Northern California Rep. Doug LaMalfa has died at age 65

from Maya S. MillerCalMatters

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Congressman Doug LaMalfa, a fourth-generation rice farmer and Republican who represented much of rural northern California in Congress for the past 13 years, has died. He was 65.

His sudden death, confirmed Tuesday morning by House Republican leadership, further shrinks the party’s already slim majority, which now stands at 218 after the resignation of Georgia Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene this week. Now the Republican Party can only afford to lose two members on each party-line vote.

While President Donald Trump and House Republicans could consistently count on LaMalfa to support conservative priorities like last year’s mega domestic policy bill, he never took on the image of a gunfighter or antagonist that many of his colleagues preferred.

Instead, LaMalfa built a reputation as a pragmatic and affable member who prioritized access to water and forest management, key interests for his heavily forested, fire-prone and heavily agricultural district. It was these issues that led him to staunchly oppose Proposition 50, Gov. Gavin Newsom’s redistricting plan, which proposed blending much of the rural North with parts of the far more urban and liberal San Francisco Bay Area.

Under California election law, Gov. Gavin Newsom has 14 days to call a special election to fill out the remainder of LaMalfa’s current term. These elections will be held under existing congressional district lines that stretch from much of the Oregon-California border through rural Shasta and Sutter counties, not the new ones A neighborhood with democratic leanings passed after voters approved Proposition 50 in November.

That creates a potentially confusing scenario for voters, as Newsom could set up the special election to replace LaMalfa to coincide with the already-scheduled June state primary that uses the new Prop maps. 50.

LaMalfa was known for his unwavering commitment to the issues that affected his district. One of his traditions was to bet on the president after the State of the Union address. In those precious few minutes, as the leader of the free world stepped down from the podium and made his way out of the chamber, LaMalfa would make his legislative demands. As the Washington Post reported, after President Joe Biden’s latest address, LaMalfa asked the president to force the US Forest Service to speed up the issuance of logging permits, telling the president, “We have to cut down some trees.”

LaMalfa strongly opposed Prop. 50, defining the gerrymander as a significant loss of representation for rural Californians. At a press conference last fall, he emphasized how much he loves representing the farmers, ranchers and other farm workers in his district, calling out the names of small towns like Fort Goodwin and Cedarville, where he said he’s knocked on countless doors and held various town halls over the years.

“I know where all these places are,” LaMalfa told the handful of reporters gathered at the Butte County Farm Bureau lodge. “Do you think that’s what’s going to happen when people from Cedarville, Modoc County are mixed with people from Sausalito and Marin County?”

LaMalfa’s successor may not be sworn in for several months, depending on when Newsom calls the special election and whether a candidate gets 50 percent of the vote. If not, voters will have to vote in a runoff.

“Whoever runs will literally be a congressman for a month,” said Paul Mitchell, the chief architect of Prop. 50 regions. He noted that while a Republican would likely win the special election, “there is no reality that they will win the Prop. 50 card.”

He noted that House Republicans would benefit from rallying behind one candidate to avoid a runoff, while Democrats would likely prefer to keep the seat open as long as possible.

Neither of LaMalfa’s Democratic rivals, state Sen. Mike McGuire and Chico State professor Audrey Denny, immediately said whether they would run in a special election.

This article was originally published on CalMatters and is republished under Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-No Derivatives license.