State Sen. Aisha Wahab, pictured in 2023, has the grit and dedication to good governance to hold her own in Congress.

It’s been a roller coaster few months for residents of California’s 14th Congressional District, which includes the Alameda County cities of Pleasanton, Livermore, Castro Valley, Hayward, Union City and parts of Fremont and Dublin. 

One moment, their popular House representative, Eric Swalwell, was the leading Democratic candidate for California governor. In the next, he was resigning in disgrace and suspending his gubernatorial campaign after the Chronicle reported a former staffer’s allegation that he had twice sexually assaulted her when she was too intoxicated to consent. More allegations from other women followed.

District 14 voters need a representative they can trust who understands and can meet their needs and who is prepared for war in the trenches with President Donald Trump.  

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There are two separate elections to replace Swalwell in Congress — the regularly scheduled June 2 primary for the new two-year term beginning in January, and a June 16 special election to serve the remainder of his current term. If none of the candidates in the special election secures more than 50% of the vote, there will be a runoff on Aug. 18 — just a few months before the regularly scheduled general election in November. 

As if that weren’t confusing enough, there are different sets of candidates running in each election. 

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Five candidates are running in the regular and special elections. An additional four candidates are running only in the regular election, while six are running only in the special election. 

It’s an unwieldy and largely unimpressive group. 

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One of the only serious candidates is BART Board of Directors President Melissa Hernandez, a Democrat who’s also director of........

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