Ochoa Bogh, a Redlands Republican, wrote to Trump, Speaker Mike Johnson and Senate Majority Leader John Thune, asking them to issue “expedited work permits to the millions of undocumented immigrants who are considered essential workers, such as farmworkers who provide critical services.” 

The effort marks a shift for Ochoa Bogh, who had long viewed immigration as a federal matter.

“For years I did not want to address immigration, and now I feel compelled to,” she told CalMatters. 

Republican Assemblymembers Leticia Castillo of Corona and Greg Wallis of Rancho Mirage, along with Republican and Democratic lawmakers from Southern California and the Central Valley, signed her letter urging a solution for the estimated 11 million undocumented immigrants in the U.S. including 2.5 million in California.

Some California Republicans have been trying to open lines of communication between the state and the White House. Last month Senator Suzette Martinez Valladares, a Santa Clarita Republican, asked Trump to focus immigration action on violent criminals and modernize the immigration process, in a letter with other Republican lawmakers including Ochoa Bogh.

“We need to advocate on the need for immigration reform and really talk about the issues that impact California,” Ochoa Bogh said. “I’m not sure that Democrats are actually communicating with the federal government.”

Trying to bridge that gap has been complicated by immigration raids that sparked conflict between California leaders and the Trump administration.

Protestors clashed with ICE agents and National Guard troops in Los Angeles last month. Perris Mayor Michael Vargas urged residents to stay inside following reports of ICE operations in the Riverside County city. And immigration enforcement on church property in San Bernardino County prompted Bishop Alberto Rojas to absolve parishioners from obligation to attend mass if they fear immigration action.

Restaurants throughout the state are closing temporarily as their workers and customers avoid immigration raids, CalMatters reported. ICE raids have ‘left crops rotting” on farms from Texas to California. 

“The system is broken,” Paul Granillo, President and CEO of the Inland Empire Economic Partnership, told CalMatters. “So we need to look at how people get their vegetables, how people get served in restaurants, and look at construction, and appreciate that unless we have immigration reform, the average Californian is going to pay more for all these goods and services, because we don’t have enough workers.”

The fallout to farms, restaurants, hotels and home-building has prompted Trump to waver between plans for mass deportations and possible concessions to employers. 

Some federal lawmakers see an opening. Congressmembers Mike Levin, a San Juan Capistrano Democrat, and Youn Kim, an Anaheim Hills Republican, proposed a federal reform package called the Dignity Act of 2025, which would provide a path to legal status for immigrant workers. Ochoa Bogh said she’s trying to build support for the bill in Sacramento.

The U.S. has offered various work visas and permits over the last century. The Bracero program, started during WW II, recruited Mexican workers to help on farms and other war industries. The H-2 Visa program of 1952 allowed foreign farmworkers to hold temporary jobs in agriculture.

Ochoa Bogh’s parents and grandparents worked under the Bracero program, so she relates to immigrants who are seeking jobs: “I have compassion and empathy for that heart.” 

Guestworker visas expanded with the 1986 Immigration Reform and Control Act, which also provided amnesty for established residents. In 1990, Congress added H-1B visas for skilled temporary workers, in a program that’s still widely used in the tech industry.

An effective work permit program should match foreign workers to labor market needs, Granillo said: “If you limit the number to smaller than the needs of the workforce, people are still going to come here, but will come illegally or overstay their visa.”

Stalled efforts to update those programs have left the country with an “outdated, slow-moving immigration system,” Ochoa Bogh wrote.

Fixing that would benefit employers, while protecting workers from unsafe work conditions and unfair pay, she said: “So that we’re able to have those folks stay here, and not work in the shadows. So that they are not subject to exploitation.”

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Rep. Ken Calvert, a Republican who has represented parts of Riverside County for more than three decades, was leading challenger Will Rollins in a rematch of their 2022 race for California’s 41st Congressional District. The Associated Press hasn’t called the race yet, but Calvert claimed victory on his social media accounts Monday, thanking Riverside County voters who have “once again placed their trust in me.”

Rollins wasn’t giving up. There could still be at least 80,000 votes left to count between mail ballots and conditional ballots, he said in a statement Monday, declaring the race “too close to call.” 

The Rollins campaign cited discrepancies in the total number of ballots the Riverside County Registrar of Voters has reportedly received by mail. There are more than 40,000 unprocessed ballots from the district, more than 35,000 uncounted ballots and more than 11,000 conditional ballots, his campaign estimated.

The 41st District also has the highest number of “uncured” ballots — those with small technical errors — of any competitive congressional race in California. Rollins argues the remaining ballots could still move the needle on the race.

“Our campaign is following the election results extremely closely, with eyes and ears at the Registrar of Voters every single day,” Rollins said. 

His challenge to Calvert was one of a handful of swing races that could decide which party controls the House of Representatives. But Republicans are well on their way to taking both the House and Senate, along with the White House, regardless of final results in the Inland Empire.

Palm Springs Councilmember Lisa Middleton conceded her race for California’s new 19th Senate District to incumbent State Sen. Rosilicie Ochoa Bogh. The candidates were statistically tied when polls closed last week, but Ochoa Bogh’s lead widened in the following days to more than 7 points Tuesday.

“I congratulate my opponent Senator Rosilicie Ochoa Bogh,” Middleton said in a statement. “I wish her success and promise cooperation in representing the people of Riverside and San Bernardino Counties. … We have lost a race. We remain steadfast to our values. I will continue to work with all who are committed to freedom, fairness, and opportunity for all.”

And Republican Assemblymember Greg Wallis inched ahead of Palm Springs City Councilmember Christy Holstege by a fraction of a point in the race for the 47th state Assembly District, reversing her slight lead. That race, divided by just a few hundred votes, is still listed as a close contest on the Secretary of State’s website.

The state Senate and Assembly races won’t change the political equation in California’s legislature, where Democrats still hold a supermajority.

However, all three races dampen their supporters’ hopes of increasing LGBTQ representation in California. Rollins, a former federal prosecutor, is gay. Middleton is a former state administrator, and hoped to become the first transgender lawmaker in California if elected. Holstege, a civil rights attorney, identifies as bisexual.

None of them made sexual or gender identity a centerpiece of their campaigns, instead focusing on issues such as infrastructure, the environment and public safety. But LGBTQ leaders in the Coachella Valley, which is part of all three districts, said they’re bracing for rollbacks of civil rights including attacks on same-sex marriage and transgender protections under a second Trump administration, the Desert Sun reported. 

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