Election 2026 · State of California

California Assembly District 54

Published September 29, 2026 · Updated October 2, 2026

Alexandra Briseno and Mark Gonzalez (incumbent) are the candidates for California Assembly District 54 on the November 3, 2026 ballot.

The State Assembly is one of the two houses of the California Legislature, which holds the state's lawmaking power. The Assembly has 80 members. Its members write and vote on state laws and, with the Senate, pass the state budget, which the Constitution requires by June 15 each year.

Summary by CityHallPass, not the official text or legal advice. The official text controls: LA County's official election information.

What it means for the City of LA

About 76% of the district's voting precincts and half its land are in the City of Los Angeles, including Downtown, Boyle Heights, Koreatown, Westlake, Pico-Union and Lincoln Heights. The rest is Montebello, Commerce and Vernon. State laws bind the City, and the state budget funds programs the City runs. Example: state law requires the City to plan housing for all income levels and update that plan on a set schedule (Government Code sections 65580 and 65588).

Primary results, June 2, 2026

Gonzalez was the only candidate printed on the ballot. Briseno ran as a write-in and finished second, so both advanced to November 3. Total votes: 48,888. Certified results

The candidates

The job

Powers. The California Constitution gives the state’s lawmaking power to the Legislature, which is the Senate plus the 80-member Assembly (art. IV, sec. 1). A bill needs a majority of each house to pass (art. IV, sec. 8). The Legislature can override a Governor’s veto with two-thirds of each house (art. IV, sec. 10). Tax increases need two-thirds of each house (art. XIII A, sec. 3). The Legislature can put constitutional amendments on the ballot by a two-thirds vote of each house (art. XVIII, sec. 1). Five of the 14 statewide measures on this ballot (Props 1, 2, 4, 5 and 43) were placed there by the Legislature (Secretary of State voter guide).

Budget. The Legislature must pass the budget bill by midnight on June 15, and a majority vote is enough (art. IV, sec. 12). CalMatters reported that the 2026-27 budget deal totaled $352 billion. It added taxes, including a sales tax on some computer software, and gave counties $900 million for homelessness (CalMatters).

The district.

• About 504,000 people live in the 54th District. The Census Bureau’s 2020-2024 survey estimates the population as 64% Latino, 21% Asian, 8% white and 5% Black, with a median household income of $57,939 (Census Reporter).
• LAist describes it as including Montebello, Boyle Heights, downtown LA and Koreatown. Voter registration is 56.2% Democratic, 24.5% no party preference and 12.5% Republican (LAist).
• Of the district’s 1,069 LA County voting precincts, 813 are in the City of LA, 205 in Montebello, 45 in Commerce and 4 in Vernon (County Registrar precinct map).
• City neighborhoods, by share of the district’s land (Neighborhood Council map): Boyle Heights (14%), Wilshire Center-Koreatown (6%), Downtown (5%), Pico-Union (4%), Lincoln Heights (4%), Historic Cultural North, which includes Chinatown (3%), Arts District-Little Tokyo (2%), plus parts of Rampart Village, Westlake, MacArthur Park, Echo Park and Olympic Park.
• City Council districts, by share of land (Council district map): CD 14 (Ysabel Jurado, 24%), CD 1 (Eunisses Hernandez, 13%), CD 10 (Heather Hutt, 7%) and CD 13 (Hugo Soto-Martinez, 5%). About half the district’s land is outside the City, much of it industrial Vernon and Commerce.
• Land shares come from laying the County’s Assembly district map over the City’s Neighborhood Council and Council district maps. They measure area, not people.

Records

Mark Gonzalez

Office and roles. Gonzalez was first elected in November 2024 and is Majority Whip (Assembly biography). His standing committees are Appropriations, Health, Public Safety, Rules, and Utilities and Energy. He also sits on select committees including the 2028 Olympic and Paralympic Games and Downtown Recovery (committee page).

Bills, 2025-26 session. The Legislature’s bill data lists Gonzalez as a lead author of the final version of 42 bills, alone or jointly; resolutions are left out. He co-led five of them with another lead author: AB 592 (Gabriel), AB 698 (Wicks), AB 1487 (Addis), AB 1646 (Bryan) and AB 1690 (Ahrens). As of the Oct 1, 2026 data file, after the Governor’s Sept 30 deadline to act on bills (art. IV, sec. 10), 25 had become law, 3 were vetoed and 14 did not pass (bill data; Governor’s Sept 30 update). The Eastsider reported the Governor signed 10 of his bills in 2025 (The Eastsider).

