BRAWLEY, Calif. — While Assemblyman Jeff Gonzalez, a newly elected Republican, was taking the oath of office in Sacramento last week, the phones of two supporters in Imperial County pinged with ecstatic updates from his staff about his first day at the Capitol. There were photos of Gonzalez’s nameplate outside his new office and of his freshly printed business cards.
There was even one showing a piece of paper bearing his new letterhead. The supporters receiving the pictures? Tony Gallegos and his fiancee, Olga Moreno, from El Centro. They are Democrats.
“We ate a little bit of crow in the beginning because here I am, a big Democrat, and [people think] all of a sudden I’ve changed,” said Gallegos, a former chair of the Imperial County Democratic Central Committee. “Well, we didn’t change. We just supported the better candidate.
” By winning his race to represent California Assembly District 36 , which borders Mexico and includes a wide swath of the Imperial and Coachella valleys, Gonzalez flipped a rural, mostly Latino district where Democrats hold a nearly 14-point voter registration advantage. Gonzalez, who wouldn’t say who he voted for in the presidential election, said he was successful because he worked hard to downplay party politics. He campaigned with prominent local Democrats — including a onetime mayor of Calexico who organized a 2019 protest of former President Trump’s visit to the border that included the infamous, diaper-clad “Trump Baby”.