Rudy Salas announces campaign to knock off vulnerable California House Republican
Julia Johnson
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Democrat Rudy Salas is challenging Rep. David Valadao (R-CA) to a rematch for California’s 22nd Congressional District, highlighting the Republican’s ties to House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) in his announcement video.
The district is one of the few that were won by President Joe Biden in the 2020 presidential election and represented by a Republican. The race is considered a pickup opportunity by Democrats.
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In 2022, Salas lost to Valadao by just 3 percentage points.
In Salas’s video announcement, he says Valadao and McCarthy are “thick as thieves.” He further depicts his opponent as a puppet whose strings are operated by the House speaker.
“David Valadao is nothing more than Kevin McCarthy’s yes man. They both need to go.”
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“My time in service has been dedicated to fighting for the people who grow our food, produce our gas, teach our children, and care for our seniors,” Salas said in a press release. “In the Assembly, I won overtime for farm workers, lowered the cost of medicine, and made drinking water safer. I was the only Assembly Democrat to vote against the gas tax, and I stood up against leaders in my own party to increase funding for law enforcement and protect oil and gas jobs.”
In a statement, National Republican Congressional Committee spokesman Ben Petersen said, “Central Valley voters swiped left on Rudy Salas after he sold them out to Sacramento special interests. Rudy Salas remains the same self-serving politician that drove up inflation, raised the gas tax, voted for a medicine tax and attacked the Valley’s way of life — only now Salas is even more desperate for a taxpayer salary.”
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Valadao is one of two House Republicans reelected after voting to impeach former President Donald Trump in 2021. The other is Rep. Dan Newhouse (R-WA).
The race is rated as “lean Republican” by the Cook Political Report.