Before the Bill Clinton years, California was widely regarded as a red state — from San Diego and Orange County to Bakersfield to Glendale and Burbank. These days, California is a Democratic stronghold; the state hasn't gone Republican in a presidential election since George H.W. Bush in 1988. Some of California's rural counties still lean Republican, but in deep red Modoc County, redistricting is fueling a major political upheaval. And incumbent Rep. Jared Huffman (D-California), now heading to the general election, is the beneficiary.
According to SFGate reporter Silas Valentino, rural Modoc County voters deeply resent being "mushed in with their ideological opposite: voters in Marin County."
"(Modoc County voters) were previously located in the 1st Congressional District, alongside similar counties like Lassen and Plumas. Rep. Doug LaMalfa, reelected seven times since 2012, spoke on behalf of the district until he died in office earlier this year," Valentino explains. "Modoc voters were asked to choose a successor for the remainder of LaMalfa's term until January 2027 — however, they are no longer in the 1st Congressional District. With the redistricting, Modoc no longer votes alongside its neighbors to the south in Lassen, Sierra and Plumas Counties. Those counties remain in District 1, while Modoc was split off and pulled into District 2 along with Shasta and Siskiyou Counties, where Marin resident and incumbent Democratic Rep. Jared Huffman was the frontrunner headed into Tuesday."
Laurel Ybarra, a Modoc County rancher, believes that California's Proposition 50 is aggravating urban/rural tensions in the state.
Ybarra told SFGate, "That's where you get this urban and rural divide. Most of the news is urban-focused and when they talk about rural areas, they say how we're a bunch of idiots and racists…. We already feel like the whole legislature doesn't even know that we're here. They don't care and don’t even come out to the county to pretend to care."
Frank Castaneda, a Modoc County shopkeeper, is frustrated as well.
Castaneda told SFGate, "We lost our voice. We're a small community that's now beholden to the people in the Bay Area."
Valentino emphasizes that politically, Modoc County is radically different from California's large urban centers.
"Open space and elbow room typically define Modoc, where about 8,500 people live among vast valleys molded by the splitting of the Sierra Nevada and Cascade mountain ranges," Valentino explains. "Their rugged fray forms the last frontier of California. Slightly smaller than Los Angeles County in square mileage, Modoc couldn't exist further away from the state's metropolitan areas in terms of politics. Seventy percent of voters consistently turned out for Donald Trump over the previous three elections, and, in response to Proposition 50 last fall, Modoc voters soundly rejected redrawing the congressional district map."
Valentine adds, "The near 80 percent disapproval was the polar opposite of opinion of those in Marin, who voted with an 80 percent approval of the new maps."