On Nov. 3, Eastsiders will decide who fills a plum post: the State Senate District 26 seat. The next occupant could hold the job for up to 12 years.
How we got here
Last year, longtime power broker Maria Elena Durazo announced that she would give up the seat to run for Los Angeles County Supervisor. But in an eight-candidate primary, with approximately 176,000 votes cast, no one came close to a majority. Sara Hernandez finished first and is joined in the runoff by Sarah Rascón.
Candidate breakdown
Hernandez, a former middle school teacher, has a long record of civic engagement. She was a City Hall staffer and helped form the community group DTLA Strong. She works as a housing and environmental attorney, and since 2022 has served as an elected Los Angeles Community College trustee. She previously told The Eastsider that the affordability crisis, particularly with regard to housing, is the biggest issue facing District 26 residents.
El Sereno native and current Glassell Park resident Rascón’s resume includes time working for then-Assemblymember Jimmy Gomez, the Mountains Recreation and Conservation Authority, and most recently, Mayor Karen Bass, where she was director of County and Regional Affairs. According to Rascón’s campaign website, she has served on the East L.A. Planning Commission and been a board member of CicLAvia. The most pressing issue facing the district, she told The Eastsider, is homelessness.
About the District
Approximately 943,000 people live in the district, which covers neighborhoods including Boyle Heights, Lincoln Heights, East Los Angeles, Los Feliz, Echo Park, Eagle Rock and Highland Park. Nearly 59% of residents are Latino, according to U.S. Census data.
The district’s household median income of $67,285 trails the countywide level of about $90,000. Nearly 60% of residents are registered Democrats.
Three big backers
Those who have endorsed Hernandez include the Los Angeles County Federation of Labor, newspaper La Opinión and Supervisor Hilda Solis.
Rascón’s backers include outgoing officeholder Durazo, progressive L.A. City Councilmember Eunisses Hernandez and the Planned Parenthood Advocacy Project L.A. County Action Fund.
Money matters
Through Sept. 14, Hernandez had raised approximately $1.12 million via 750 donations (including the primary period), according to the Secretary of State’s fundraising database.
Rascón’s fundraising total is $208,000 through 530 contributions.
Where the candidates stand
Sara Hernandez
What is one specific action you would take to improve the lives of people in Boyle Heights and East LA?
One specific action I would take is to secure dedicated state resources to improve the everyday quality of life in Boyle Heights and East Los Angeles. People deserve to live in neighborhoods that are clean, safe and cared for. That means more frequent bulky-item and illegal-dumping removal, rapid graffiti abatement, cleaner streets and sidewalks, better lighting, repaired sidewalks, more trees and landscaping, and investments that make it safer for children, seniors, and families to walk through their neighborhoods.
I would also support community-led beautification efforts that go beyond government services. Local nonprofits, neighborhood groups, small businesses, artists, and residents already do tremendous work caring for their communities. I want to help expand those efforts through grants and partnerships that support neighborhood cleanups, tree planting, murals, community gardens, and other projects led by the people who know their neighborhoods best. These may sound like basic things, but they have an enormous impact on how people experience their community every day. Working-class communities should not be expected to tolerate conditions that would be unacceptable elsewhere. I will fight to bring resources home and work alongside the community to make Boyle Heights and East LA cleaner, safer, greener, and more beautiful places to live and raise a family.
Many families in our community include immigrants and mixed-status households. What specific policies will you support to protect immigrant residents?
As an immigration attorney, I have provided pro bono legal support to asylum seekers, worked with people inside immigration detention centers, and helped young immigrants protect their DACA status. I have seen firsthand the fear families experience when our immigration system threatens to tear them apart. In the State Senate, I will fight to protect immigrant families from ICE overreach and ensure California resources are not used to carry out federal immigration enforcement. I will work to strengthen protections at sensitive locations such as schools, hospitals, and courthouses, while ensuring that personal information and other sensitive data about citizens and legal residents are kept confidential by state and local agencies.
I will also fight to make sure immigration status never prevents families from obtaining the services they need. That means fighting to protect the access of citizens and lawful permanent residents to programs like Medi-Cal as well as immigration legal services. It also means fighting to allow students to attend school and college without fear of immigration consequences to themselves or their families. CA cannot fix the broken federal immigration system, but we can use all the available tools to protect our communities, defend due process, and keep ensuring that families from Boyle Heights to East LA and all over the District can live, work, learn, and get treated in the hospital without the fear of them or their loved ones being torn apart. We need comprehensive immigration reform with a path to citizenship for all.
Boyle Heights and East LA have long experienced environmental challenges, including air pollution and industrial activity. What will you do to improve environmental health in our communities?
For too long, families in Boyle Heights and East Los Angeles have carried an unfair share of our region’s pollution. Families living near freeways, warehouses, industrial facilities, and freight corridors should not have to sacrifice their health because of where they live. The Lineage fire made that injustice impossible to ignore. Families endured smoke, odors, pests, and uncertainty for months. California has since enacted new protections to strengthen emergency response and hold corporations accountable when environmental disasters harm communities.
I will build on those protections and fight to make sure another community never has to endure what Boyle Heights did. In the State Senate, I will fight pollution at the source by expanding zero-emission infrastructure for trucks and freight, strengthening protections for neighborhoods near warehouses and industrial facilities, improving air-quality monitoring, and enforcing our existing clean-air laws. Environmental justice also means investing in communities that have historically received the least. I will fight to expand parks, trees, and green space, with a goal of increasing the number of residents who live within a 10-minute walk of a park or plaza from 65% to 80%. Clean air and green space are not luxuries. They are basic rights, and the communities that have carried the greatest environmental burden should be first in line for investment and protection.
What else will you promise to people in the community?
