How California’s midterm election could shape national political conflicts

When a professional political operative describes an election as “nationalized,” it means the outcome could have consequences far beyond the locality in which it occurs and therefore is drawing outside attention and resources.

This year’s congressional elections in California are a prime example, with two distinct and unusual aspects.

First and most obviously, Democrats are hoping to gain as many as five California seats in the House of Representatives due to a partisan gerrymander of the state’s 52 districts last year. Thus the outcome in California could determine whether their party regains control of the House, where Republicans now hold a paper-thin majority.

Meanwhile, outside the five districts that Democrats hope to switch, there are safely Democratic districts where progressive candidates are jousting with mainstream rivals, a subset of the national party’s ideological conflict.

One example is the duel between progressive state Sen. Aisha Wahab and Melissa Hernandez, president of the Bay Area Regional Transit board, over the east Bay Area congressional seat Eric Swalwell held until resigning amid allegations of sexual misconduct.

Another is in San Francisco, where state Sen. Scott Wiener faces San Francisco Supervisor Connie Chan for the seat that former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is vacating. While both are self-proclaimed progressives, there are specific issues dividing them, such as housing. Wiener has long championed making housing easier to build, but in San Francisco resisting development is a bedrock cause for those on the city’s left.

There’s another conflict on California’s November ballot that’s become nationalized: Proposition 40, which would impose a 5% tax on the wealth of California’s roughly 200 billionaires. Once again, it’s on two distinct levels.

First, it tests a concept of taxation that, if enacted, could spread to other states or even become a national issue. It has drawn attention in national political media and from national political figures, such as progressive icon Bernie Sanders.

Secondly, Prop. 40 has divided California Democrats and their political allies, somewhat mirroring the party’s aforementioned national conflict.

Attacking the wealthy is a long-held tenet of left-leaning politics. In California, progressive politicians see Prop. 40 as an embodiment of that attitude. However, not-so-progressive Democrats — such as Gov. Gavin Newsom and Xavier Becerra, Newsom’s almost-certain successor — are concerned about driving high-income taxpayers out of the state and undermining the state budget.

The state’s unions are also divided. While Prop. 40 is sponsored by SEIU-UHW, a union of healthcare workers — and it would direct most of its new revenue to healthcare programs — the California Teachers Association and other influential unions are opposed because of that financial slant.

Prop. 40 joins three other California ballot measures in the last half-century that became nationalized: Proposition 13, the state’s iconic tax limits adopted in 1978, sparked a national tax revolt; Proposition 187, passed in 1994, would have denied public services to undocumented immigrants had it not been overturned in the courts — it foretold an immigration policy debate that continues to rage — and Proposition 209, approved in 1996, prohibited affirmative action preferences by race, sex, color, ethnicity or national origin in college admissions, public employment and public contracting.

Were it to pass, Prop. 40 could also reverberate nationally, but its approval remains uncertain as the 2026 campaign season narrows. Mail voting will begin in just seven weeks.

Seemingly countless millions of dollars are being spent on the measure, particularly by its wealthy opponents. And the latest poll, conducted by the Institute of Governmental Studies at UC Berkeley, found 48% of likely voters support it, 41% oppose it and 11% are undecided.

That translates into a maybe — maybe a win, maybe a loss and maybe a national impact.