• Laws include AB 476 (metal theft), AB 543 (Medi-Cal “street medicine” for homeless patients), AB 688 (the Telehealth for All Act), AB 630 (abandoned RVs), AB 770 (an exemption for advertising displays under a City of LA ordinance), AB 1487 (a Two-Spirit, Transgender, Gender Nonconforming and Intersex Wellness and Equity Fund; led by Assemblymember Dawn Addis, with Gonzalez as joint lead author), AB 1920 (community college fee waivers, with Assemblymember Patrick Ahrens) and AB 2541 (a Lowrider license plate).
• Vetoed earlier: AB 554 (coverage of HIV antiretroviral drugs) and AB 574 (prior authorization for physical therapy).
• Signed Sept 27 to 29: AB 817 on cold storage facilities, written after the Boyle Heights Lineage warehouse fire, signed Sept 27 (Governor’s office); AB 2332 on dual language immersion coordinators, signed Sept 27 (Governor’s office); and AB 2152 on environmental review for local fire stations, signed Sept 29 (Governor’s office). AB 1646 on visits at juvenile facilities, led by Assemblymember Isaac Bryan with Gonzalez as joint lead author, was signed Sept 27 (Governor’s office).
• Vetoed Sept 30, 2026: AB 1896, with Speaker Robert Rivas as joint lead author, which his office said would bar people who took part in certain immigration enforcement from public jobs (release; veto message).
• Signed Sept 30, 2026: AB 1941 on organized copper wire theft (Governor’s office); AB 2418 (private review of nonresidential building permits) and AB 1679 (a local pop-up small business program) (Governor’s office); and AB 1645 (the HUGS Act on prison visits), AB 1837 (camera enforcement of parking violations), AB 647 (abandoned RVs) and AB 1607 (emergency medical services) (Governor’s office).

Key floor votes. From the Assembly’s recorded votes:

Source: Assembly floor vote records on leginfo, linked for each bill above.

Before the Legislature. His office says that before his election, while he chaired the Los Angeles County Democratic Party, he helped lead the fight for the 2022 state constitutional amendment protecting abortion rights and organized for the 2023 law setting a $25 minimum wage for health care workers (Assembly biography).

Ethics and court records. The FPPC lists no enforcement case or penalty against him. No City Ethics Commission orders or State Bar license matching him were found. Results for “Mark Gonzalez” in FEC enforcement records could not be tied to him (searched Oct. 1, 2026). The Assembly Legislative Ethics Committee posts no complaint decisions. No court case naming him as a party was found in CourtListener federal dockets and opinions or in web searches of Justia and PacerMonitor (searched Oct. 1, 2026).

Alexandra Briseno

Career and record. No occupation, public office or career information was found. She has no ballot designation (certified list). Cal-Access lists a committee, Briseno for Assembly 2026, with no reports in the Sept 29 data.

Ethics and court records. No complaints or enforcement actions that can be tied to her were found in FPPC, City Ethics Commission or FEC records (FEC searched Oct. 1, 2026), and no license in her name at the State Bar. No court case naming her as a party was found in CourtListener federal dockets and opinions or in web searches of Justia and PacerMonitor (searched Oct. 1, 2026).

Where they stand

Neither candidate’s answers to the Southern California News Group’s 2026 questionnaire were found, and Briseno has no website or public statements on record. Gonzalez’s entries come from bills he wrote.

On the other ballot measures

State propositions are listed in the Secretary of State’s voter guide. For measures the Legislature placed on the ballot, the incumbent’s floor vote is shown. A vote to place a measure on the ballot is not the same as an endorsement.

Source: measure titles from the Secretary of State’s voter guide; floor votes linked in each row.

