Jim Desmond

Running for Representative - District 48 in California

Downloadable Report Card

Supports Health Care Cuts for Southern Californians
Supported the Largest SNAP Cuts in History
Refused to Criticize Trump's Tariffs as Costs Rose for Southern Californians
Backed Trump's War with Iran That Raised Gas Prices for Southern Californians
Defended DOGE While Seniors Lost Social Security Services
Is Ethically Challenged and Uses His Office for Personal Gain
Spread COVID Misinformation While San Diegans Died
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Supports Health Care Cuts for Southern Californians

Jim Desmond cheered on Trump's "Big Beautiful Bill" — a law that strips health coverage from millions of Americans and triggers hundreds of billions in Medicare cuts. Then, as a county supervisor, he voted against even planning for the damage it would do to San Diego.

He celebrated the bill that takes health coverage away from 17 million people. On July 3, 2025 — the day the House passed the "Big Beautiful Bill" — Desmond praised the bill and attacked the sitting Democratic congressman he was then running against, saying his opponent "voted to keep taxes high." The bill would leave at least 17 million Americans without health insurance.
The same bill forces roughly $490 billion in Medicare cuts. The Congressional Budget Office found the bill's deficits would trigger automatic spending cuts, reducing Medicare by roughly $490 billion between 2027 and 2034 unless Congress steps in to stop it. 6.9 million Californians were on Medicare in 2024.
He voted against planning for the damage in his own county. San Diego County's analysis found the bill puts more than $300 million a year at risk — including Medi-Cal, the health coverage low-income San Diegans depend on, plus SNAP, housing and early childhood care. When the Board of Supervisors proposed a subcommittee to prepare for it, Desmond voted no, calling it "political fear-mongering" and an excuse to raise taxes. It passed 3–2 without him.
The leaders who wrote the bill are backing his campaign. Desmond was endorsed in a joint statement from Speaker Mike Johnson, Steve Scalise, Tom Emmer and Lisa McClain — the House leaders who drove the "One Big Beautiful Bill" to passage — and by Trump, whom Desmond thanked while promising to "bring common sense back to California."

Jim Desmond cheered a law that takes health coverage from millions and cuts Medicare by hundreds of billions — then fought his own county's effort to protect San Diegans from it. We deserve better.

Supported the Largest SNAP Cuts in History

In 2024, more than 25,000 households in California's 48th District relied on SNAP to afford groceries. Jim Desmond backed a bill that would cut that help.

In 2024, 25,617 households in California's 48th District — one in every ten — relied on SNAP to afford groceries. More than 12,000 of those households included someone aged 60 or older, and more than 13,000 included children.
Desmond praised the "Big Beautiful Bill" on the day it passed, and as county supervisor he voted against a plan to prepare for its effects on San Diego's food assistance programs, dismissing the effort as "political fear-mongering." He argued the only people at risk were "able-bodied adults who aren't willing to work, volunteer or go to school for at least 20 hours a week."

Jim Desmond backed cutting food assistance for Southern Californians while attacking those trying to protect it. We deserve better.

USDA SNAP Community Characteristics Dashboard — Congressional District 48, California (2024): 25,617 SNAP households, 10% of all households

Refused to Criticize Trump's Tariffs as Costs Rose for Southern Californians

Trump's tariffs raised housing and food costs across Southern California. Rather than let San Diego County go on the record saying so, Jim Desmond voted down his own housing proposal.

In March 2026, Desmond voted against his own first-time homebuyer proposal, saying he was "forced to vote against my own item" because colleagues had "loaded it up with politically motivated amendments." What those amendments actually did was direct county staff to oppose federal policies that drive up housing construction costs — with Board Chair Terra Lawson-Remer specifically calling out tariffs on construction materials. Desmond called that language a "poison pill" and told his colleagues, "Just put up, 'I hate Trump' in the proposal." Rather than let it stand, he voted against his own item; it passed anyway on the votes of the board's three Democrats.
Jessica Anderson, interim president and CEO of the San Diego Regional Chamber of Commerce, said the tariffs would have a "very direct impact on the cost of living for your average San Diegans." Cory Singer, a general contractor working on 10 rebuilds in Pacific Palisades after the January 2025 wildfires, told the Los Angeles Times he was padding a 5% to 10% contingency for "market volatility" into his budgets and telling homeowners to prepare for higher costs, and San Diego restaurant owners were squeezed by tomato prices rising faster than most other foods, which NBC 7 attributed partly to weather and partly to tariffs.