Boyle Heights and East Los Angeles will never be an afterthought in my office. Boyle Heights and East LA have contributed greatly to LA’s culture, economy and identity. Working-class families and individuals in these communities deserve the same basic investments as other communities in order to live dignified lives and remain in the communities where they have worked hard to build. I will be continuing to fight to allow working-class families to stay and thrive in the communities they have worked hard to help build.
In particular, I will continue to fight to:
1) Protect renters from unfairly being evicted from their homes; 2) Develop and create more affordable housing opportunities as well as means to purchase a home; 3) Support small businesses as well as the hundreds of street vendors; 4) Create safer streets and provide quality public spaces for the community to enjoy; and 5) Ensure that our K-12 schools and community colleges are preparing students to secure high-paying, union jobs.
My promise is that my office will be consistently accessible. We will work with many of the local organizations and with many of the community leaders that you trust. I want to make sure that my office is providing the best possible services to you in the language that you speak and that you can hold me accountable for the work that we’re doing. As a State Senator, I’ll fight to defend the interests of working people who are being priced out of the California dream. Boyle Heights and East LA will always have a seat at the table with me.
Sarah Rascón
What is one specific action you would take to improve the lives of people in Boyle Heights and East LA?
We have unfortunately become all too familiar with the disaster of the Lineage Logistics warehouse fire. The smell of rotten, spoiled food still lingers in a neighborhood still dealing with decades of what the Exide battery plant left behind. I’ve spoken with families in this district, exhausted from being told to wait for a cleanup order while their kids breathe in toxins. We can’t afford to wait for solutions.
I’d introduce legislation that holds corporations accountable in real time and make necessary adjustments to insurance for accidental, natural disasters and chemical fires. I’d implement mandatory community accountability standards for industrial and warehouse operators, including accounting for the presumption of illnesses that may arise after a disaster. We need real enforcement, real penalties, and residents to have a voice when these companies put their health at risk. I also know this firsthand. I grew up in El Sereno, having had asthma since childhood; we were only a few minutes from Boyle Heights; I was raised by my grandmother in a home with poor air quality and the energy bills were too high. It’s part of why I’ve spent my whole career fighting for climate justice and working in public service. Boyle Heights and East LA have carried this burden for generations. It’s time the companies causing the harm paid for it, not the families who never had a say.
Many families in our community include immigrants and mixed-status households. What specific policies will you support to protect immigrant residents?
Boyle Heights and East LA are home to many mixed-status families like the one that raised me. My childhood in El Sereno taught me how fear of enforcement shapes daily life. People feared who went to the doctor, who picked their kids up from school, and who answered the door. I strongly support California’s sanctuary laws and will fight to defend them against federal attacks. There should be strict limits on any collaboration between local law enforcement and ICE, and state agencies should never share data with federal immigration authorities.
I support prohibiting hospitals, schools, and other public institutions from cooperating with ICE, so families can access care and education without fear. Like current sitting State Senator María Elena Durazo, I’ll fight to ensure immigrant families have tenant protections and that we maintain and expand full-scope Medi-Cal regardless of immigration status, because no one should be denied care because of where they were born. I support expanding state investment in immigrant legal defense, know-your-rights education, and rapid response networks, so families facing detention or enforcement have real resources when they need them most.
When ICE raids hit Los Angeles, I joined community patrols, worked with rapid response networks, and helped distribute food and resources to families too afraid to leave their homes. As State Senator, I’ll bring that same urgency to Sacramento for families across this district.
Boyle Heights and East LA have long experienced environmental challenges, including air pollution and industrial activity. What will you do to improve environmental health in our communities?
Air pollution in Boyle Heights and East LA stems from years of being under-resourced, fragmented infrastructure, lack of green space, freight trucks moving through industrial corridors, warehouses packed into residential blocks, and decades of underinvestment in basics like tree canopy that protects people against heat and smog.
As the former Deputy Executive Officer for Environmental Equity at the MRCA, I secured federal funding for environmental protection and green jobs in working-class neighborhoods and helped shape the LA River alongside community members. I know what it takes to make plans a reality, and I’ll bring that experience to Sacramento. I’ll push for stronger air quality enforcement, including monitoring and mitigation requirements for new or expanded facilities, so we prevent pollution before it harms residents. I’ll also fight for equity, focusing on neighborhoods with the least canopy cover. I’ll work to end oil and gas subsidies and reinvest that money into rooftop solar, EV charging, and neighborhood microgrids, so families here see the benefits of the clean energy transition.
Funding for toxic cleanups also needs to include current environmental crises in the area, including contaminated soil and incidents like the Lineage Logistics warehouse fire. Too often, cleanup funds only come after years of delay and red tape. I’ll fight to get that funding to residents faster, so communities aren’t left waiting for relief they’ve already earned.
What else will you promise to people in the community?
I’ll be a State Senator who keeps showing up. I’ve spent my career in the communities that comprise Senate District 26 and have listened to residents and found actionable solutions for our problems. I’ll fight for a housing agenda that helps working families by reforming outdated zoning to allow more affordable, multi-family housing near transit and job centers, protecting tenants from displacement, and ensuring any new development is built with fair, skilled union labor. I’ll push to expand access to healthcare, including full-scope Medi-Cal and more behavioral health and primary care providers in neighborhoods that have often not had access to healthcare in the past. And access to care shouldn’t depend on your income or your immigration status.
I’ll also fight for career pathways, not just college degrees. Our community should have union apprenticeships and workforce training that let people build a stable life without leaving the neighborhood that raised them. And I’ll always keep my door open. I know Sacramento can feel disconnected from Boyle Heights and East LA. I won’t let that happen. I’ll keep coming to community meetings, listening sessions, and events.
