Politics
Can Dems unseat a thrice-elected GOP congressman in this battleground L.A. County district?
Early on a Saturday morning at Rawley Duntley Park in Lancaster — the high-desert sun blazing — George Whitesides, a Democrat running for Congress, was encircled by dozens of cheering, noisemaker-blasting volunteers.
“I really want to make sure that even the astronauts out there can hear his name!” Nadia Abrica, an organizing director with the state Democratic Party, shouted, pointing to the sky. “George! George! George!”
“Are you guys feeling fired up?” Whitesides asked the crowd. “Are you feeling ready to go? … Are we going to change the House of Representatives?”
“Yes!” they screamed.
George Whitesides’ supporters gather at a campaign event in Lancaster.
(Zoe Cranfill / Los Angeles Times)
Whitesides, a former NASA chief of staff under President Obama, is running to unseat Rep. Mike Garcia, the thrice-elected Republican incumbent, in California’s hotly contested 27th Congressional District in northern L.A. County. The race will be crucial in determining whether Republicans maintain their narrow majority in the U.S. House.
Democrats, riding the national enthusiasm unleashed by Vice President Kamala Harris’s entry into the presidential race, feel good about their chances to flip the district.
“You feel the difference — and what really helped is the re-energizing when we found out about Biden dropping out,” said Alvarez Marcos, 61, a volunteer for Whitesides. “We’re building off that.”
But after leaving the pep-rally vibe at the park to knock on doors at a nearby apartment complex, Whitesides spoke with middle-of-the-road voters who made one thing abundantly clear: Winning this purple suburban district will not be easy.
“I am not a Democrat,” said a young woman who was the first to open her door. “Are you for open borders?”
“No, ma’am,” Whitesides said, after trying to summarize his message — largely about creating local jobs — in about 90 seconds. “We’re trying to create a secure border for our country.”
In this presidential election year dominated by hyperpartisan national issues — including immigration — both Whitesides, 50, and Garcia, 48, are trying to cast themselves as a moderate and their opponent as a political hardliner.
“People are excited to bring positive change to the district, and they’re really excited to beat Mike Garcia, who they view as this extreme guy who doesn’t connect or fit with the folks in our district,” Whitesides told The Times.
Rep. Mike Garcia is looking to keep the Antelope Valley seat he has held since 2020. The race will be crucial in determining whether Republicans maintain their House majority.
(Dania Maxwell / Los Angeles Times)
Whitesides calls Garcia a pro-Trump sycophant and highlights the congressman’s vote against certifying the 2020 presidential election results after the Jan. 6 insurrection, as well as his vote against President Biden’s $1-trillion infrastructure bill.
Whitesides also points to Garcia’s anti-abortion record. Garcia was among the GOP congressional members who signed an amicus brief urging the Supreme Court to overturn Roe v. Wade and, in 2021, co-sponsored the Life at Conception Act, which amounts to a nationwide abortion ban with no exceptions. (Garcia later indicated he could support such exceptions for rape, incest or threats to the mother’s health — a departure from the bill. He did not sponsor a reintroduced version.)
Garcia’s campaign did not respond to requests for comment for this story.
But his backers are trying to paint Whitesides as a far-left mega-donor trying to use his personal wealth to buy a congressional seat.
As a first-time candidate, Whitesides has no voting record to scrutinize. So, Republicans have zeroed in on his hundreds of thousands of dollars in contributions to progressive candidates and causes.
Ben Petersen, a spokesman for the National Republican Congressional Committee, said in a statement that Garcia, a former Navy pilot, “has led a life of service, from flying fighter jets in combat to his mission in Congress of lowering inflation and defending public safety.”
“Voters can easily spot the difference with extreme George Whitesides, who backed legislation raising the cost of living and bankrolled radical activists attacking police and dismantling law and order,” he added, referencing Whitesides’ support of Equality California, an LGBTQ+ rights organization that prominent conservative fundraisers have dubbed a defund-the-police group. (Whitesides has touted his endorsement by Equality California.)
About an hour’s drive north of solidly liberal downtown Los Angeles, the 27th Congressional District stretches from fast-growing Santa Clarita to the Kern County line. It includes the cities of Lancaster and Palmdale, as well as rural desert towns such as Acton and Pearblossom.
