A new poll released Wednesday shows Assemblyman Jeff Gonzalez leading Democratic challenger Ida Obeso-Martinez 46% to 40% in the race for California's 36th Assembly District, a six-point lead that comes just weeks before the sprawling desert and border district decides whether to keep its Republican incumbent or hand the seat back to Democrats.
The survey, conducted by Guidant Polling & Strategy for the Legislative Bipartisan Action PAC, polled 300 likely general election voters from September 19 through 23 and carries a margin of error of ±5.65%, according to Uken Report. Democrats have made Assembly District 36 their top spending target in California, pouring more than $2 million into the race in an effort to reclaim a seat the party held for years before losing it in 2024.
AD-36 stretches across all of Imperial County along with eastern portions of Riverside and San Bernardino counties, linking border communities like Calexico and El Centro with Coachella Valley cities including Indio and Coachella, according to CalMatters. Registered Democrats hold a nearly 14-percentage-point voter registration advantage there, making up roughly 41% of registered voters, per the Los Angeles Times.
A Seat Republicans Flipped, and Democrats Want Back
Gonzalez originally won the seat in November 2024 with 51.8% of the vote against Democrat Jose “Joey” Acuña Jr., making him one of three California Republicans to flip a Democratic Assembly seat that year after longtime incumbent Eduardo Garcia opted not to seek re-election, the Los Angeles Times reported. In the June 2026 primary, Gonzalez placed first with 44.6% of the vote, or 36,315 ballots, while Obeso-Martinez advanced to the general election in second place with 24.1%, or 19,586 votes, beating out fellow Democrats Oscar Ortiz and Tomás Oliva, according to Ballotpedia.
Gonzalez is a Marine Corps veteran who served in Iraq and Afghanistan. The new poll finds that 58% of recently informed voters rated him favorably, while 21% viewed him less favorably, per the same survey covered by Uken Report.
Obeso-Martinez, the Mayor of Imperial, is a cardiovascular nurse practitioner. She has centered her campaign on healthcare access and economic relief for working families, the outlet notes.
A Late-Summer Swing in the Polls
The six-point Gonzalez lead marks a dramatic reversal from August, when a districtwide poll had shown Obeso-Martinez ahead by eight percentage points, per the Uken Report. That shift followed weeks of heavy advertising and increasingly pointed regional media commentary about the race.
Much of that commentary centered on a September 16 column in which The Press-Enterprise criticized Obeso-Martinez's readiness for legislative office after she said in an interview that she was unprepared to offer positions on the state budget, Proposition 40, or AB 1383 without further review, according to the Gonzalez campaign. The interview drew critical scrutiny.
The Press-Enterprise Editorial Board went further on September 26, formally endorsing Gonzalez for re-election and calling it “an easy call” while praising what it described as his pragmatic, bipartisan record representing rural communities, per the Uken Report. In his own comments on the new poll, Gonzalez said there is still a lot of work to do and pledged to keep putting people over politics, listening to communities, and delivering results regardless of party, according to Uken Report.
Legislative Record Enters the Campaign
Gonzalez has pointed to his record fighting Governor Gavin Newsom's proposed cuts to In-Home Supportive Services and to what he calls delivering for veterans and working families as central to his case for re-election, per Uken Report. He also co-authored AB 1145, a Highway 74 commercial truck safety bill named for a Palm Desert crash victim that passed the Legislature in August and was sent to Newsom ahead of a September 30 signing deadline, as Hoodline previously reported.
With the general election set for November, the AD-36 contest remains a race to watch, pitting a Republican incumbent trying to hold a seat in a Democratic-leaning district against a Democratic challenger seeking to reverse a flip that took her party by surprise two years ago.