Endorsements

Mark Gonzalez

From his endorsement page, checked Sept 29, 2026:

• Party: California Democratic Party, plus the Asian Democrats of Los Angeles County, Avance Democratic Club, Northeast Democratic Club and Stonewall Young Democrats (endorsement page).
• Unions: the California Federation of Labor Unions, the LA County Federation of Labor, the SEIU California State Council, the Western States Regional Council of Carpenters, ILWU Locals 13, 63 and 94, the California Teachers Association, the California Federation of Teachers, the California Faculty Association, CSEA, AFSCME District Council 36, UDW/AFSCME Local 3930 and PECG (endorsement page).
• Organizations: Planned Parenthood Advocacy Project LA County Action Fund, California YIMBY, Sierra Club California, Pilipino Action Center and California State Retirees (endorsement page).
• Newspapers: The LA Times endorsed him in October 2024, in his first race (LA Times). No 2026 editorial endorsement was found.

Alexandra Briseno

None found. The California Republican Party’s 2026 endorsement list does not include Assembly District 54 (CAGOP).

Polls

No public polls of this race were found.

Money

Source: Form 460 summary pages in the Cal-Access bulk data, downloaded Sept 29, 2026: Gonzalez committee, latest report, July 1 to Sept 19, 2026, first 2025 report, with the transfers, late contribution reports; Briseno committee. The Assembly contribution limit for 2025-26 is $5,900 per person per election (FPPC).

Who is giving

Method: itemized contributions (money and in-kind) on Gonzalez’s Form 460s from Jan 1, 2025, plus late contribution reports filed after the last Form 460 (Cal-Access contributions). A donor is a normalized name plus ZIP code for people, or a normalized name for organizations. A ZIP counts as City of LA if at least half its area is in the City.

Mark Gonzalez. 411 donors gave $1,388,807 in itemized contributions: 115 people and 296 organizations. Organizations gave 89% of the money. Eighty-six donors gave at least one $5,900 maximum gift, totaling $791,580 (57.0%). Donors giving under $250 in total gave 0.2% (Cal-Access contributions).

Source: Cal-Access contributions to Mark Gonzalez for Assembly 2026, grouped by donor type.

• Geography. 14.9% of itemized dollars came from City of LA ZIP codes, 10.6% from the rest of LA County, 52.3% from elsewhere in California and 22.2% from out of state. Among individual donors, 37.1% of dollars came from the City (Cal-Access contributions).
• Largest donors. The Association of California School Administrators PAC, the United Domestic Workers Action Fund and SEIU Local 1000 each gave $23,600. The Los Angeles Police Protective League PAC gave $17,700 and the California State Association of Electrical Workers PAC $12,500. Airbnb, Comcast, the Central City Association PAC, the Doctors Company PAC, the LGBT Caucus Leadership Fund, the Pechanga and Morongo tribes and the Southern California Pipe Trades each gave $11,800 (Cal-Access contributions).
• Real estate and development: 8 donors, $25,500 (1.8%), including the California Business Properties Association PAC ($11,800), the Realtors’ CREPAC ($6,000) and NAIOP SoCal’s PAC ($5,000) (Cal-Access contributions).
• Lobbying interests. 53 donor organizations, giving $247,830, are registered state lobbyist employers (Cal-Access lobbying). Two individual donors, giving $3,500 in total, match registered state lobbyists by name and firm (Cal-Access lobbying). Six match City of LA registered lobbyists by name and firm, giving $5,500 (City lobbyist registry).
• Clusters. No group of five or more donors from one employer within three days was found.

Outside spending

Source: Form 496 reports in Cal-Access: Issues and Advocacy Committee, State Candidate Committee. No outside spending for or against Briseno was found. The County party committees’ top funders are listed on the 46th District page.

Key moments

Debates and forums

No debates or candidate forums for this race were found.

Events

• Boyle Heights Lineage warehouse fire (summer 2026).
  • What happened: a June 17 fire at a Lineage cold storage warehouse in Boyle Heights, in this district, burned for eight days and was followed by a long cleanup (Governor’s office; LA Times). KTLA reported on air purifiers handed out to residents (KTLA). Sen. María Elena Durazo said residents lived for 84 days beside “88 million pounds of rotting food” (Gonzalez’s office).
  • Gonzalez’s response: he introduced AB 817 with Mayor Bass and Sen. Durazo, and the Governor signed it on Sept 27 (Governor’s office). “This legislation aims to heal a wound,” he said (release).
  • Briseno’s response: none found.