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Our verdict

LiberalMind endorses Kevin Lincoln II — as unproven in federal office, and on watch

Election Day is Tuesday, November 3, 2026. This is the whole race — the records, the claims against each candidate, and what the sources actually show. Read the research, and decide which flaw you can live with.

The setup

California's 13th District — Modesto, Merced, Turlock and the surrounding Central Valley farm country — elected Rep. Adam Gray in 2024 by 187 votes over Republican incumbent John Duarte, the closest U.S. House race in America that year, under the old lines. Proposition 50, approved by voters in November 2025, replaced the map for 2026: the new 13th keeps its Central Valley base, adds Stockton voters, and flips the district's 2024 presidential vote from Trump +5.4 on the old lines to Harris +0.4 on the new ones (FTP Elections Intelligence, sourcing the Assembly Elections Committee analysis). Cook Political Report's Partisan Voting Index for the new district is D+2. (One secondary compilation describes the shift on a different metric as "D+11% to D+14%"; it does not match Cook's PVI or the presidential recomputation, and we do not print it as settled.)

The raters disagree by a full notch, and the spread is the story: Cook — Likely D (moved from Lean D on Oct 23, 2026); Sabato's Crystal Ball — Likely D; Inside Elections — Tilt D, a full category more cautious than the other two. We print the spread; we do not average it. There are no public general-election polls of this race in the record we reviewed — none — so any claim about where it stands beyond ratings and money is unsourced. The money: through October 14, Gray had raised $5.24 million with $848,600 on hand; Kevin Lincoln had raised about $2.97 million with $448,400 on hand (FTP/Green Papers FEC compilations). The outside-spending asymmetry runs the other way: the Congressional Leadership Fund had spent more than $4.34 million on this race by October 11, while the House Majority PAC had spent less than $400,000 (CalMatters via The Modesto Focus, Oct 20, 2026). California's top-two primary (June 2) advanced exactly two names: Gray (41.97%) and Lincoln (27.74%). Speaker Mike Johnson traveled to Chowchilla to rally for Lincoln; DCCC Chair Suzan DelBene traveled to Modesto for Gray; President Trump endorsed Lincoln.

Adam Gray (Democratic)

The record: Gray served a decade-plus in the California Assembly before winning this seat in 2024. In the House he sits on the Agriculture and Natural Resources committees and is a whip of the Blue Dog Coalition. His dealmaker brand has product behind it: the House passed his telehealth-access bill co-authored with Republican Rep. David Valadao and a geothermal-streamlining measure co-authored with Republican Rep. Young Kim, and the California Farm Bureau — which rarely backs Democrats — endorsed him in April 2026, citing water access and farm-technology work (CalMatters). He voted against the One Big Beautiful Bill and introduced H.R. 4849 to reverse its Medicaid cuts and permanently extend ACA premium tax credits (it did not pass); he co-sponsored bills to limit presidential tariff authority; he voted against the DHS appropriations bill because, in his own words, it "keeps funding for Immigration and Customs Enforcement flat while cutting funding for U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services" (gray.house.gov). Roll-call compilations consistently place him among the 15 Democrats who voted yes on the BOWOW Act, making non-citizens convicted of harming law-enforcement animals deportable (the compilations disagree on the chamber total; his presence on the yes list is consistent across all three we reviewed). His campaign's claim of "over $16 million in federal funding secured for district projects" is his own office's figure, attributed as such, not independently audited in our review.

On enforcement: Gray's posture is documented in his own official statements, and it is not abolition: "Let me be clear: I condemn recent ICE raids throughout California that are causing fear across the Valley" (June 27, 2025); a May 2026 letter to the DHS Secretary questioning ICE detainment policy; an October 13, 2026 demand with Sens. Padilla and Schiff for answers over enforcement activity in Mendota — "Federal immigration laws must be enforced, but how that happens matters" (Padilla Senate office release). He cosponsors the Dignity Act and the Farm Workforce Modernization Act, which pair border security with an earned path for long-standing farm workers. No statement calling for ending ICE cooperation or abolishing the agency was located. That is the steelman, and it is genuine: on style and on agriculture, Gray is the most moderate Democrat holding a California swing seat.

The 2017 vote and the construction file — the documented weight: As an assemblymember, Gray voted for SB 1, the 2017 transportation bill containing a 12-cent-per-gallon gas-tax increase and higher vehicle-registration fees. The bill passed with the minimum two-thirds supermajority — his vote was a deciding vote — and his district received $100 million for the 4.5-mile Campus Parkway project among eleventh-hour "sweeteners" for swing legislators (CalMatters). That is a proven roll call in a cost-of-living election, and Lincoln's core attack — that Gray was "complicit in the cost of living crisis" via those tax and fee votes — rests on it. Beside it sits a disclosure file: Gray holds a minority stake in Marvulli, a construction company owned by his cousin; House financial disclosures show he received more than $366,000 from the company in 2023 and 2024 and hold a stake valued at $250,000–$500,000 generating $50,000–$100,000 in income; the company was awarded a contract to build a hotel anchoring a plaza near the new Campus Parkway segment (CalMatters, from House financial reports). Now the allegation built on those facts, at its exact weight: a Congressional Leadership Fund ad charges Gray "pocketed $400,000 of the $100 million allocated to the project." That is a super-PAC ad claim. No sourced finding of impropriety, ethics charge, or investigation was located in our review, and Gray rejects the implication. The vote is fact. The disclosures are fact. The profiting charge is an unadjudicated allegation, and we print it as one.

Pros: An incumbent who has already won this seat's hardest version of the race; bipartisan bills actually passed with Republican co-authors; the Farm Bureau's rare Democratic endorsement; a Blue Dog whip operation; a documented enforcement-with-oversight posture that is nobody's caricature of his party.

