Political Notes: Gay entrepreneur Riker eyes CA GOPer Issa’s House seat

Republican Congressmember Darrell Issa (R-Vista) may once again find himself fending off a gay opponent for his Southern California House seat. This go around it could be against a Democrat in a redrawn district that includes the LGBTQ tourist and retirement mecca of Palm Springs.

Gay entrepreneur and trained economist Brandon Riker, who was born in the Bay Area and lived in Orinda, California until middle school, plans to run against Issa should the new House district become a reality. Earlier this year Riker had announced his candidacy to unseat conservative Congressmember Ken Calvert (R-Corona) from his 41st District House seat.

Palm Springs was carved into Calvert’s district due to the decennial redistricting process that concluded in 2021. Nonetheless, he was able to fend off gay former federal prosecutor Will Rollins in both 2022 and 2024.

Rollins has ruled out another run in 2026, even if Palm Springs ends up a part of Issa’s redrawn 48th Congressional District. Meanwhile, Riker announced August 16 his intention to now take on, if need be, the wealthy congressmember who has served in the House since 2001.

“Palm Springs is my community, where I have built my life and I am proud to call it my home,” stated Riker, 38, who serves on the board of SafePlace International, a nonprofit that works with displaced LGBTQ people across the globe. “Wherever the new lines fall, I will run to represent the people of Palm Springs in Congress. Redistricting can change maps, but it doesn’t change who I fight for. Palm Springs deserves a representative who shows up for the community.”

Five years ago, when running for reelection to his San Diego County-centered seat then numbered 50, Issa came in second in the June primary to knock out fellow GOPer Carl DeMaio, a gay former San Diego councilman who is now a member of the state Assembly. In the November 2020 election, Issa easily defeated his Democratic opponent, first-place primary finisher Ammar Campa-Najjar, by 8 percentage points.

The following summer gay Latino veteran Joseph C. Rocha had announced a bid to unseat Issa but then pivoted to mount an unsuccessful run for a state Senate seat in 2022 against a GOP incumbent. Running that year in his newly numbered 48th District, Issa easily defeated his Democratic challenger, whom he also defeated by double digits last November.

Redistricting goes to voters
Now, due to California Democratic leaders moving to match a congressional mid-decade redistricting effort launched by Texas Republican state leaders, Issa could find himself in a vastly different political situation next year. His district is one of several GOP-held House seats in the Golden State that could be redrawn to favor a Democratic candidate.

At the request of Governor Gavin Newsom, his Democratic allies in the state Legislature Thursday approved holding a special election this November to have voters cast ballots for Proposition 50, the “Election Rigging Response Act,” and adopt the new congressional boundaries. It is in response to GOP Texas lawmakers gerrymandering their House seats to make five more favorable to Republicans.

If Prop 50 is enacted, five of the Golden State’s House seats would be more favorable to the Democratic candidates running for them. Under such a scenario, Issa would find himself in a redrawn 48th District House seat that loops in the Democratic heavy Coachella Valley with more rural parts of San Diego County.

A Democratic candidate would have a 4-point advantage due to the new voter makeup of the district should it be approved in time for next year’s June 2 primary. Under the state’s open primary system, the top two vote-getters regardless of party affiliation will advance to the general election next November.

“As we await the decision of California voters, our campaign is building a grassroots movement focused on solving the affordability crisis facing California, protecting social security, Medicare and Medicaid, and ending the reckless economic policies that are exploding our national debt and accelerating inflation,” stated Riker. “I look forward to continuing to share that message with both friends and neighbors who have been part of this campaign, and voters we have yet to reach.”

Speaking by phone with the Bay Area Reporter August 22, Riker said the district lines of the House seat he vies for next year may change, along with his opponent, but he remains confident of being able to flip it from red to blue.

“Ken Calvert is beatable,” said Riker. “Darrell Issa is certainly beatable in a new 48th district.”

One big difference with his race from those that Rollins ran is that President Donald Trump is back in the White House, noted Riker, whereas Joe Biden was president at the time of Rollins’ back-to-back campaigns.

