Republican Max Hsia and about a dozen of his South Bay Patriots group gathered in the San Jose parking lot of Bass Pro Shops, donned their red MAGA hats, hung their “No on Prop 50” signs on a pop-up tent and tried to encourage a Charlie Kirk-style “Prove Me Wrong” debate with passers-by.

Republican Max Hsia, who opposes Prop 50 that would redraw five California congressional districts to favor Democrats, holds a Charlie Kirk-style “prove me wrong” booth in the parking lot of a Bass Pro Shops in San Jose, hoping to entice supporters of the measure to debate him, on Oct. 14, 2025. (Dai Sugano/Bay Area News Group) 

That’s not what they got with Evangelina Zavala. Instead, she pulled her Subaru SUV into a nearby parking slot, rolled down her windows and blasted the hip hop protest song, “(Expletive) Donald Trump.”

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Hsia approached her. “We do have a microphone if you’d like to speak your piece and share your thoughts,” he said.

“You guys can share your thoughts,” she said, “I share my music.”

With only one statewide measure on the Nov. 4 special election ballot, partisans are squaring off across the Bay Area. Despite more than $100 million spent on the ballot fight so far, however, many are tuning out.

Proposition 50 would temporarily redraw the boundaries of California’s 52 congressional districts to help Democrats flip five of the nine seats now held by Republicans, a Democratic countermove to a Republican-led effort in Texas. But none of those five targeted districts are in the heavily Democratic Bay Area, where its impact is less personal.

Swing Left volunteer Susan Brooks waits for a response at the door of a home while canvassing for support for Proposition 50 in Berkeley, CA on Sunday, October 19, 2025. The only statewide measure on the ballot, Prop 50 moves five congressional seats to favor Democrats in response to Texas Republicans doing the same in their state to keep control of the House. (Don Feria for Bay Area News Group) 

Partisans like Hsia and Zavala are fired up. So is Democratic volunteer Debbie Raucher of Oakland, who’s been spending weekends knocking on doors to encourage Yes on 50 votes, and Republicans in San Jose like Carol Pefley who hang “No on 50” banners over freeway overpasses during rush hour. But across the Bay Area, others are barely tuning in.

In a region where locals are most concerned about sky-high housing prices and budget-busting groceries, keeping up with an interstate political battle can seem irrelevant. In the Bass Pro Shops parking lot, the only shopper who took the mic was a man who wanted to debate the legacy of the slain conservative activist Kirk rather than Proposition 50.

When Menlo College Professor Melissa Michelson asked her Politics 150 class in San Mateo County last week about what’s on the Nov. 4 ballot, most of her students “tried to look invisible.”

“They don’t see how this affects their life. It just seems like stupid politics,” Michelson said. “And I think that is a huge problem for the Prop. 50 proponents.”

To Zavala, however, a sixth-generation Californian, it’s all about her opposition to President Trump. The 38-year-old mother has a planned trip to San Diego with her school-age son, but she’s nervous that she might be profiled and apprehended by federal ICE agents near the Mexican border.

“I’m taking my mother, who’s a little bit lighter-skinned than me, because I’m afraid,” she said. “I have a passport, I’m college educated, I’m taking birth certificates when we go down there because who knows, right?”

Pro-Prop 50 videos coursing through social media are tapping into that fear. Former President Barack Obama, for instance, narrates a commercial over images of ICE agent crackdowns, saying, “Democracy is on the ballot.” Meanwhile, former Republican California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, who had championed the state’s voter-approved independent redistricting commission, calls the measure “insane” and “a big mistake.”

Santa Clara County Republican Party Chair David Johnson, top left, and Santa Clara County Democratic Party Chair Bill James, top right, debate at the Almaden Valley Community Association in San Jose, Calif., on Monday, Oct. 13, 2025. They debated Proposition 50 and Measure A. At far left is a doctored photograph of Governor Gavin Newsom, who is a supporter of Proposition 50. (Nhat V. Meyer/Bay Area News Group) 

In a state that voted overwhelmingly for former Vice President Kamala Harris over Donald Trump in the 2024 presidential election — a nearly 60-40 split — Democrats have a huge advantage. A recent poll conducted by the nonpartisan Cook Political Report found that 50% of registered voters supported Proposition 50 compared with 35% opposed. Still, nearly half of those were either soft on their position or undecided.

