The Path to Democratic Control of Congress Runs Through California
WHO WE ARE
Battleground California is the state’s only table dedicated to the long-term coordination of local efforts within California’s most competitive Congressional districts.
In 2024, our coalition ran competitive organizing programs across six targeted congressional districts, investing $4.5 million in a field program that knocked on nearly 400,000 doors and reached more than one million voters by phone and text. We exceeded our voter identification goal, ultimately identifying nearly 135,000 voters. The results validated our approach: we helped flip three seats and hold one, all by a combined margin of fewer than 19,000 votes.
After the election, we worked with Data for Social Good to conduct an analysis of our efforts, utilizing propensity score matching. We found that when contacted by Battleground CA organizations, voters were nearly 8% more likely to cast a ballot in their congressional races.
WHY BATTLEGROUND CALIFORNIA?
Progressive donors have poured money into California House races for years—but money alone doesn’t build on-the-ground power. Battleground California exists because flipping a seat on election night means nothing if the infrastructure disappears the next morning. We are building permanent, community-rooted organizing capacity in the districts that will decide the majority, so the relationships, the trust, and the trained organizers are still there for the next fight, and the fight after that.
Grassroots power over TV ads: Establishment campaigns will keep pouring millions into television while the doors in these districts go unknocked. We fund the trusted messengers—neighbors, union members, community organizers—who talk to voters face-to-face, build real relationships, and turn out people the algorithms and consultants overlook.
Infrastructure that outlasts a single election: California has never lacked money; it has lacked a durable, coordinated table for progressive power-building around congressional races. Battleground California is that table—so your investment builds capacity that compounds cycle over cycle, not an operation that evaporates in November.
The majority runs through California: Our 2026 targets are among the most winnable Republican-held seats left in the country, and the difference between holding and losing the House. Every dollar here is leveraged against a map where the path to a Democratic majority is shortest and most direct.
Power built by and for the communities on the frontlines: Our coalition is led by organizations already embedded in Latino, Black, AAPI, and immigrant communities across these districts. We’re not parachuting in strategists—we’re resourcing the people already doing the work, and giving them the sustained backing to do it at scale.
OUR PARTNERS
THE ROAD TO 2026
Winning Democratic control of Congress is urgent. To provide a meaningful check on the Trump administration, we must flip our targeted California House races. Proposition 50 reshaped the map, and California offers some of the country’s strongest pickup opportunities—especially in CA-22 and CA-48. Battleground California is expanding its coalitions in both districts, running accountability campaigns against Republican incumbents, and preparing for large-scale general election mobilization efforts.
Flipping a Central Valley Seat
Battleground California is backing Randy Villegas, a Visalia school board trustee and College of the Sequoias political science professor, in his challenge to six-term Rep. David Valadao. The son of immigrants who grew up in a working-class Kern County family, Villegas ran an unapolo-getically anti-corporate campaign—refusing PAC money—and outperformed the establishment-backed favorite in the June primary, drawing energized grassroots turnout and endorsements from Senator Bernie Sanders, Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, and the Working Families Party. His message is landing in a district reshaped by redistricting: post-Prop 50, CA-22 has moved from a comfortable Republican lean to just R+1.8%, and Democrats now hold a real registration edge (42.9% to 25.5%, with 31.6% no party preference) in a district that is majority Latino. With roughly 320,000 registered voters and a projected win number near 91,000 votes at expected turnout, this is a race where sustained field investment—not just message—will decide the outcome.
An Open Seat, A Historic Opportunity
CA-48, the open seat vacated by longtime Rep. Darrell Issa, represents one of the most dramatic shifts on the map: the district moved from a 15-point Republican presidential margin to a 3-point Democratic one under the new lines. Battleground California is backing Marni von Wilpert, a San Diego City Councilmember and former federal labor attorney who grew up in the district and is the only leading Democrat in the race with a proven record of flipping a seat from red to blue—her own council district. A Peace Corps alum with deep local roots and broad labor and institutional support, von Wilpert offers voters a results-oriented track record that sets her apart from her opponent. With registration nearly evenly split among Democrats, Republicans, and voters with no party preference, and roughly 463,000 registered voters overall, CA-48 will come down to turnout: our win number sits near 132,000 votes at expected turnout, and closing that gap is exactly the work Battleground California’s grassroots infrastructure is built to do.
HOW YOU CAN HELP
Real power isn’t built in a single election cycle—it’s built by showing up year after year, in community after community, until the infrastructure is too strong to dismantle. Battleground California is asking progressive donors to invest not just in a win in November, but in the organizers, the relationships, and the grassroots capacity that will still be standing long after this election is over. With control of Congress on the line and some of the most winnable seats in the country sitting right here in California, now is the moment to go all in on sustained, community-powered mobilization.