“Donald Trump fundamentally changes the race,” said Riker, pointing to how Calvert and Issa have voted lockstep for the president’s legislative priorities such as the One Big Beautiful Bill that makes it harder for people to qualify for Medicaid and provides additional tax breaks to the wealthy.

And where the Democratic Party was slow to initially support Rollins with donations and endorsements when he first ran, this time around the Palm Springs House seat is seen as a critical pickup if the Democrats will have a chance to take back control of the chamber. Riker told the B.A.R. that no matter his GOP opponent, his race will be one of the “most competitive” in California next year.

“And the path to the majority of the U.S. House of Representatives rolls through Palm Springs,” said Riker, who worked as an organizer on former President Barack Obama’s first campaign in 2008.

Issa’s campaign did not return a request for comment Friday. In a post on X it blasted Prop 50 as “simply a Democrat power grab. It's time we fight back and block the Gavinmander on Nov 4th,” using a portmanteau of Newsom’s first name and the term gerrymander. It linked to an online petition against Prop 50 with a photo of a smiling Issa, 71, shaking Trump’s hands.

Riker is one of at least four gay male Democratic 2026 House candidates running in California, with politico Jake Rakov of Studio City in Los Angeles County aiming to oust from office his former boss Congressmember Brad Sherman (D-Sherman Oaks). Incumbent Congressmembers Mark Takano (D-Riverside) and Robert Garcia (D-Long Beach) are both expected to easily win reelection next year, even if placed in newly drawn districts.

As of July 1, Riker reported having raised more than $457,000 from donors and matched it with a personal contribution to his campaign to bring his total haul during the first half of 2025 to roughly $914,000 with more than $756,500 in cash on hand. According to his campaign, Californians accounted for more than 70% of contributions, which averaged $98 per donor.

Calvert, 72, reported having close to $2.5 million as of July 1 in his campaign account, while Issa was sitting on more than $2.2 million. He also reporting having debts or loans totaling more than $5 million.

“We are not going to lose this race because of a lack of resources,” Riker told the B.A.R. “I am prepared to do whatever it takes to defeat Ken Calvert or Darrell Issa.”

Transgender former Palm Springs councilmember and ceremonial mayor Lisa Middleton endorsed Riker August 21, just as legislators in Sacramento were voting to place Prop 50 on the November ballot.

“Brandon will bring desperately needed pragmatic fiscal responsibility to Congress. He will find practical solutions to address housing and health care affordability,” stated Middleton, who was termed out of her council seat last year and lost her bid for a state Senate seat in last November’s election.

Speaking to the B.A.R. Thursday evening, Middleton demurred when asked if she had considered running for the House seat or been asked by people to seek it, saying, “I don’t want to get into those conversations. I am not a candidate for the U.S. Congress; my candidate is Brandon Riker.”

He had reached out to her last December to discuss his candidacy and seek her support. At that point not yet ready to make an endorsement, Middleton said she was “impressed with what I heard” from Riker and monitored his campaigning this year. He has held or attended several hundred events over the past eight months to introduce himself to his potential future constituents.

“I have seen at every turn someone who is without question the best qualified candidate to take on whichever Republican he ends up running against,” said Middleton, adding that Riker has a winning strategy to defeat either Issa or Calvert next year.

In late July, progressive Congressmember Ro Khanna (D-San Jose) had endorsed Riker’s House bid. In a post on Riker’s Facebook campaign page, Khanna stated, “Brandon understands the challenges working families face and has the skills to deliver real solutions.”

Background
Riker was diagnosed with dyslexia in middle school in Scottsdale, Arizona, where the family lived for a time until moving again in 2001 to Marlboro, Vermont, where Riker graduated from high school. He went on to graduate in 2010 with an economics degree from Washington College in Maryland, doing so magna cum laude and with Phi Beta Kappa honors.

With his family, Riker started the investment firm Teucrium Trading LLC in 2010. He then earned a Master of Science degree from the London School of Economics and Political Science in 2014 with merit honors.