The ballot measure is part of an ongoing national congressional redistricting battle heating up ahead of the 2026 midterm elections. How those districts are drawn can shape the outcome, stoking accusations of gerrymandering — drawing district boundaries to advantage one party over another.

Since 2011, California’s Citizens Redistricting Commission has redrawn congressional lines after the 10-year Census indicates population shifts. Six other states have similar systems, while in most others, including Texas, lawmakers redraw the boundaries.

The U.S. Supreme Court in 2019 ruled that partisan gerrymandering is beyond the federal courts’ jurisdiction. But it is now reviewing a section of The Voting Rights Act that bans gerrymandering intended to dilute the voting power of racial minorities. If justices overturn it — perhaps as early as January — voting rights groups say it could heavily favor Republican congressional districts, especially in the South.

President Trump called for Texas lawmakers to change the Congressional lines before the 2026 midterm elections to help Republicans maintain their majority. Republicans say they’re countering aggressive blue-state gerrymandering that already gives Democrats outsized congressional representation relative to their statewide vote share, even in independently drawn California.

“California has 40% conservative voters and only 17% representation in Congress,” said Pefley, who is running for state Assembly and attended a debate on the proposition in San Jose. “If Prop. 50 passes, we’ll have 7% representation for 40% of the population, and that is not a constitutional republic. A constitutional republic is supposed to be representative of the people. And right now, California is not.”

Proposition 50 essentially began as a bluff. Democratic U.S. Rep. Zoe Lofgren from the South Bay said the threat was intended to deter Texas from going through with its mid-decade change, since California would neutralize its Republican gains.

The Yes on 50 campaign, which Gov. Gavin Newsom is pushing to adopt temporary, gerrymandered congressional districts in California. (AP Photo/Godofredo A. Vásquez) 

When it didn’t, California — led by Trump antagonist and potential presidential candidate Gov. Gavin Newsom — steamed ahead as well. If the proposition passes, the new congressional districts will be in place for the 2026, 2028 and 2030 elections. California’s independent redistricting commission would resume its work after the 2030 Census.

For some Bay Area voters, the political gamesmanship has overshadowed what they really care about — the high cost of living here, from housing to gas to groceries.

A poll by the San Francisco-based Latino Community Foundation in late September showed that 46% of Latino voters planned to vote yes on Proposition 50, and 29% were still undecided. In California, the Democratic Party has generally won over the Latino community. Two-thirds of them voted for Harris over Trump in November.

Max Hsia waves flags as he protests against Proposition 50 and Measure A on the Samaritan Crossing pedestrian bridge over Highway 85 in San Jose, Calif., on Wednesday evening, Oct. 15, 2025. (Nhat V. Meyer/Bay Area News Group) 

“But something that we’ve seen in recent years is an increase in the number of independents not loyal to any political party,” said Christian Arana from the Latino Community Foundation. “If our data is showing that 29% are undecided, these are winnable votes. It’s going to require contact and investment and education because in the midst of all the many problems that we’re facing as Californians, this is not something that is top of mind for many people.”

Hsia, who sponsored the rally at the Bass Pro Shops and also organizes freeway overpass rallies with Pefley, said he’s happy when he gets a toot of a horn during rush hour — a sign he hopes means the motorist agrees that Proposition 50 is a bad idea.

In Oakland, Raucher says she often encounters people as she canvases door-to-door who are unaware of the measure, and some are initially uncomfortable with the idea of redrawing congressional lines specifically to favor one party.

Each time, she explains that “these are not normal times,” she said. “What I always say to them is unprecedented times call for unprecedented actions.”