Most California lawmakers never buck their party. These few do

Mavericks are hard to find in the California Legislature. 

It’s exceedingly rare for lawmakers to vote against the majority of their party. 

A CalMatters Digital Democracy analysis of current legislators’ voting records found that, on average since 2023, they broke from the majority of their colleagues less than 1% of the time. 

But a few are more willing to stray from the herd. Some represent the few competitive swing districts in California.

The top maverick voter is Assemblymember Greg Wallis, a Republican representing the Rancho Mirage area. He broke from his party 8% of the time. It’s a reflection of how competitive his district is. Wallis won his first election against a Democrat in 2022 by a mere 85 votes. It was one of the smallest margins in state history.

This year, Wallis was the only Republican to vote for a bill that seeks to prevent arrests of abortion providers or providers of gender-affirming care. He was the lone Republican to vote for a measure prohibiting tech companies from turning over data if law enforcement is targeting protesters or others protected by the First Amendment. And Wallis was the only Republican to vote for an LGBTQ Caucus priority bill that seeks to protect insurance coverage for gay and transgender people.

“Republicans, Democrats, independents, nobody has a monopoly on good ideas,” Wallis said. “I was elected to represent all 500,000 constituents in the 47th Assembly District, and so our approach has always been to evaluate every bill based on its merit, not solely on which party supports or opposes it.” 

Already rare, maverick voting may become even rarer in California and around the country as voters become increasingly polarized. If a moderate politician casts a vote that bucks the party line, a hard-liner from their party could use it as ammunition against them in a primary election.

This year’s primary elections show what’s at stake for moderates. President Donald Trump’s Make America Great Again movement has all but consumed the Republican Party. Trump’s hard-line MAGA loyalists almost unanimously scored primary victories over more moderate Republican incumbents. Meanwhile, democratic socialists and far-left progressives had their own string of primary victories, defeating moderate Democrats across the country.

California lawmakers also have strong incentives to vote with their party leadership. The party controls lucrative committee assignments, leadership positions and campaign resources that individual lawmakers depend on for reelection.

A moderate faces a reckoning 

Voting against her party may have contributed to a June primary loss for Assemblymember Jasmeet Bains. She’s a moderate Democratic family physician representing the Bakersfield area. She ran for Congress this year and lost to progressive college professor Randy Villegas.

She has Digital Democracy’s second-highest maverick ranking among Democrats, voting against the majority of her party just under 2% of the time since she was elected to the Legislature in 2022. 

Her moderate, nuanced views and votes, particularly on fossil fuels and healthcare, gave Villegas lines of attack that appealed to more left-leaning voters. 

Villegas now faces moderate Republican U.S. Rep. David Valadao, who also prevailed in the top-two primary, in November. 

In an interview, Bains said she always voted for what she felt was best for her constituents, even if it angered her fellow Democrats. She has no regrets.

“It wasn’t for a party,” she said. “It was for them; it was for my community.”

Most famously, Bains was the lone Democrat to vote against Gov. Gavin Newsom’s 2023 bill that sought to crack down on oil company profits. She felt the law would harm the oil industry that’s important to Kern County’s economy.

Her vote led to a public rebuke from the governor’s now-indicted former chief of staff, Dana Williamson, who wrote on social media, “Alone and confused you shall likely remain.” 

Then-Assembly Speaker Anthony Rendon also punished Bains by temporarily removing her from a committee.

Wallis said Republicans are more understanding when he breaks ranks to vote for a Democratic bill, but they do give him a good-natured hard time. 

He said his favorite candy bar is Twix. After he casts a vote for a Democratic bill, he said he’ll sometimes find only the left Twix bar in its wrapper on his desk.

Modesto Republican Assemblymember Juan Alanis is right behind Wallis in Digital Democracy’s maverick rankings. He’s broken with the majority of his Republican colleagues 7% of the time.

Alanis said his colleagues know he represents a district with only slightly more Republican voters than Democrats, so his fellow Republican lawmakers understand when he casts a vote that bucks the party line.

But he is mindful that conservative Republican primary challengers might someday use his votes for Democratic bills against him.

Still, he said he’s going to keep voting for his district and his conscience. If a right-wing challenger wants to make an issue of that, “then so be it,” he said.

Voting ‘no’ leads to outliers

Others buck their party merely because they’re more willing to vote “no” more often than their colleagues. 

Not voting is a common tactic California lawmakers use to express discomfort with a bill while avoiding a firm “no” that could anger powerful interest groups or legislative colleagues. 

As CalMatters has reported, Democrats vote “no” less than 1% of the time. Republicans vote “no” more often, typically around 20% of the time, but they also abstain from voting on bills more than Democrats do.

San Diego Republican Assemblymember Carl DeMaio doesn’t skip many votes. He just votes “no.” Last year, he had the most “noes” of any member of the Legislature.

DeMaio, who has often bucked his party publicly, also isn’t shy about voting “no” even when Republicans are voting “aye.” He ranked third in the maverick rankings, breaking with the majority of his party 5.5% of the time.

Notably, DeMaio broke with the majority of his party this year by voting “no” on legislation that seeks to give state public safety workers pay raises and pension increases.

DeMaio said he votes against bills he thinks will raise costs for California taxpayers, and he doesn’t care if it angers wealthy and powerful groups such as the unions pushing for the pay and pension legislation.

“I’m simply not going to be swayed by how powerful a group is,” DeMaio said. “If they’re backing a bill that is bad policy, I’m going to vote ‘no.’”

It also helps that DeMaio runs a massive grassroots conservative fundraising machine that insulates him from needing campaign donations from wealthy special interests. 

On the Democratic side, Assemblymember Anamarie Ávila Farías, representing the Concord area, also votes “no” on bills more than her Democratic colleagues. Last year, she cast more “no” votes than any member of the Democratic caucus.

She also leads the Democratic caucus in voting against her party, thanks to her occasional “no” votes. She’s voted against her party 2.16% of the time.

This year, she was the only Democrat to vote against a measure that seeks to give Californians the right to sue companies for forming harmful monopolies.

Several of her moderate Democratic colleagues expressed concerns that the bill could be used by predatory law firms to shake down businesses already struggling in a high-cost state. Unlike Ávila Farías, those worried Democrats just didn’t vote.

Ávila Farías said her constituents sent her to Sacramento to make hard decisions, so she’s comfortable voting “no” when she thinks a proposal isn’t in their best interest or it could raise costs for Californians, even when her colleagues won’t.

“It’s much harder to undo something than stand firm and raise the flag,” she said. “I’m more governed by, you know, the facts and the data and the execution and the unintended consequences than really party ideology.”

Our methodology: To determine how often lawmakers voted against their party, we analyzed each lawmaker’s votes since 2023 and compared them with their party’s majority position. When the majority voted yes, we noted if a lawmaker voted no. When members of the majority voted no or abstained, we noted if they voted yes. We averaged how often each lawmaker voted against their party across all years since 2023.

Digital Democracy’s Foaad Khosmood, Forbes professor of computer engineering at Cal Poly San Luis Obispo, contributed to this story.