With its close proximity to Edwards Air Force Base, the region has deep ties to the military and aerospace industry, as reflected by the name of its recently disbanded Minor League Baseball team, the Lancaster JetHawks.
Once staunchly conservative, the district has become more favorable to Democrats, with the population growing younger and more diverse as L.A. residents moved in for more affordable housing. Redistricting after the 2020 census made CA-27 even bluer by excising conservative Simi Valley.
Just over 41% of registered voters are Democrats, and about 30% are Republicans. More than a fifth are independents, a wildcard that makes the district somewhat unpredictable.
The district voted for Biden in 2020. But in the 2022 gubernatorial race, it backed Republican state Sen. Brian Dahle over Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom.
Though his district has more registered Democrats than Republicans, frustrations over California’s high cost of living have given GOP Rep. Mike Garcia an edge in earlier campaigns.
(Myung J. Chun / Los Angeles Times)
The district has been on the front lines of partisan warfare since Katie Hill, a millennial Democrat, unseated the Republican incumbent in 2018, only to resign less than a year later amid a sex scandal. Garcia won the seat in a special election and retained it in two subsequent elections, thrice defeating the same Democratic challenger, former state Assemblywoman Christy Smith.
In the 2020 general election, Garcia defeated Smith by just 333 votes. He won by 12,732 votes during the subsequent midterm election, when fewer people cast ballots.
The Cook Political Report, a nonpartisan election handicapper, calls this year’s election a toss-up.
“When you’ve run a company that launches humans into space on a test-flight program, you kinda get used to being involved in high-stakes things,” said Whitesides, the former chief executive of Mojave-based Virgin Galactic. “We’ve got to flip the House so we can protect all these hard-won gains in healthcare and climate and jobs.”
“The Republican caucus right now is totally dysfunctional,” he added. “I”m trying to bring, like, actually getting stuff done back into focus. Wouldn’t that be great? Make the Congress work again.”
Lawrence Becker, a political scientist at Cal State Northridge, said it’s “going to be a tough election for Garcia.”
Most voters “are going to the polls with the presidential election on their minds,” he added. Trump is deeply unpopular in California, and having him at the top of the ticket “becomes a bit of a headwind that Mike Garcia has to face.”
Still, frustrations over California’s high cost of living and gas prices — potent issues for the many residents in this district who make the long commute to L.A. for work — have previously given Garcia an edge. He easily won last spring’s three-way primary election with 55% of the vote, while Whitesides got 33%.
State GOP Chairwoman Jessica Millan Patterson said the fact that Republicans are able to be so competitive in a district where Democrats have a large registration advantage shows how much voters “are getting sick and tired of what California Democrats have been serving up to them.”
Both parties are pouring money into the race.
The Congressional Leadership Fund, a super PAC that supports Republicans running for the House, is planning an $18.2-million ad blitz in the L.A. area this fall, with a focus on the 27th district.
Courtney Parella, a spokeswoman for the super PAC, said Garcia has a unique biography that resonates in his district. As a Navy pilot, the congressman flew in more than 30 combat missions during Operation Iraqi Freedom before spending 11 years as an executive with the defense contractor Raytheon.
“California voters remain fed up with rising crime, chaos at our border and skyrocketing costs — all caused by Democrats’ progressive single-party rule,” Parella said in a statement. “The House majority runs through California, and CLF is committing significant resources here this fall.”
George Whitesides introduces himself to Sean and Megan Holst. “It’s supposed to be more affordable in the Antelope Valley,” Megan says. “I thought we had a decent income, and it’s still — it’s hard.”
(Zoe Cranfill / Los Angeles Times)
Meanwhile, Whitesides — who loaned his campaign more than $1 million — is outraising his opponent. As of June 30, Whitesides’ campaign had $3.9 million in the bank, according to the Federal Election Commission. Garcia’s campaign had $2.2 million on hand.
Whitesides’ campaign is seizing on accusations that Garcia hid his sale of up to $50,000 in Boeing stock in August 2020, just before the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, of which he was a member, released a scathing report about the company.