Trump's tariffs drove up costs for Southern Californians, and Jim Desmond would not say a word against them — he voted down his own housing proposal to stop his county from saying it for him. We deserve better.

Backed Trump's War with Iran That Raised Gas Prices for Southern Californians

Trump's war with Iran drove up gas prices across Southern California. Jim Desmond told San Diegans to accept the pain.

Days after launching his congressional campaign, Desmond defended the war on Real America News as necessary to keep Iran from getting nuclear weapons and said: "No pain, no gain." He added: "It's unfortunate that oil prices are going up, but I do believe this is a spike and President Trump is right."
The pain was real for the people he wants to represent. By March 19, 2026, with prices climbing since the Middle East conflict began, the average gallon of gas in San Diego hit $5.61 — 96 cents higher than a year earlier, according to AAA.

Jim Desmond backed Trump's war with Iran even as it raised gas prices for Southern Californians. We deserve better.

Defended DOGE While Seniors Lost Social Security Services

DOGE gutted the Social Security Administration's workforce and wiped out millions in research funding at San Diego State. Jim Desmond called concerns about it "fear-mongering."

In March 2025, Desmond wrote that Democrats saying DOGE would cut Medicaid and Social Security were "lying again" and that the claim was "completely false, but it makes for a great headline and fuels their favorite weapon — fear-mongering."
By that spring DOGE had cut deep into Social Security. The agency had already seen 7,000 job losses and was drafting plans to lay off thousands more. Of the roughly 2,500 employees who took buyouts that April, nearly 2,000 worked in field offices serving the public, and 40 of those offices were set to lose a quarter or more of their staff. The agency then stopped publicly reporting its call wait times and benefit processing times altogether, removing the data customers had used to track its performance. A year on, the agency had shed roughly 12 percent of its workforce during the DOGE era and was still reassigning staff to cover phone lines.
The cuts hit research in Desmond's own backyard. San Diego State University faced the loss of $26 million in terminated federal grants, which it is appealing to have restored, part of an estimated $273 million in NIH grants lost by California colleges and universities, with the disruptions hitting research into mental health, HIV/AIDS and climate change. At UC San Diego, a biology professor had yet to receive the third-year funding of a four-year NIH grant studying Alzheimer's and heart disease.

Jim Desmond backed the DOGE cuts that hamstrung services for seniors and threatened critical research in California. We deserve better.

Is Ethically Challenged and Uses His Office for Personal Gain

Jim Desmond has twice been accused of using his office for personal benefit — once seriously enough that state regulators opened a formal investigation — and was the only county supervisor to vote against protecting San Diegans from scams.

In 2018, while Mayor of San Marcos and running for supervisor, Desmond was accused of accepting four campaign donations totaling $2,150 from the property owner, environmental consultant and engineers behind the San Marcos Highlands development — a project he had voted to approve as mayor, and one that had drawn years of community opposition and been rejected twice before. His spokesman argued San Marcos campaign finance rules didn't apply to a county race, and the complaint ultimately did not move forward.
In 2024, the California Fair Political Practices Commission opened a formal investigation into conflict-of-interest allegations over his work on the "No on G" committee opposing a transit sales tax he had publicly campaigned against. Regulators were also examining a $5,000 contribution from Affirmed Housing's James Silverwood, made months after Desmond voted as supervisor to give the company funding.
In March 2026, Desmond was the only San Diego County Supervisor to vote against creating a Consumer Fairness and Public Protection Unit to crack down on junk fees, scams, and predatory financial practices. The board approved it 4–1 over his lone no vote.

Jim Desmond has twice been accused of trading on his office, and voted alone against protecting San Diegans from predatory practices. We deserve better.

Spread COVID Misinformation While San Diegans Died

During the deadliest public health crisis in a century, Jim Desmond used his podcast to tell San Diegans the danger wasn't real.

In May 2020, Desmond claimed San Diego County had seen only "six pure, solely coronavirus deaths" — waving away the nearly 200 other San Diegans who had died with underlying conditions such as diabetes, obesity, COPD or cancer. National media outlets and Joe Rogan picked up the claim. By that August, the county had recorded more than 600 COVID deaths.
He repeatedly dismissed the county's own COVID-19 messaging as "hysteria" and, Voice of San Diego reported, "openly advocate[d] that catching the coronavirus is a good thing, because healthy people will build up antibodies" — a claim the outlet noted was "entirely speculative" and unsupported by CDC guidance at the time.

When San Diegans needed facts from their county government, Jim Desmond sold them denial. We deserve better.

Supervisor by Day, But a COVID-19 Skeptic on the Airwaves (Voice of San Diego)

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