Nicolas Carjuzaa, a Martinez resident and political newcomer with a background in financial regulation, is hoping to capture the 8th Congressional District seat, which covers parts of Contra Costa, Solano and Sacramento counties.
He’s one of two Democrats with west county ties challenging the democratic incumbent U.S. Rep. John Garamendi, who’s been involved in state politics for more than 50 years.
Also running against Garamendi in the June 2 primary are two other political newcomers: Democrat Aaron Rowden and Republican Rudy Recile, a business owner, Army veteran, and retired Department of Agriculture employee who has run unsuccessfully for Congress twice. Recile, who lives in Vallejo and was born in Canada, appears to primarily be campaigning in Solano County. The top two vote-getters will go head-to-head in the November election.
Mail-in ballots can be placed in ballot drop boxes at several Richmond locations. (Experts don’t advise mailing them this late due to recent changes in postmark rules.) In-person voting will take place from 7 a.m. to 8 p.m. on Tuesday.
Carjuzaa told Richmondside he was inspired to run during President Donald Trump 2025 campaign.
“I decided to run about 10 years ago when Donald Trump ran for office and was making comments about Muslims that made me very angry because if he just replaced the word ‘Muslims’ with ‘Jews’ they were identical to a quote that a Nazi would have made,” Carjuzaa said.
He said he’s critical of both sides of the aisle.
“I’m fed up with this process of a political pendulum swinging back and forth between bad options and want to see change,” he said.
Carjuzaa said he admires what Garamendi, who’s served in the House of Representatives since 2009, has done, but he feels that it’s time for a new person to take over.
June 2 primary election
Here’s where to find a list of ballot drop-off boxes.
Early in-person voting will take place at Richmond’s Memorial Auditorium on Friday, Saturday and Monday. Here are those details.
Polls will be open 7 a.m. to 8 p.m. on Tue., June 2.
For more info.: Visit Richmondside’s voter guide or the Contra Costa County elections page.
“I respect his legacy and his past work,” Carjuzaa said. “But he’s passed his prime and is missing hundreds of votes. He’s been such an effective person, why not pass the torch? I think he’d make a good mentor.”
Garamendi has missed 183 of 1,070 congressional votes since January of 2024, a little more than 17%, which is much higher than most of his colleagues. The current representatives serving have, on average, missed 2.1% of votes during their terms.
Although Carjuzaa has never run for office, he has volunteered for several campaigns, including Barack Obama’s successful presidential runs, one of Bernie Sanders’ campaigns, Ted Lieu’s successful congressional run, and Zohran Mamdani’s recent successful mayoral run in New York City. He said he’s taken what he’s learned, in particular the practice of “winning votes by going to the voters directly,” and applied it to his campaign.
Carjuzaa said his team has knocked on about 14,000 doors, including more than 3,000 in Richmond
If you live in Richmond, you may have seen Carjuzaa or one of his campaign volunteers out on the streets or even at your home. Carjuzaa said that his team has knocked on about 14,000 doors, including more than 3,000 in the Richmond area, and he’s visited 7,000 home himself.
His campaign has garnered some local support, as Our Revolution East Bay, a progressive political organization that emerged out of the Sanders campaign, and the Contra Costa County Young Democrats, have both endorsed him.
Although Carjuzaa was born and raised in Martinez, he lived in the United Kingdom and France when he was in graduate school, earning two masters degrees, one in business management, with a focus on international business, and the other in international relations, with a focus on nationalism and migration politics.
Carjuzaa said he spent three years working as a financial regulator for the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA). FINRA is an independent agency that oversees U.S. stockbrokers and brokerage firms, and Carjuzaa thinks that having experience in financial regulation is crucial for reforming our current financial system, which he said needs to do a better job of supporting the middle and lower classes.
“You need hands-on experience with financial regulations to understand them,” Carjuzaa said. “To be in Congress you need to understand that when you pass legislation it’s got to be airtight.”
