Thursday, October 15, 2026
B.C. votes in 9 days

California’s 26th District

U.S. House · CA-26

Election day November 3, 2026 · forecast of October 15, 2026

Our forecast gives the Democrats a more than 99% chance of winning, with an average lead of 25.6 points.

Safe seat. Chance of a final gap under 5 points: 1%.

Projected vote share

Projection by party

  • Democrat 62.8%

    Jacqui Irwin

  • Republican 37.2%

    Sam Gallucci

Thin vertical mark: 2024 result.

Compared with the average

Democrat Republican
CA-26 62.8%37.2%
National averageUnited States 54.5%+8.3 44.2%−7.0

Simple average of the 435 districts, not weighted by population.

Projection track

How the projection has moved

Current member

Brownley, Julia · Democrat

Primary results

Held June 2, 2026 · Certified official result · Official source

Top-two primary Jacqui Irwin · Advanced to the general election 41.3% 79,790 votes
Top-two primary Sam Gallucci · Advanced to the general election 20.9% 40,334 votes

Who's running

The candidates

Candidates for the upcoming election.

  • Democrat Open seat

    Jacqui Irwin

    source
  • Republican Open seat

    Sam Gallucci

    source

Previous election (2024)

The Democrats won by 10.3 points.

Our current projection: the Democrats ahead by 25.6 points.

Where these voters came from

This district was redrawn in the 2025-2026 redistricting. Share of its voters from each former district:

  • Former district 26 75%
  • Former district 27 23%

Nearby districts

Party ahead and how sure the projection is.

  • CA-27 Democrat, safe seat
  • CA-29 Democrat, safe seat
  • CA-32 Democrat, safe seat
  • CA-30 Democrat, safe seat
  • CA-37 Democrat, safe seat
  • CA-34 Democrat, safe seat

Watch list

The tightest races

The smallest projected gaps between the top two.

  1. AZ-2Republican52%5.7-point gap
  2. KY-6Republican53%5.8-point gap
  3. VA-1Republican58%5.8-point gap
Forecast updated