The latest Democrat seeking to oust GOP Rep. Ken Calvert from one of California’s marquee House battlegrounds is betting that her home base of Horsetown USA is the launching pad her party needs to capture that seat.
Katherine Aleman, a public school teacher and chicken farmer, is a former councilmember from Norco, an equestrian-centric city and conservative pocket of Calvert’s Inland Empire district.
More than fodder for a colorful campaign bio — she sells eggs on her property under the label “Fluffy Butt Ranch” — Aleman’s roots mark a potential new strategy for Democrats, who for the past two cycles rallied around Will Rollins, a denizen of deep-blue Palm Springs, as their contender to take on Calvert.
Rollins won kudos from Democrats in California and nationally for his polish as a candidate and disciplined campaign. But Calvert was quick to label him as an outsider and an interloper, while playing up his own roots in the western, red-tinged part of the district.
Aleman, who was the sole Democrat on the city council when she served in nearby Norco, believes she has enough bona fides in that area to cut into Calvert’s geographic advantage.
“The majority of the residents and the voters in this district live on the west side, which is where I live,” Aleman told POLITICO.
Aleman distilled her campaign message to two words: “costs and cuts.”
“Costs keep going up. We were promised they would go down, and they have not,” she said. Meanwhile, President Donald Trump’s slashing of federal spending is “affecting our local economy. Businesses are losing contracts, things are slowing down.”
But she did not indicate plans to run a particularly Trump-centric campaign, instead emphasizing more local concerns.
“The issues that my residents are concerned about — costs, cuts, loss of health care, education, afterschool programs — that’s exactly what we should be focusing on,” Aleman said.
Aleman also took aim at Calvert’s 33-year tenure in the House.
“I’m a middle-school science teacher. We have a term for someone like Ken Calvert, and that’s a dinosaur,” she said.
Calvert’s long career in Congress has earned him significant seniority, including a perch on the powerful Appropriations Committee and serious fundraising chops. He pulled in $1.3 million during the last fundraising quarter.
The representative has attracted a crowded field of Democrats hoping to oust him, including Brandon Riker, a Palm Springs-based entrepreneur who once ran for lieutenant governor of Vermont, and Anuj Dixit, a Riverside attorney who grew up on the nearby March Air Force Base.
Aleman is launching her campaign with the endorsement of former California Sen. Barbara Boxer, as well as 70 local elected officials and civic leaders.
