The California primary races are not over just yet, as ballots there continue to be counted, but we have an answer on one man's fight to continue serving Californians in the U.S. Congress - against some tough odds. He had to switch to Independent to do it, after all.
Decision Desk HQ (DDHQ) now reports that GOP Rep. Kevin Kiley is victorious in the primary, and will advance to the general election:
Decision Desk HQ projects Kevin Kiley as one of two winners in the CA US House 6 Primary#DecisionMade: 7:26 PM EDT pic.twitter.com/oDpeqfCd0Z
— Decision Desk HQ (@DecisionDeskHQ) June 5, 2026
Kiley will be joined by a second candidate; two other candidates - Democrat Richard Pan and Republican Michael Stansfield - remain locked in the fight. Their numbers are too close to call, at the time of this writing.
As my California-savvy colleague Jennifer Oliver O'Connell wrote on Wednesday, June 3, the returns reported late on June 2 were looking positive for Kiley - with 46 percent of the vote estimated to be in, Decision Desk HQ reported:
Kevin Kiley (I): 21,781 (24.9%)
Richard Pan (D): 19,897 (22.7%)
Michael Stansfield (R): 18,767 (21.4%)
She also shared some analysis on the unique nature of Golden State politics, as part of the reason for that. O'Connell wrote:
What people fail to realize about the state of California is that, despite the deep blue progressive governance that has dictated much of its policies, many Californians are neither team red nor team blue. They just want life and their state to work and their elected representatives to work for them, and not just for themselves.
That is the factor that could guarantee Kiley pulls off a win in this newly reconstituted district. With 45 percent of precincts reporting, Kiley is leading the race and will more than likely make the Top 2 for the November election.
In addition to her story, current California voter, RedState's Bob Hoge underlined Kevin Kiley's background of fighting hard for conservative measures, including in the state legislature, then in Congress:
...A few years ago, while Democrat nimrods in the state’s legislature were all competing to see who could come up with a new tax or extreme gender identity law, then-assemblymember Kiley was fighting back and telling the truth about the mess they were making with the Golden State. He served from 2016 to 2022, then was elected to the U.S. House of Representatives.
But Democrat Gov. Newsom had other plans, as Hoge continued:
Because of that, he [Kiley] became one of the targets of Gov. Gavin Newsom’s grand achievement, the shredding of the state constitution in order to gerrymander the districts with Prop. 50 and perhaps get rid of five GOP seats, including Kiley’s.
Kiley ran as an independent, as a result. And Hoge shared the glowing prospects for Kiley, and Stansfield, in the primary for the new district 06:
...[H]e’s currently leading the vote count. In the jungle primary system, that would mean that if his lead holds, he would head to a run-off.
Here comes the good part: the second leading vote-getter is also a Republican — Michael Stansfield. If that stays the case, it would ensure that there were no Democrats in the final two, and no Dem could capture the seat.
Read More: Will California Independent Kevin Kiley Win His Fight?
Could Gavin Newsom's Redistricting Scheme Faceplant? Kevin Kiley Might Still Be Headed Back to DC
As I said, we do not have final numbers for District 06 yet. Things are looking positive for the Republican in the race. And rest assured, RedState will bring the updates to you from California's elections when they are available.
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