Harley Rouda

Rouda says he was raised in a "traditional Republican household."[2] He was a registered Republican until 1997, when he left the party and became an independent because he felt the Republican Party had been moving in the "wrong direction" on social issues.[13] Rouda says the last Republican he voted for was Bob Dole in the 1996 presidential election. He switched his party affiliation to the Democratic Party after the 2016 election.[2] Shortly before registering as a Democrat, Rouda donated to the John Kasich 2016 presidential campaign. Kasich would suspend his campaign shortly before he was defeated by Donald Trump in the California primaries. Due to these donations, he was criticized by Democrats as insufficiently loyal to the party or being a "Republican in disguise" during the campaign,[14] to which Rouda responded, “we gave … because they are personal friends – not because he is someone who I share a political ideology with – and because I wanted to stop Donald Trump and his divisive campaign.”[15]

On March 2, 2017, Rouda announced his candidacy for U.S. Representative from California's 48th congressional district, challenging the incumbent, Dana Rohrabacher, shortly after changing his party registration from no party preference into a Democrat.[11] His primary opponent, Hans Keirstead, was endorsed by the Democratic Party of California at the party convention.[16] Rouda received the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee endorsement in May 2018.[17] In the nonpartisan blanket primary election, Rouda secured the second spot over Keirstead on the ballot by 125 votes (from a total of 174,024), thus allowing him to face Rohrabacher in the general election.[18]

On October 25, Michael Bloomberg announced he would be supporting Rouda's campaign by donating $4 million to his PAC, Independence USA. That made Rouda's race against Rohrabacher the most expensive House race in the 2018 election cycle.[19]

On November 6, the election was too close to call, as Rouda held a narrow lead over Rohrabacher.[20] As mail-in votes were counted, Rouda's lead expanded,[21] and the Associated Press called the race in his favor on November 10.[22]

Rouda ran for reelection and faced off against the Republican challenger, Orange County supervisor Michelle Steel,[23] during the general election on November 3, 2020. Steel ultimately defeated Rouda, garnering 51.1% of the vote to Rouda's 48.9%.[24][25] Immediately after his loss, Rouda announced he would run against Steel again in 2022.[26]

Rouda missed federally mandated deadlines for reporting that his wife traded stocks while he was in office. The missed reporting appeared to violate the STOCK Act, which is designed to combat insider trading.[27][28]

After conceding the election, Rouda had announced that he would challenge Steel in 2022.[26] However, new congressional maps going into effect for the 2022 cycle placed the homes of Rouda, Steel and two-term Democratic Representative Katie Porter in the same district, now numbered the 47th district. When Porter announced her intention to run in the 47th district,[29] Steel chose to run in the new 45th district.[30]

After initially announcing his intent to challenge Porter,[31] Rouda dropped out of the race in January 2022.[32] Rouda formed a political action committee, Join Together PAC, to support the election of moderate Democrats, such as Katrina Foley of the Orange County Board of Supervisors.[33]

After incumbent representative Katie Porter announced that she would not be running reelection to the House in the 47th district, instead opting to run in the 2024 United States Senate election in California, Rouda announced that he would run for the seat in the 2024 elections.[34] However, on April 11, 2023, Rouda announced his withdrawal from the race, citing a traumatic brain injury he received following a fall.[6]

• United States House Committee on Oversight and Reform
  • Subcommittee on Environment (Chair)
  • Subcommittee on National Security
• United States House Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure
  • Subcommittee on Highways and Transit
  • Subcommittee on Water Resources and Environment

• Congressional Asian Pacific American Caucus
• New Democrat Coalition