Just like Garamendi and Rowden, Carjuzaa believes that the wealthiest Americans need to pay more taxes for social welfare causes. Recile has taken a different route. He supports President Donald Trump and his policy of austerity for social programs, and he maintains that Trump won the 2019 election, which Joe Biden won. His platform emphasizes getting water to commercial farms in California, school choice and support for veterans.
Healthcare is an issue that could benefit from financial reform, according to Carjuzaa. Like Garamendi, and Rowden, Carjuzaa believes in universal healthcare funded by the wealthy, expanding on the Affordable Healthcare Act, or Obamacare, which doesn’t require this.
“We have to have wealthier people pay into the healthcare system or it won’t work,” Carjuzaa said.
Carjuzaa also said the wealthy have to do more to support housing, which he believes we need to treat “like a public utility” and “almost as a right.”
To improve both healthcare and housing, Carjuzza suggests changing tax codes by closing loopholes that allow the wealthy to avoid capital gains tax and improving oversight to tax earners accurately.
Carjuzaa also says campaign finance reform important
Carjuzaa said campaign finance reform is high on his reforms priority list. He supports overturning the Supreme Court’s Citizens United ruling, which allows organizations, most often corporations, to spend unlimited funds on elections. That would require reforms of the high court, he said, including term limits or expanding the court. First and foremost though, Carjuzaa said Congress needs to pass an enforceable ethics code that would have power over the court.
Carjuzaa also supports banning elected representatives from stock trading and said he owns no stock.
Carjuzaa, Garamendi and Rowden share many of the same stances on social issues. All support reproductive rights and gender affirming care. Carjuzaa said that abortion rights should be codified into law as part of an equal rights amendment that would ensure no gender or sex- based discrimination. He also said “there’s a difference between gender and sex” and that medical professionals and patients should determine gender affirming care, not the government.
Like his Democratic opponents, Carjuzaa has taken a strong stance against immigration enforcement actions. He said that he sees ICE actions as “political violence” and said that “they can’t be held accountable like police.” Carjuzaa said that his father, wife and sister-in-law, along with many of his neighbors, are immigrants and that it’s crucial to stand with them.
“I think there should be a pathway to citizenship for anyone who wants to be an American,” he said.
Carjuzaa does not support the war in Iran and has called it “illegal.” He also doesn’t support sending aid to Israel.
“We need to reset our relationship with Israel,” Carjuzaa said. “I don’t think we need to be complicit with their war mongering and genocide.”
Carjuzaa said he thinks the current administration is too “hawkish” and that the United States should only go to war or provide military aid when “innocent people are attacked,” citing Ukraine as a recent example.
He said part of the reason he’s spent so much time campaigning in Richmond is that he sees the area as “vitally important,” and that the country has a lot to learn from the city in terms of community, police and financial reforms.
Citing the $550 million dollar settlement the city of Richmond reached with Chevron, Carjuzaa said the city has shown you can “stand up to big companies without driving them out.”
This story was updated to correct a name spelling and the number of residences the campaign has visited.
Good to see Carjuzaa For Congress finally getting the media spotlight it has earned through its robust & visible grassroots campaigning in CA8. This young man will make a huge difference if the voters give him a chance. He is clearly ready to roll up his sleeves & do the hard work.
Nicolas Carjuzaa is exactly the kind of fresh, hardworking leadership our district needs. Knocking on thousands of doors and speaking directly with residents shows that he is serious about listening to the community and earning people’s trust. His willingness to stand up for working families make him an impressive candidate. It is exciting to see someone with substance (and energy) step forward to serve. Go Nicolas!
I hope Nicolas Carjuzaa makes in this primary and that for the November election Richmondside covers him fairly and timely, and not just the day before the election’s deadline (like now)
Nick Carjuzza is a DSA candidate, and they are a huge part of the problem in the East Bay, CA and US.
Their platform consists of abolishing the police, prisons (by defunding to $0) and private property ownership, and weaponize the homeless in Oakland to support their anarchy.
The DSA is compromised of three main factions — Socialists, Communists and Marxists.
All of this is readily available on their websites. Please do your research.
Vote No on Carjuzza and the DSA.