Your guide to the race for California’s 19th Congressional District
Six candidates are trying to unseat incumbent Jimmy Panetta to lead California’s 19th Congressional District.
San Luis Obispo County is split between two congressional districts — Districts 19 and 24, currently represented by Democrats Panetta and Salud Carbajal, respectively.
SLO County’s districts were unaffected by the redrawing of the state’s congressional districts after the passing of Prop. 50.
The candidates running against Panetta range from business owners, to a professor, a landscape contractor and a software engineer. A total of seven candidates have qualified to compete in the congressional election.
The primary will be held on June 2 in California. The top two vote-getters will make it onto the November ballot.
Here’s what to know about the congressional race:
Where is the district?
The L-shaped district spans from south San Jose in Santa Clara County, running into Santa Cruz and down the Monterey County coastline.
It also stretches into northern SLO County, including Cambria, Paso Robles, Templeton and Atascadero.
Who are the candidates?
Panetta has represented the 19th Congressional District since 2017. Now in his fifth term in Congress, he serves as the chief deputy whip and sits on the House Committee on Ways and Means and House Committee on the Budget.
He previously served as an intelligence officer in the U.S. Navy and worked as a deputy district attorney in Monterey County.
Fellow Democrat Sean Dougherty lives in Santa Cruz and works as a software engineer. He was an activist during the Occupy Wall Street movement and was a part of the advisory group Santa Cruz for Bernie.
Republican Tuka Gafari earned a bachelor’s degree in computer science from Chico State University. He previously worked for Apple, Yahoo and Sun Microsystems, according to the SLO County Republican Party’s website.
Republican Peter Verbica is a managing director at the money management firm, Silicon Private Wealth. In 2022, he ran for California’s State Board of Equalization District 2 and lost with around 30% of the vote. He’s running as a “common sense, fiscally conservative” candidate, his campaign website said.
Tech entrepreneur and libertarian Lars Mapstead, grew up in a barn in Big Sur and founded several startup companies, including FriendFinder Networks. He ran for president as a libertarian in 2024, according to his campaign website.
Ana Luz Acevedo-Cabrera, an adjunct professor at Hartnell college, is not affiliated with any political party. She currently serves on the board of the Monterey County Free Libraries Foundation and CHISPA Housing, a nonprofit housing developer.
35-year-old Thomas Coxe is running with no party affiliation. He lives in Watsonville and works as a landscape contractor.
Who is funding the race?
Panetta raised nearly $1.6 million in campaign contributions throughout 2025, according to the Federal Election Commission’s website.
Panetta received more than $175,000 from ActBlue, a Democratic Party PAC, and more than $84,000 from the American Israel Public Affair’s Committee PAC, according to 2025 campaign finance records.
Financial services firm Janney Montgomery Scott contributed nearly $19,000 to his campaign, while the Wine and Spirits Wholesalers of America’s PAC and the National Cattlemen’s Beef Association PAC each donated $10,000.
Verbica has collected more than $38,000 in campaign contributions, mostly from individual donors.
Dougherty has primarily self-funded his campaign through more than $43,000 in personal loans.
No recent campaign finance data was available for Acevedo-Cabrera, Coxe, Gafari or Mapstead, according to the Federal Election Commission.
Who else is supporting the candidates?
Panetta has earned endorsements from Congressmembers Carbajal, Sam Liccardo, Zoe Lofgren and Ro Khanna, as well as Assemblymembers Robert Rivas, Patrick Ahrens, Dawn Addis, Ash Kalra and Gail Pellerin.
State Sens. John Laird and Dave Cortese have also endorsed him, along with the entire Monterey, Santa Cruz and Santa Clara counties’ Boards of Supervisors. SLO County Supervisors Bruce Gibson, Dawn Ortiz-Legg and Jimmy Paulding have also backed Panetta.
Dougherty has been endorsed by several Santa Cruz organizations, including Santa Cruz for Bernie, Sunrise Santa Cruz and the Democratic Socialists of America Central Coast.
Verbica has received endorsements from Jessica Patterson, former chair of the California Republican Party; California Congress of Republicans President Mark Hershey; and Monterey County Republican Party Chair David Drew.
Mapstead has been endorsed by the Libertarian Party of California.
No endorsement information was available from the three other candidates in the race.
This story was originally published April 15, 2026 at 5:00 AM with the headline "Your guide to the race for California’s 19th Congressional District."