According to the Daily Beast, which first reported the sale, Garcia missed the 45-day deadline to disclose the sale and filed paperwork only after narrowly winning his election that November.
A spokesman for Garcia’s campaign told Politico that Garcia had not seen the report before it became public and that his failure to disclose his stock sale was an accident.
After leaving Rawley Duntley Park that late-July Saturday, Whitesides — who has embraced his nerdy-dad vibe — donned a white NASA ball cap and brandished a 50-SPF spray can of sunscreen for his canvass of the apartment complex.
In each brief interaction, he said that, while running Virgin Galactic, he created 700 local jobs and that he was centering his campaign around job creation.
Propped in one apartment window was a license plate that read, EPDMLGY. Whitesides bounded up to the door, saying, “Epidemiology! Come on, that’s my voter.”
“I’m a moderate Democrat,” he said when Nancy Welsh, a 63-year-old pharmaceutical administrative assistant, opened the door. “I worked for NASA, so I’m a big science and facts kind of person.”
When Whitesides asked what issues were important to her, she laughed and said: “Don’t get me started.”
He stopped Megan and Sean Holst, a married couple in their early 30s, as they walked their golden retriever, Cosmo. “I know you from my dad!” said Megan, whose father planted a Whitesides yard sign outside his home on a dirt road in Acton.
Megan said she supports abortion rights and did not like Garcia’s record on the issue. But the couple — she is a clinical lab scientist and he is a programmer — are pretty moderate, she said. Mostly, they care about local issues, such as crime and cost of living. They have lived in the apartment complex for years and hope to someday be able to afford a house.
“It’s supposed to be more affordable in the Antelope Valley,” she said. “I thought we had a decent income, and it’s still — it’s hard.”
Whitesides handed her his campaign flier. She said she would consider it.
new video loaded: Virginia Voters Approve New Map Favoring Democrats
By Shawn Paik
April 22, 2026
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Sparks flew on Capitol Hill as Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., accused Federal Reserve nominee Kevin Warsh of being a potential “sock puppet” for President Donald Trump.
Warsh, tapped by Trump in January to lead the Federal Reserve, faced a two-and-a-half-hour confirmation hearing before the Senate Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs Committee.
If confirmed, he would take the helm of the world’s most powerful central bank, shaping interest rates, borrowing costs and the financial outlook for millions of American households for the next four years.
WHO IS KEVIN WARSH, TRUMP’S PICK TO SUCCEED JEROME POWELL AS FED CHAIR?
Kevin Warsh, nominee for chairman of the Federal Reserve, listens to ranking member Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., make an opening statement during his Senate Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs Committee confirmation hearing on Tuesday, April 21, 2026. (Tom Williams/CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty Images)
In her opening remarks, Warren sharply criticized Warsh’s record and questioned his independence, arguing he is “uniquely ill-suited for the job as Fed chair” and warning he could give Trump influence over the central bank.
She accused Warsh of enabling Wall Street during the 2008 financial crisis, which fell during his tenure as a Federal Reserve governor when he served from 2006 to 2011.
“In our meeting last week, we discussed the 2008 financial crash, where 8 million people lost their jobs, 10 million people lost their homes and millions more lost their life savings,” Warren said. “Giant banks, however, got hundreds of billions of dollars in bailouts… and he said to me that he has no regrets about anything he did.”
She added that Warsh “worked tirelessly to arrange multibillion-dollar bailouts” for Wall Street CEOs, with nothing for American families.
The hearing grew more tense as Warren pivoted to ethics concerns, pressing Warsh over his undisclosed financial holdings and questioning him over links to business dealings connected to the late convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.
The two spoke over each other and raised their voices in a heated exchange on Capitol Hill.
WARSH’S $226 MILLION FORTUNE UNDER SCRUTINY AS FED NOMINEE FACES SENATE CONFIRMATION
Sen. Elizabeth Warren: The Fed has been plagued by deeply disturbing ethics scandals in recent years. It’s critical that the next chair have no financial conflicts — none. You have more than $100 million in investments that you have refused to disclose. So let me ask: do the Juggernaut Fund or THSDFS LLC invest in companies affiliated with President Trump or his family, companies tied to money laundering, Chinese-controlled firms, or financing vehicles linked to Jeffrey Epstein?
