California Democratic Congresswoman Boosts One of Her Republican Opponents on her Own Campaign Website

Sacramento Bee ^ | May 20, 2026 | Tom Philp

[TBP]

The 7th Congressional District race is shaping up to be a classic duel between two Democrats, the veteran Doris Matsui and the upstart from Sacramento City Council, Mai Vang. So why is this campaign becoming so much about two Republicans?

Vang is pitching the similarities between Matsui and the Republican everybody knows about, President Donald Trump. And now Matsui is doing her best to elevate a Republican few know about, Sacramento State student Zachariah Wooden, who is an also-ran in this race and apparently hasn’t raised a penny in support from his party or anyone.

Vang and Matsui have been revealing their political playbooks through their websites. It’s a perfectly legal way to signal to others, particularly independent expenditure campaigns, what the strategy is. For both Vang and Matsui, Republicans are coming in quite handy, just in different ways.

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TOPICS: News/Current Events; Politics/Elections; US: California
KEYWORDS: 7thdistrict; california; democrat; dorismatsui; maivang; tomphilp; toptwo; zachariahwooden

[TBP]

Matsui has a strong Democratic opponent, Sacramento city councilmember Mai Wang. There are four Democrats and two Republicans running in the primary in the Seventh District. The story says that Matsui hopes to boost a Republican so that he, not Wang, will place second and be her opponent in the November election. This is another example of how the top-two system motivates candidates to make insincere statements to manipulate who places second.

[hanamizu]

In 2012 Claire McCaskill actually ran ads for Missouri Republican Congressman W. Todd Akin in the Republican primary confident that he’s screw up and she could easily win the Senate, which she did.

[TBP]

A Democrat group ran ads for Dan Cox in Maryland in 2022, figuring he was too conservative to win a blue state. I’m surprised they hven’t rpreated the tactic this time.

[scrabblehack]

She’s been a widow for 20+ years, no? Robert died during the Bush 43 years.