard it wasn’t us that day. I have never been in her yard at all.” 

The Restraining Order

In the restraining order case, two community members came to Abraham’s defense. Abraham applied for the restraining order against her next-door neighbor Juan Cunningham in May 2021. 

Abraham’s neighbor Reels says Cunningham was “mean” and “not a good neighbor.” 

Cunningham’s former landlord — who asked not to be named — said that Cunningham was petty and had instigated the run-ins with Abraham. The former landlord said Abraham was not to blame. 

In her court filing, Abraham alleged that her neighbor Cunningham and his family committed “acts of verbal threats, aggressiveness, threats of physical violence [and] damage to personal property,” in a court filing requesting the restraining order. 

In Cunningham and his wife’s filings to the court, however, they accuse Abraham of harassment, calling the police on them and using her cameras as a “spy tool.” Abraham wrote in her court filing that she flagged down a deputy once after Juan threatened her and that police “were called” in other cases — though she does not say by whom. 

In a restraining order case, the requester must meet a “clear and convincing” standard of proof. A judge ultimately ruled that Abraham didn’t meet the bar. 

“I respected the court’s decision then and I respect it now,” Abraham wrote in her initial response to Voice. 

The tension between Cunningham and Abraham seems to at least partially have been fueled by a disagreement over a wall that separated their properties. 

Cunningham’s former landlord said the wall ran through both properties. The wall was short and Cunningham’s family frequently hung out and sat on it, he said. 

The court records show that the neighbors clearly had multiple run-ins with each other. The court filings are full of competing narratives about who made what threatening comment when. 

Reels, the neighbor, said that people want to tear down Abraham to keep her out of office. Reels is an elementary school teacher at Johnson Elementary, which is in the neighborhood. Abraham attended the school as a child, at the same time Reels worked there.

She just wants the truth to come out. 

“The truth doesn’t have versions,” Reels said.

Correction: Abraham attended Johnson Elementary at the same time Reels worked there; Reels was not Abraham’s teacher. Reels witnessed Williams and her daughter quietly hanging out by the canopy around 1:15 p.m. on Sept. 4, 2025. She could not tell if they were studying.

The post Fact Check: Understanding Martha Abraham’s Interactions with Police   appeared first on Voice of San Diego.

In a social media post, San Diego Councilmember Sean Elo-Rivera accused the police department’s leadership of flouting a city law meant to inform the public about instances in which officers responded to the scene of Immigration and Customs Enforcement arrests. 

The law in question is the city’s Due Process and Safety Ordinance, which went into effect in May. It was inspired in part by chaotic scenes throughout 2025 during which ICE agents arrested residents accused of being undocumented. Officers with the San Diego Police Department were a familiar presence at ICE raids across the city. 

Take the chaotic raid of Buonna Forchetta, an Italian restaurant in South Park. After residents gathered to protest the detainment of restaurant workers, SDPD set off flashbangs to disperse the crowd. Daylight San Diego reported the department sent 41 officers to an ICE call at the 47th Street trolley station last year and handed over an individual they’d arrested to immigration officials.  

Despite laws prohibiting SDPD’s collaboration with ICE, many residents were left asking what exactly are local police doing there? 

The ordinance sought to clarify that question. It included the requirement that the department issue incident reports within three business days when officers respond to calls for service from “law enforcement activity by federal law enforcement agency personnel” when the alleged crime is a “protected personal characteristic.” 

That term covers all sorts of things, including a person’s immigration status. In short, the law required SDPD to notify the public when they respond to the scene of ICE arrests with reports that include the names of agencies present, whether they’d been presented with a judicial warrant and identifying information of the personnel involved, including badge numbers and which agency they belong to. Another element of the law required the department to notify councilmembers. 

But in a social media post, Councilmember Elo-Rivera, who helped push for the ordinance, claimed SDPD Chief Scott Wahl hasn’t been providing those reports.  

“Chief Wahl is ignoring the law. The public is being left in the dark,” the post reads. 

Since the law’s passage, Elo-Rivera said his office has received only four of the required notifications. At least one unnamed Council office hadn’t received a single one, according to the post.  

When it came to the required public-facing notifications, SDPD hadn’t issued a single one.  

In an email, SDPD spokesperson Ashely Nicholes wrote that the department is committed to meeting the responsibilities of the ordinance.  

When officers respond to “federal officials investigating an alleged crime involving a protected personal characteristic, including immigration status” they notify all councilmembers and the mayor, she wrote. 

“Our commitment is to follow the law, keep people safe and make sure our communities and elected officials are informed,” Nicholes wrote.  

Elo-Rivera clearly disagrees. 

But what’s especially frustrated him is what he sees as a disconnect in SDPD communications. As efforts to dismantle the city’s license plate reader network have heated up, department officials have repeatedly sent communications advocating for the network. Meanwhile, they’ve been largely mum on the required communications regarding ICE. 

In one instance, a community relations officer emailed residents touting the positive impacts of the Flock network.  

“We should be strengthening law enforcement’s ability to protect our neighborhoods, not taking away technology that has demonstrably helped solve violent crimes,” Community Relations Officer Terrell Totten wrote in the email. “I encourage everyone who supports retaining these cameras to contact our elected representatives and express that support,” he continued, providing councilmembers’ email addresses.  

That response stands in stark contrast to SDPD’s approach to ICE enforcement messaging, Elo-Rivera said. He claimed that in conversations with the police chief, Wahl told him it was “too controversial” for SDPD to release communications about the enforcement actions 

“I have a problem with the selectivity of what’s worth speaking up about and what’s not,” Elo-Rivera said. “They have more than enough money in their communications budget to communicate to the public about things that are of this much importance to the community.” 

In the social media post, Elo-Rivera also plugged a petition he’d launched calling on SDPD to “stop hiding SDPD’s presence at ICE enforcement.” 

The post Councilmember Accuses Cops of Failing to Notify When They Are Present at ICE Raids  appeared first on Voice of San Diego.