Kevin Warsh: Senator, I’ve worked closely with the Office of Government Ethics and agreed to divest all of my financial assets.
Warren: Could you answer my question, please? You have more than $100 million in undisclosed assets. Are any of those investments tied to the entities I just mentioned? It’s a yes-or-no question.
Warsh: I have worked tirelessly with ethics officials and agreed to sell all of my assets before taking the oath of office.
Warren: Are you refusing to tell us if you have investments in vehicles linked to Jeffrey Epstein? You just won’t say?
Warsh: What I’m telling you is those assets will be sold if I’m confirmed.
Warren: Will you disclose how you plan to divest these assets? The public might question your motives if, for example, someone who profits from predicting Fed policy cuts you a $100 million check as you take office.
Sen. Elizabeth Warren questions Kevin Warsh during his Senate Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs Committee confirmation hearing on Tuesday, April 21, 2026. (Tom Williams/CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty Images)
Warsh: I’ve reached a full agreement with the Office of Government Ethics and will divest those assets before taking the oath.
Warren: I’m asking a very straightforward question. Will you disclose how you divest those assets?
Warsh: As I’ve said, I’ve worked with ethics officials.
Warren: I’ll take that as a no.
In a separate exchange, Warren invoked Trump’s past statements about the Fed and challenged Warsh to prove his independence in real time.
She insisted that Warsh answer whether he believes Trump won the 2020 presidential election and if he would name policies of the president with which he disagrees. The hopeful future Fed chair dodged the question and said he would remain apolitical, if confirmed.
THE ONE LINE IN WARSH’S TESTIMONY SIGNALING A BREAK FROM THE FED’S STATUS QUO
Warren: Donald Trump has made clear he does not want an independent Fed. He has said, “Anybody that disagrees with me will never be Fed chairman.” He’s also said interest rates will drop “when Kevin gets in.” Let’s check out your independence and your courage. We’ll start easy. Mr. Warsh, did Donald Trump lose the 2020 election?
Warsh: Senator, we should keep politics out of the Federal Reserve.
Warren: I’m asking a factual question.
Warsh: This body certified the election.
Warren: That’s not what I asked. Did Donald Trump lose in 2020?
Warsh: The Fed should stay out of politics.
Warren: In our meeting, you said you’re a “tough guy” who can stand up to President Trump. So name one aspect of his economic agenda you disagree with.
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Kevin Warsh listens to a question during a Senate Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs Committee confirmation hearing on Tuesday, April 21, 2026. (Graeme Sloan/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
Warsh: That’s not something I’m prepared to do. The Fed should stay in its lane.
Warren: Just one place where you disagree.
Warsh: I do have one disagreement — he said I looked like I was out of central casting. I think I’d look older and grayer.
Warren: That’s adorable. But we need a Fed chair who is independent. If you can’t answer these questions, you don’t have the courage or the independence.
On March 28, a sunny Saturday in southwestern Utah, Jack Hoopes and his wife, Lorna, brought their homemade signs to the local “No Kings” rally.
The couple joined a crowd of 1,500 or so marching through the main picnic area of a park in downtown St. George. Their signs — cut-out words on a black background — chided lawmakers for failing to stand up to President Trump and urged America to “make lying wrong again.”
After about an hour, the two were ready to go home. They got in their silver Volvo SUV, but before pulling away, Jack Hoopes decided to swing past the demonstration, which was still going strong. He tooted his horn, twice, in a show of solidarity.
That’s when things took a curious turn.
A police officer parked in the middle of the street warned Hoopes not to honk; at least that’s what he thinks the officer said as Hoopes drove past the chanting crowd. When he spotted two familiar faces, Hoopes hit the horn a third time — a friendly, howdy sort of honk. “It wasn’t like I was being obnoxious,” he said, “or laying on the horn.”
Hoopes turned a corner and the cop, lights flashing, pulled him over. He asked Hoopes for his license and registration. He returned a few moments later. A passing car sounded its horn. “Are you going to stop him, too?” Hoopes asked.
