Nearly an hour into a fundraiser in a tidy gated community just outside Palm Springs in late May, a soft-spoken Lisa Middleton — who could become California’s first out transgender state lawmaker if elected in November — acknowledged her historic run for office matter of factly and without fanfare.
It wasn’t until after she addressed pedestrian safety, public transportation, college access and climate change over plates of deviled eggs and sweaty glasses of lemonade in the desert city she once served as mayor that she mentioned her gender identity.
That approach is intentional: A campaign ad released last week omits the Democratic candidate’s potentially groundbreaking election and instead focuses on her ability to work with Republicans on issues like building better roads and creating jobs.
“I’m never going to back away from who I am, but what I’ve consistently tried to do is make it clear that it’s just a part of my identity — it’s not everything,” Middleton told The Times. “And it’s not why I ran for office.”
Identity politics, however, are unavoidable in the competitive race to represent Calfornia’s 19th Senate District as LGBTQ+ advocacy groups and top Democrats rally for Middleton to flip the long-held Republican seat currently held by incumbent Sen. Rosilicie Ochoa Bogh (R-Redlands) who is also running as a “first.”
Since elected to the state Legislature in 2020, Ochoa Bogh, the daughter of Mexican immigrants, has made being the first Republican Latina in the California Senate a key part of her platform, calling it an overlooked demographic that values “family, faith and work ethic.” Among the state’s likely Latino voters, 16% are registered Republicans, according to the Public Policy Institute of California.
“I did not hear my voice as a conservative Latina being spoken,” she said. “People think Republicans are representative of just rich people or Caucasians.”
Ochoa Bogh, 52, is a former teacher, real estate agent and Yucaipa school board member. She sits on the Senate Education and Housing committees and has authored bills signed into law by Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom that support mental health providers and provide free admission to fairs for military personnel.
Middleton, 72, is a longtime Palm Springs City Council member who previously oversaw fraud cases for California’s State Compensation Insurance Fund. Her campaign tenets include creating more affordable housing and demanding accountability for state spending on issues like homelessness.
Both candidates have endorsements of law enforcement agencies and are promising to crack down on crime in a district that struggles with fentanyl overdoses and human trafficking. Both consider themselves pragmatists and say they are more interested in unsexy local government issues and meetings with everyday constituents than political theater.
And both are running campaigns that seek to give a voice to underrepresented Californians in the state Capitol.
But that’s where their similarities appear to end.
Middleton is supporting Kamala Harris for president in November and Ochoa Bogh is supporting Donald Trump. While Middleton has made protecting abortion rights a central part of her campaign, Ochoa Bogh received a 0% score from Planned Parenthood for her legislative record last year and authored a bill that would have mandated that schools teach about antiabortion crisis pregnancy centers. The bill failed to reach the governor’s desk.
For Middleton, who transitioned from male to female 30 years ago and married her wife in 2013, Ocha Bogh’s voting record in the state Senate is personal.
The Republican has opposed bills that bolster gender-affirming healthcare services and shield transgender children and their families from being criminalized for seeking treatment in California. She has abstained from voting at all on bills that affirmed gay marriage rights in the state Constitution and recognized LGBTQ+ Pride month.
One of Ochoa Bogh’s most impassioned speeches on the Senate floor this year came when she stood up to oppose a law that bans schools from requiring teachers to notify parents about student gender identity changes. While Democrats warned that conservative school board rules could out transgender kids who may not be accepted at home, Ochoa Bogh called it “bad policy” and said “the default assumption should always be that parents are acting in the best interests of their children.”
Campaigning in Riverside and San Bernardino counties in a race energized by a newly redrawn district that has brought in thousands of registered Democrats, Middleton has drawn a vast distinction between herself and Ocho Bogh.
“The lies that are being talked about — and they are lies — are ones that I know fundamentally, because I have lived this life,” Middleton said.
Middleton called coming out as transgender “the hardest thing I ever ever had to do” and said she feels fortunate to maintain a relationship with her children and a successful career as others have struggled to find the same acceptance.
“I fought that for a very, very long time,” she said. “Any of us who have ever spent any time in the closet know what it’s like trying to pretend to be something you’re not.”
Ochoa Bogh teared up while talking about transgender suicide rates and said that she has “a lot of compassion and empathy” for the community.
She said her voting record does not make her anti-LGBTQ+, but that she had nuanced reasons for opposing each bill. She voted against the same-sex marriage measure, for instance, because it did not include a carve-out that would ensure churches are not forced to conduct ceremonies they do not support, she said, and she has concerns about medical treatment when it comes to transgender minors.
“We have a right to pursue life, liberty and happiness, whatever that may look like, as long as it doesn’t infringe on someone else’s ability to do the same,” Ochoa Bogh said from the California GOP headquarters in Sacramento last month. “I would never do anything that would be disrespectful to anyone’s life or choices. We all have family members of that nature.”
The state Senate race is expected to be among the closest legislative competitions this election.
In the March primary election, Ochoa Bogh won 54% of the vote to Middleton’s 46%.
The newly redrawn district combines Republican San Bernadino County strongholds, including parts of the Inland Empire and high desert, with liberal areas of Riverside County such as Palm Springs, and is home to more than half of a million voters.
The district, which once leaned right, is now nearly even when it comes to party preference — with 35% of voters Republican and 36% Democrat, while the remaining percentage is no party preference or other parties. Trump narrowly won the district in 2020 over President Biden.
Nearly half of constituents in the district are now new to Ochoa Bogh, a process she called “demoralizing” but one that has motivated her to hold about 50 town halls.
“I’m very engaged because I do believe that it’s important to be accountable and as transparent as possible with your constituency,” she said.
Each candidate seeks to differentiate themself from the other, while avoiding making their trailblazing roles a distraction.
Pei-Te Lien, a professor at UC Santa Barbara who specializes in the politics of identity, said it can be tricky for politicians to navigate.
She pointed to the presidential campaign of Harris, who could be the first woman and first person of Asian descent to serve as president, but who Lien said has strategically not overemphasized that fact.
“Voters are getting more used to it,” Lien said. “The idea that we can embrace people’s different identities and backgrounds and see them as still equally capable of representing us and speaking for us and understanding our concerns, that certainly is a development — a good development — in terms of politics.”
