Former Vice President Kamala Harris is heading back onto the campaign trail in her home state, with stops in two newly redrawn California congressional districts that could help decide control of Congress. She will headline a fundraiser in San Diego on September 26, 2026, then campaign in the Sacramento area on October 2.
Marni von Wilpert, a Democratic city councilmember running in the newly redrawn 48th Congressional District, is the beneficiary of the San Diego event. The October 2 appearance is on behalf of Richard Pan, a pediatrician and former California state senator who is challenging Rep. Kevin Kiley in the 6th District.
Invitations laying out both events have surfaced. The two stops are Harris’ first announced midterm campaign appearances in California, and they land as Democrats look to press their advantage on a congressional map redrawn in 2025.
The Open Seat in the 48th District
Rep. Darrell Issa, the longtime Republican who holds the seat von Wilpert is chasing, announced his retirement after the redistricting. He has represented the 48th District since 2023, after holding the 50th from 2021 to 2023, and he had an earlier run in the House from 2001 to 2019. He chaired the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee from January 2011 to January 2015.
Von Wilpert’s opponent on November 3 is San Diego County Supervisor Jim Desmond, a Republican who carries President Donald Trump’s endorsement. The district reaches across parts of San Diego and Riverside counties and includes the Palm Springs area.
A Pediatrician Runs in the 6th
Born October 28, 1965, in Yonkers, N.Y., Pan now lives in Sacramento. He served in the California State Senate from 2014 to 2022, where his 6th Senate district covered parts of Sacramento and Yolo counties. A practicing pediatrician, he also teaches at the University of California, Davis. Pan said on October 14, 2025, that he intended to seek a House seat, and after Proposition 50 passed he declared his candidacy in the 6th District on November 5, 2025.
He finished second in the June 2 primary, moving on to the general election alongside Kiley. The incumbent’s standing is unusual: Kiley, who has represented California’s 3rd Congressional District, changed his voter registration to no party preference once redistricting reshaped his former district. He ended up in the 6th after deciding against a challenge to fellow Republican Rep. Tom McClintock in another redrawn seat. The district takes in parts of Sacramento, Placer and Yolo counties.
How Proposition 50 Redrew the Map
Voters in California approved Proposition 50 on November 4, 2025, answering the new congressional maps Texas lawmakers adopted ahead of the 2026 elections. The measure — formally titled “Authorizes Temporary Changes to Congressional District Maps in Response to Texas’ Partisan Redistricting. Legislative Constitutional Amendment” — replaced the state’s existing congressional lines with maps drawn by the Legislature.
The tally was 7,453,339 votes in favor, or 64.42 percent, to 4,116,998 against, or 35.58 percent, out of 11,584,393 ballots cast — turnout of 50.16 percent among the state’s 23,093,274 registered voters. Supporters framed it as California’s answer to Texas’ mid-decade redistricting, while opponents argued the measure weakened the state’s independent redistricting system. The Legislature’s lines govern the 2026 elections and are set to stay in force through 2030; after the 2030 census, the California Citizens Redistricting Commission is due to take back responsibility for congressional maps.
A Consultant Sizes Up the Strategy
Political consultant Matt Klink, who works out of California, told The California Post that the stops are aimed at driving Democratic turnout, not at converting undecided voters. “Gavin Newsom’s Prop 50 redistricting already rigged these districts to make Democrats’ job easier,” Klink said.
“Nationalizing these two Congressional races around Kamala Harris hands vulnerable Democrats a gift-wrapped attack ad,” Klink said, adding that the strategy, in his view, pulls attention away from Trump.
Her unsuccessful 2024 presidential campaign left Harris a prominent figure in the Democratic Party. She announced that candidacy on July 21, 2024, and sealed the Democratic nomination through a virtual roll call on August 2, 2024. Voters elected her to the U.S. Senate in 2016; earlier, she served as California attorney general from 2011 to 2017 and was San Francisco’s district attorney from 2004 to 2011.
Stumping for down-ballot Democrats is familiar work for her. In the final days of the 2022 midterms, then-Vice President Harris organized her travel around women candidates in Democratic strongholds, dropping in on races that had grown tighter than expected.
This time she is working her own state, and the schedule is being read as an early signal of how she may approach the run-up to 2028. A September 10 story on the two California appearances ran under the headline “Kamala Harris faces first big test for presidential run as she explodes back on to political stage,” casting the San Diego and Sacramento-area stops as a test tied to a possible presidential run. She has not announced a campaign for any office. On July 31, Harris said she had “not made a decision” about a potential 2028 presidential bid, and that she is “fully, sincerely” focused on the midterm elections this November. For now, two dates sit on the calendar: September 26 in San Diego and October 2 near Sacramento, with both House races going before voters on November 3.