Riker had come out of the closet in college in his early 20s. In 2015, at age 28, he mounted an unsuccessful bid as a gay candidate to be Vermont’s lieutenant governor.

Two years later he bought a home in Palm Springs, partly due to it having better cellphone and internet service than he had in New England, which was one issue he had focused on in his campaign. Riker, a fourth-generation Californian, resides with his dog, Cooper.

“Palm Springs made sense for me,” said Riker, recalling he had first come to town for a fundraiser for the LGBTQ+ Victory Fund, on whose campaign board he was serving at the time, and was struck by how easy it was to get to the Palm Springs International Airport. “I thought, ‘This is incredible.’ The community was incredibly welcoming, the architecture is stunning, but really it was the people who drew me to it.”

He is currently not working and solely focused on running for Congress. One lesson he learned from both his time with the Obama campaign and mounting his own bid for public office, said Riker, is the need to first listen to people and learn about their struggles then talk to them directly about how to address those concerns.

“Voters don’t care how much you know until they know how much you care,” said Riker. “When they realize you can empathize with them then you can gain their trust.”

His focus as a House candidate is pointing out his economic bona fides to voters amid an ongoing housing affordability crisis in the state, rising food prices and other inflationary impacts squeezing households’ buying power, and growing anxiety about Trump’s tariff actions and other policies facing no pushback from congressional Republicans. The three themes he focuses on are affordability, predictability, and opportunity when talking to voters.

“I fundamentally believe we have to, as a party, talk about affordability with voters. It is how we win,” said Riker, who rejects the theory that transgender rights are what caused Democrats to lose in last year’s election. “We lost because didn’t we didn’t acknowledge the pain people were feeling from inflation.”

Should he take on Issa, Riker is likely to face homophobic mud-slinging from the congressman. DeMaio was subjected to such tactics when he ran five years ago against Issa, who then deployed Islamophobic attacks against Campa-Najjar during their fall 2020 campaign.

“I have incredibly thick skin,” Riker told the B.A.R. when asked if he would be prepared for such attacks.

While described as an “LGBTQ candidate” in several Instagram posts that the B.A.R. found, Riker doesn’t mention anywhere on his campaign website about being gay or a member of the LGBTQ community. Asked about the omission by the B.A.R., Riker said it was not “intentional or unintentional” on his part and that he doesn’t “hide being gay” out on the campaign trail. He doesn’t believe his sexuality is what voters are going to judge him on, as the main determinant for cementing their support will be what his stances are on pocket-book issues.

Middleton joked that anyone who has met Riker in person at a campaign event knows immediately he is a member of the LGBTQ community.

“My gaydar isn’t absolutely 100%, but I don’t make too many mistakes. It was pretty obvious to this transgender lesbian that Brandon was a gay man from our first meeting,” said Middleton.

And the choice for voters between Riker and either Issa or Calvert couldn’t be starker, added Middleton. She pointed out that Calvert “consistently and without fail” has voted against the LGBTQ community and recalled how he had outed Takano as gay when the former educator had first run for a House seat against Calvert in 1994 and lost. (Takano became the first openly gay person of color to be elected to Congress in 2012.)

“We know the methods Ken Calvert is capable of, but he stands in stark difference to the kind of individual that Darrell Issa is. Whereas Ken Calvert is frequently someone who will not directly attack our community, Darrell Issa misses absolutely no opportunity to make it clear his antipathy to the LGBTQ community,” said Middleton. “He makes it clear he will miss no opportunity to say the most disgusting, hateful and alarming things about members of the LGBTQ community.”

So, added Middleton, “the difference between these two candidates, assuming in fall of 2026 we are looking at a choice between Brandon Riker and Darrell Issa, it will be a choice between night and day. It will be a choice that is as different as Palm Springs on July 4th at noon compared to Antarctica on the same day at the South Pole.”

Due to Labor Day weekend, the Political Notes column will be on hiatus until Monday, September 8.

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