Cara Brown McCormick
California’s 31st Assembly District runs through the agricultural heart of the San Joaquin Valley, where the land is lined with orchards, vineyards, and produce fields that feed the state and the nation. It covers portions of Fresno County, including the cities of Parlier, Selma, Orange Cove, Fowler, and Sanger, as well as parts of Fresno and Clovis.
The district follows the Highway 99 corridor, stretching east along Highway 180 and south along Highway 41, connecting small rural towns to the city of Fresno.
It is a culturally rich and economically vital region where Latino, Hmong, Sikh, Black, and Middle Eastern families live and work side by side. Shared concerns in these communities include immigrant rights, affordable housing, education, and reliable transportation.
This is a majority Latino district, with Latinos making up about 63.8 percent of the population according to 2023 census data.
The district includes roughly 150,000 households and remains protected under the Voting Rights Act to ensure fair representation.
As of October 2025, there are 229,000 registered voters in AD 31. Democrats account for 43.42 percent, Republicans 24.10 percent, and No Party Preference voters 23.72 percent. About 13,744 veterans call this district home, many of them employed in agriculture, logistics, and local government.
Though the seat has long been safely Democratic, voting patterns across Fresno County have trended more conservative in recent years.
AD 31 is one of the most economically challenged districts in the state.
The median household income is about $56,000, and more than half of residents, about 51.9 percent, are renters. The median rent is $1,100 a month, a relatively modest figure by California standards but high compared with local wages. Nearly 28 percent of residents rely on food assistance programs, a measure of how tight household budgets remain even for working families.
For families across the Valley, the cost of housing, food, and transportation defines the struggle to remain stable in a region that powers the state’s economy but rarely sees its prosperity shared equally.
Assemblymember Joaquin Arambula, a Democrat and emergency room physician, has represented the district since winning a 2016 special election. Born and raised in the San Joaquin Valley, Arambula is the son of former Assemblymember and Fresno County Supervisor Juan Arambula, who held the same seat from 2004 to 2010.
Before entering politics, Joaquin Arambula worked as an emergency room physician at Adventist Medical Center in Selma. He earned his bachelor’s degree from Bowdoin College in Maine and his medical degree from the University of Minnesota Duluth. He lives in Fresno with his wife, Elizabeth, and their three daughters.
In Sacramento, Arambula became known for his focus on health care access, early childhood development, and protections for immigrants. He led California’s efforts to expand Medi-Cal access regardless of immigration status.
In 2020, he was selected to lead the Assembly’s informal business-friendly New Democrats caucus but stepped down several months later after casting a decisive vote in favor of expanding family leave.
In July 2023, Assembly Speaker Robert Rivas removed him from the Assembly’s health committee after Arambula discussed challenging Rivas for the leadership seat earlier in the year.
Because his service began mid-term in 2016, an additional term would exceed California’s 12-year legislative limit, and he will leave office in 2026. Arambula has filed to run for a Fresno City Council seat in 2026.
The race to replace him has quickly become one of the most competitive contests in the Central Valley. Two Democrats, Fresno City Councilmember Annalisa Perea and nonprofit executive Sandra Celedon, have declared their candidacies, along with one Republican, retired county engineer Jim Polsgrove.
Annalisa Perea, the daughter and granddaughter of Mexican American farmworkers and railroad workers, and the sister of former Assemblymember Henry T. Perea, represents District 1 on the Fresno City Council and comes from one of the region’s best-known political families.
She has built her career on housing, infrastructure, and community redevelopment, particularly in Fresno’s urban core. Perea has a degree in City and Regional Planning from Cal Poly San Luis Obispo and has spent her career as an urban planner. Perea is the city's first openly gay council member.
Perea entered the race with strong name recognition and substantial early fundraising success, collecting more than $306,000 for the cycle and finishing midyear with about $257,000 in cash on hand. She has been endorsed by Attorney General Rob Bonta, the Fresno City Employees Association, and SEIU.
Sandra Celedon, president and CEO of Fresno Building Healthy Communities, is a longtime nonprofit leader and community advocate. She has spent years working on housing equity, public health, and youth programs and has earned endorsements from Assemblymember Joaquin Arambula and former Assemblymembers Sarah Reyes and Juan Arambula.
Celedon highlights her involvement in local initiatives, such as Measure P, which funds Fresno’s parks, arts, and trails. Her website says she worked to bring in $70 million in state funds to transform Fresno, which included $17 million to construct a Fresno City College campus in Southwest Fresno and create hundreds of jobs.
Her campaign has also been endorsed by the California Working Families Party.
Celedon has raised nearly $109,000 for her campaign and ended midyear with $95,000 on hand. Her campaign reflects a progressive vision rooted in grassroots engagement and neighborhood empowerment.
Republican candidate Jim Polsgrove is a retired senior engineering technician for Fresno County. He was born in Fresno and grew up on a small ranch.
He was a member of the Fresno County GOP committee, the Republican National Hispanic Assembly, and the Fresno County California Republican Assembly. He was also the Vice President of the NRA Members Council of the Central Valley.
He is campaigning on a platform of lowering taxes, reducing crime, and bringing common sense to Sacramento.
Polsgrove has contributed $25,000 of his own funds to his campaign. He reported raising a total of $25,050 and finished the period with about $22,000 cash on hand.
He’s been endorsed by actor and comedian Rob Schneider.
While Republicans face a steep climb here, Polsgrove’s entry signals an effort to test whether the district’s slow rightward movement might open the door to new competition.
Sanger City Councilmember Esmeralda Hurtado, the sister of State Senator Melissa Hurtado, briefly entered the race before withdrawing to pursue a run for the 14th Senate District instead.
Between 2020 and 2024, this assembly district swung 17 points toward the right in presidential voting, moving from a 30-point Biden margin to a 13-point Harris margin. That swing, in a place where one of four voters has refused to affiliate with either major political party, has caught the attention of strategists from across the political spectrum.
Source note: This article draws on publicly available information from the California Secretary of State’s voter registration database, CalMatters, the California Target Book, Ballotpedia, California FPPC campaign finance filings, candidate websites, and reporting from local news outlets.