Candidate chaos: California appellate court rules Asm. Vince Fong can stay on Nov. ballot as CD-20 candidate

BAKERSFIELD, Calif. (KGET) — Bakersfield Assemblymember and 20th Congressional District candidate Vince Fong will remain on the Nov. 5 ballot for Congress and state Assembly, the state’s third district appellate court in Sacramento ruled Tuesday morning.

It was a unanimous decision by the three justices.

“If Sacramento wants to continue to interfere with the Central Valley and elections in the Central Valley, that’s very unfortunate,” Fong said in an interview with 17 News Tuesday afternoon.

He continued, “The appeal was a last-ditch attempt by Sacramento to invalidate over 60,000 votes that were legally cast in the [March 5 primary] election.”

So far, Fong is the candidate of choice of over 66,000 voters in that CD-20 race.

Since Fong first declared his run for Congress in December 2023, he and California Secretary of State Shirley Weber, the state’s chief elections official, have been in a legal tug-of-war regarding his congressional candidacy.

The issue?

Fong is a declared candidate for both re-election to his state Assembly seat, as well as that CD-20 seat, left vacant by Kevin McCarthy.

“I attempted to remove my name off the Assembly ballot, and unfortunately the Secretary of State’s misguided interpretation prevented that from happening,” Fong said of his legal limbo of a situation.

In California, one who is already a declared candidate for office cannot withdraw. Death is the only exception.

He admitted, “It’s been stressful, but at the end of the day we’ve been confident all along.”

In December, a Sacramento superior court judge ruled in favor of Fong, allowing him to remain on the March 5 presidential primary ballot as a congressional candidate. That’s why you saw his name on the March ballot.

Weber appealed that decision, and an expedited hearing was held last Thursday.

And Tuesday morning, the justices rejected that appeal, stating “The petition for writ of mandate is denied. The parties shall bear their own costs in this original proceeding.”

Fong said while he’s asking that the Secretary of State reimburse his attorney fees, he will utilize campaign funds, if unsuccessful.

Legislative law expert Chris Micheli told 17 News if the Secretary of State wants to further appeal the decision, the California Supreme Court would be the next step.

Though, Micheli said, “It’s highly unlikely that the court would accept this case for review,” as Fong has already won in both the trial and appeal courts.

“But I think it’s something that had to have weighed heavily on the justices, that the voters already spoke on March the 5,” Micheli added. “I think they also expressed some hesitation regarding the remedies that the Secretary was proposing, including dropping Assemblyman Fong and moving up the second and third place finishers or even going out and having an entirely new election.”

The Secretary of State said in a statement, “This ruling leaves the door open to chaos, gamesmanship and voter disenfranchisement, and disadvantages other candidates. My office sought to avoid such problems through this litigation. This ruling highlights the need for legislative attention. We are carefully considering all our options.”

The entire legal debate was on whether California Election Code § 8003(b) applies to Fong as a congressional candidate.

As Micheli summarized, Weber and her legal team argued that the above election code states one can’t run for two offices.

Just that subsection, which is what Weber centered her rejection of Fong’s congressional candidacy on, reads, “(b) No person may file nomination papers for a party nomination and an independent nomination for the same office, or for more than one office at the same election.”

Fong’s team, on the other hand, maintained the code was not being utilized in the correct context. They stated that the code only applies to “independent nominations.”

Fong was not working towards an independent nomination, and both the trial and appeal courts agreed with his reading of the elections code.

Part of the Fong team’s response to Weber’s appeal was that even if Fong won both the congressional and Assembly seats, the two are not “incompatible,” meaning he could hold the two offices simultaneously.

“I have only been running for one office this entire election, and that is the 20th Congressional District,” Fong said.

When asked if he rules out holding the congressional and Assembly seats simultaneously, Fong reiterated, “I am only running for Congress.”

Meantime, Fong is also running in the CD-20 election to complete the remainder of Kevin McCarthy’s seat in Congress, which was vacated prior to the end of his term.

He, alongside fellow Republican Tulare County Sheriff Mike Boudreaux, will be advancing to a May runoff election.

Fong also stated, “California needs to clean up its election code… this court case clearly affirms that need.”

In response to the court case he describes as a “separation of powers issue,” Fong has proposed AB 2003 in the state legislature.

The bill aims to modify existing election law to allow candidates who have already declared their candidacy to withdraw until 5p.m. “on the final day that nomination documents may be delivered or filed for that office at the primary election.”

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