Cons: On the cycle's decisive questions his record is his party's: against the tax-and-enforcement bill, for reversing its Medicaid provisions, against the DHS bill — the dealmaking is real and it lives on the small bills. His signature tax vote raised the cost of living by roll call, with a district sweetener attached, and his family's construction income now sits beside the project that sweetener built. Inside Elections still rates his hold a full notch shakier than the other raters do.

The flaw, plainly: Gray's flaw is the deciding-vote species: when Sacramento needed one more vote for a gas-tax increase, his was available, and his district's reward was a road project beside which his cousin's company — and his disclosed income from it — now stands. The ethics inference his opponents draw is unproven and we do not draw it. The vote, the sweetener, and the disclosures need no inference; they are the record.

Kevin Lincoln II (Republican)

The record: Lincoln is a Stockton native, a Marine Corps veteran who served in military police and was assigned to Marine One under President George W. Bush, a pastor, and a security-company executive (Ballotpedia News, July 20, 2026; Merced County Times). In 2020 he unseated incumbent Mayor Michael Tubbs and served as mayor of Stockton from 2021, choosing not to seek re-election; instead he ran for Congress in CA-09 in 2024 and lost to Rep. Josh Harder, 51.8% to 48.2%. When Proposition 50 redrew CA-13 to include southern Stockton, he switched his 2026 target to Gray — announcing two days after Prop 50 passed. He also worked as a California Republican Party finance director in 2025 (Merced Focus; CalMatters).

His claims, checked at the strength they carry: Lincoln's signature mayoral claim — that Stockton's violent-crime rate hit a 15-year low by the time he left office — is his record as reported, with CalMatters' context printed beside it: the decline reflected a nationwide downward trend in violent crime. The Democratic counter-record is also documented: Stockton police staffing shortages during his tenure forced the department to cut the types of calls officers responded to; Lincoln answers that Stockton faced the same post-2020 recruitment crisis as departments nationwide (CalMatters). The DCCC's attack line — "skyrocketing housing and utility costs, rampant crime, and taxpayer-funded perks for himself" — is a partisan-source characterization whose particulars, including the alleged perks, were not itemized in any sourced record we found; we do not print them as fact. Gray's counter-frame — that the party is "literally running him so that they can get another yes-man for Trump" — is campaign rhetoric aimed at his 2025 party job, printed as rhetoric.

The program, and its documented thinness: Lincoln's stated program is lower taxes, cutting wasteful spending, investing in law enforcement, no return to "Biden-era immigration policies" at the southern border, pro-growth and pro-housing positioning, and support for the Trump administration's AI self-policing approach (CalMatters' summary of his campaign materials). CalMatters documents the gap plainly: he "does not outline specific suggestions for how he would cut taxes and curb allegedly wasteful government programs." No specific ICE-operations position in his own words — on interior enforcement, 287(g), or detention — was located in our review; only the border framing above. Diligence requires us to say what that means: his signature claims are a mayoral crime trend that verifies with context and a federal program that does not yet exist in checkable form. We do not invent the specifics he has not published.

Pros: A Marine with a Marine One detail and a mayor's office won by beating a nationally famous progressive incumbent in a heavily Democratic city — demonstrated crossover appeal, the exact skill this district rewards. Trump-endorsed, with Speaker-level and $4.34 million of CLF investment behind him. A Stockton native running in a district the map just extended into Stockton.

Cons: A two-time federal candidate who has never won a federal race. A mayoral record with a real counter-record on police staffing. A district switch two days after the map changed, which hands his opponent the party-placement attack already in use. Half his opponent's cash on hand. And a federal program documented as thin by the same newsroom that documents his strengths.

The flaw, plainly: Lincoln's flaw is an unwritten program: biography and crossover history where a governing agenda for Congress should be. He is unproven at the federal level — a watch posture, not a demerit — but diligence prices the absence honestly: there is no math in his file to check, because he has not offered any.

OUR CALL

LiberalMind endorses Kevin Lincoln II — as unproven in federal office, and on watch.

The exception test decides it. Gray is the strongest plausible version of a swing-district Democrat — a Blue Dog whip with Republican co-authors and a Farm Bureau endorsement — and we have printed that case at full strength. But the Manchin exception is earned by proven breaks toward our values on the questions that decide, and on those questions Gray's record is his party's line: against the tax-and-enforcement bill, for restoring its Medicaid spending, against the homeland-security bill. His bipartisanship is genuine and it is spent on telehealth and geothermal bills. What is proven against him is heavier than anything proven against his challenger: a deciding vote for a gas-tax increase with a $100 million district sweetener, beside a disclosed family-business income stream from the corridor that sweetener built — the profiting inference unproven, the vote and the disclosures fact.

Lincoln is endorsed as what he is: a crossover-proven mayor and Marine whose federal program is unwritten, carrying a party-placement attack he invited by switching districts with the map. We endorse a direction and a demonstrated ability to win voters who do not start with his party — both will be audited against his first term, in print, by us. A blank federal page is a risk we can price; a proven party-line record with a deciding-vote tax increase is a record we cannot un-price.

This race is one of hundreds in LiberalMind's Election 2026 coverage. For the complete breakdown — every race, claim by claim — go to liberalmindhq.com.

Vote early. Research your candidates. Choose the best moderates, whatever their party — no extremism from either side. And encourage your friends and family to do the same.

Sources

Election result — November 4, 2026

Winner: Adam Gray (Democratic) — called by the Associated Press. This result was appended on November 4, 2026 (results wave 2); the original article above is unchanged, exactly as published before Election Day.

AI-assisted article — but the sources are human, and the facts are very real.

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