Kiley was first elected to the U.S. House of Representatives in 2022. In March 2026, Kiley announced he would run for re-election in 2026 as an independent in California's 6th congressional district.[5] He formally changed his party affiliation from Republican to independent on March 9, adding that he would remain a member of the House Republican Conference.[6]
Early life, education, and early career
Kiley grew up in the Sacramento area, where his father was a physician and his mother was a special education teacher. He graduated from Granite Bay High School.[7]
After winning a second term in the State Assembly, Kiley ran for the State Senate in California's 1st District. He finished second in the primary, but lost the runoff to fellow Assemblyman Brian Dahle. Soon after the start of the new legislative session, Kiley introduced legislation to close for private use a controversial DMV office that catered exclusively to state legislators and staff. In a statement to The Sacramento Bee, Kiley said: "This is supposed to be a government of the people, by the people and for the people, not an oligarchy where a gilded political class enjoys privileges that aren’t available to the people that we represent."[13]
Kiley has said climate change is real, but opposed Governor Gavin Newsom's executive orders requiring all new vehicles sold in California to be zero emission by 2035 and banning oil-drilling by 2045.[14][8] He is a supporter of charter schools.[15] During a candidate interview in a 2021 California state race, Kiley declined to answer questions about the outcome of the 2020 presidential election.[16] Kiley has said his position is to "stay out of national politics altogether", and that "national politics is a distraction that is used frankly by those in power in Sacramento [as] kind of a smokescreen for their own failures."[8]
Though he voted to authorize $1 billion of emergency pandemic spending for Governor Newsom in March 2020, saying "to trust in Governor Newsom’s leadership and listen to his guidance", Kiley later said Newsom "made a mockery of that trust" and, alongside fellow California legislator James Gallagher, sued in June 2020 to remove Newsom's emergency powers. Kiley lost the case on appeal.[8]
In his final term in the State Assembly, Kiley introduced legislation to ban local and state governments from implementing vaccine mandates.[17]
United States Senate vacancies
In 2020, Kiley urged passage of his bill that would require the potential successor of then-candidate for vice president and Senator Kamala Harris to be elected by California's voters and not appointed by the governor;[18] he reiterated that view during the 2021 gubernatorial recall campaign by pledging to allow voters to pick a replacement for Senator Dianne Feinstein if he became governor and her seat became vacant.[19] Kiley later flagged a constitutional issue with Newsom's appointment of Alex Padilla to replace Harris and Padilla's expected service until January 2023, since the U.S. Constitution stipulates that such appointees serve "until the people fill the vacancies by election".[20]
After lawmakers in the state assembly passed a bill to address the issue that would require voters to select two senators for the same seat—one to serve in the lame-duck session from November 2022 to January 2023 and another for January 2023 to January 2029—Kiley said Newsom should have called a special election to fill Harris's seat much earlier, and that the bill would solve the problem in "the most undemocratic way possible".[20] Newsom signed the bill, which meant California's voters had to vote simultaneously for both the lame-duck Senate seat and the next full Senate term.[21]
Kiley published a book in January 2021 entitled Recall Gavin Newsom: The Case Against America's Most Corrupt Governor.[22]
On July 6, 2021, Kiley announced his candidacy for governor of California in the 2021 recall election.[23] According to the New York Times, he was one of the "more moderate Republican recall candidates,"[24] while the Los Angeles Times deemed him and John Cox the "more traditional conservatives" in the election.[16][25]
Kiley indicated his support for school choice during the campaign and said teachers' unions in the state were too powerful (with the California Teachers Association having been Newsom's top donor), to students' detriment.[17] Though vaccinated against COVID-19, Kiley pledged to overturn vaccine and mask mandates Newsom implemented if he became governor.[8]
The recall election failed, with voters choosing to retain governor Gavin Newsom by a 62%–38% margin. Kiley finished sixth among candidates to replace Newsom. He received 3.5% of the vote, or 255,490 votes total, finishing behind Republicans Larry Elder, Kevin Faulconer, and John H. Cox and Democrats Kevin Paffrath and Brandon M. Ross.[26]
Following a Democratic Party-friendly 2025 redistricting process,[5] on March 2, 2026, Kiley announced he would run for election in the redrawn 6th district rather than seeking re-election in the 3rd district.[29][30] Later, on March 6, Kiley filed for re-election as an independent.[31]
Tenure
Kiley supports ending California High-Speed Rail.[32] He authored legislation to stop federal funding for the project.[33] In February 2026, he introduced legislation to prevent states from retroactively taxing the assets of former residents, targeting a central provision of California's proposed wealth tax.[34]
On March 9, 2026, Kiley formally changed his party affiliation from Republican to independent, adding that he would remain a member of the House Republican Conference.[6]
Committee assignments
Kiley was appointed to the following committees/subcommittees for the 119th United States Congress. When Kiley left the Republican Conference, his committee assignments were vacated pursuant to Clause 5B of House Rule 10. (until March 18, 2026)[35]
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