California elections officials say Assemblymember Vince Fong can’t run for Congress in Bakersfield

California’s chief elections officer said late Friday that Bakersfield Republican Vince Fong cannot appear on the ballot for a Central Valley congressional seat because he is already running for reelection to the state Assembly — a decision the state lawmaker vowed to challenge in court.

When Rep. Kevin McCarthy (R-Bakersfield) this month announced his retirement, Fong, 44, said he would stay in his job in the 32nd Assembly District and would not run for Congress. Days later, Fong changed his mind and filed paperwork to enter the race, prompting complaints from other candidates that he was trying to run for two offices at once, which is prohibited by state law, they said.

Fong’s paperwork to run for Congress was “improperly submitted,” the office of Secretary of State Shirley N. Weber said late Friday. The office said Fong “will not appear on the list of certified candidates for Congressional District 20 that our office will transmit to county election officials on candidates on Dec. 28.”

Fong’s campaign released a statement vowing to file a lawsuit “imminently” and calling the secretary of State’s decision an “unprecedented interference in the candidate filing process.”

County elections offices have “full jurisdiction to qualify candidates for the ballot,” while the secretary of State “simply has a ministerial duty to certify the candidate lists and include ALL qualified candidates,” the campaign said.

Fong was sworn in as a candidate for the congressional race Monday at the Kern County Elections Division office in Bakersfield.

“I will fight the Secretary of State’s misguided decision and do whatever it takes to give voters in our community a real choice in this election,” Fong said in a statement.

Jessica Levinson, an election law professor at Loyola Law School, said California is “not at all alone in making a policy choice that candidates should only run for one office at the same time.

“Given that there are a number of state laws that do appear to have bans on running for two different offices in the same election, and California appears to have such a ban, this does seem to be an appropriate decision,” Levinson said.

But, she said, she wondered whether Fong could challenge as outdated a section of the state law that reads: “No person may file nomination papers for a party nomination and an independent nomination for the same office, or for more than one office at the same election.”

In 2010, California voters rewrote the state’s primary system, scrapping party nominations in favor of a system in which the top two vote-getters advance to the general election, regardless of party affiliation.

Fong, 44, has been widely seen as the front-runner in the congressional race and has secured McCarthy’s endorsement. Born and raised in Bakersfield, Fong began his career working for McCarthy’s predecessor, then-Rep. Bill Thomas, then worked for nearly a decade as McCarthy’s district director.

Fong was elected in 2016 to the state Assembly, where he has largely focused on public safety, water and fiscal issues, generally eschewing the culture wars that dominate factions of the GOP. He carried bills attempting to pause a tax on gasoline that funds road repairs and direct money away from high-speed rail, both of which were unsuccessful.

Fong has served as vice chairman of the Assembly budget committee, a perch he has used to advocate for conservative fiscal policies, even though Republicans have little power to influence decisions in the state Capitol.

Fong was the only candidate who filed to run for the 32nd Assembly district seat. The filing deadline for the race was Dec. 8.