That did not sit well. The officer said he’d planned to let Hoopes off with a warning. Instead, he charged the 71-year-old retired potato farmer with violating Utah’s law on horns and warning devices. He issued a citation, with a fine punishable up to $50.
Hoopes — a law school graduate and prosecutor in the days before he took up potato farming — is fighting back, even though he estimates the legal skirmishing could cost him considerably more than the maximum fine. The ticket might have resulted from pique on the officer’s part. But Hoopes doesn’t think so. He sees politics at play.
“I’ve beeped my horn for [the pro-law enforcement] Back the Blue. I’ve beeped my horn for Black Lives Matter,” Hoopes said. “I’ve seen a lot of people honk for Trump and for MAGA.”
He’s also seen plenty of times when people honked their horns to celebrate high school championships and the like.
But Hoopes has never heard of anyone being pulled over, much less ticketed, for excessive or unlawful honking. “I think it’s freedom of expression,” he said.
Or should be.
Jack and Lorna Hoopes made their own protest signs to bring to the “No Kings” rally in St. George, Utah.
(Mikayla Whitmore / For The Times)
St. George is a fast-growing community of about 100,000 residents set amid the jagged red-rock peaks of the Mojave Desert. It’s a jumping-off point for Zion National Park, about 40 miles east, and a mecca for golf, hiking and mountain-bike riding.
It’s also Trump Country.
Washington County, where St. George is located, gave Trump 75% of its vote in 2024, with Kamala Harris winning a scant 23%. That emphatic showing compares with Trump’s 59% performance statewide.
St. George is where Hoopes and his wife live most of the time. When summer and its 100-degree temperatures hit, they retreat to southeast Idaho. The couple get along well with their neighbors in both places, Hoopes said, even though they’re Democrats living in ruby-red country. It’s not as though they just tolerate folks, or hold their noses to get by.
“Most of my friends are conservative,” Hoopes said. “Some of the Trump people are very good people. We just have a difference of opinion where our country is going.”
He was speaking from a hotel parking lot in Arizona near Lake Havasu while embarked on an annual motorcycle ride through the Southwest: four days, a dozen riders, 1,200 miles. Most of his companions are Trump supporters, Hoopes said, and, just like back home, everyone gets on fine.
“Right?” he called out.
“No!” a voice hollered back.
Actually, Hoopes joked, his charitable road mates let him ride along because they consider him handicapped — his disability being his political ideology.
Hoopes is not exactly a hellion. In 2014, he and his wife traveled to Africa to participate in humanitarian work and promote sustainable agriculture in Kenya and Uganda. In 2020, they worked as Red Cross volunteers helping wildfire victims in Northern California.
Virtually his entire life has been spent on the right side of the law, though Hoopes allowed as how he has racked up a few speeding tickets over the years. (His career as a prosecutor lasted four years and involved three murder cases in the first 12 months before he left the legal profession behind and took up farming.)
He’s never had any problems with the police in St. George. “They seem to be decent,” Hoopes said.
A department spokesperson, Tiffany Mitchell, said illicit honking is not a widespread problem in the placid, retiree-heavy community, but there are some who have been cited for violations. She denied any political motivation in Hoopes’ case.
“He must’ve felt justified,” Mitchell said of the officer who issued the citation. “I can’t imagine that politics had anything to do with it.”
And yes, she said, honking a horn can be a political statement protected by the 1st Amendment. “But, just like anything else, it can turn criminal,” Mitchell said, and apparently that’s how the officer felt on March 28 “and that’s the direction he took it.”
The matter now rests before a judge, residing in a legal system that has lately been tested and twisted in remarkable ways.
Jack Hoopes’ case is now before a judge in St. George, Utah.
(Mikayla Whitmore / For The Times)
As he left an initial hearing earlier this month, Hoopes said his phone pinged with a fresh headline out of Washington. Trump’s Justice Department, it was reported, was asking a federal appeals court to throw out the convictions of 12 people found guilty of seditious conspiracy for their roles in the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection.
“We have a president that pardons people that broke into the Capitol and defecated” in the hallways and congressional offices, Hoopes said. “Police officers died because of it, and yet I get picked up for honking my horn?”
Hoopes’ next court appearance, a pretrial conference, is set for July 15.
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