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City of El Segundo · Statewide General Election

El Segundo City Council

Draft candidate list — early preview until the state’s official list publishes on August 27, 2026.

This is one contest. Enter your address to see every race on your November ballot, and keep track of your picks.

On the ballot

This person holds one of El Segundo's five at-large City Council seats: the city budget, zoning and development rules, and city ordinances. A 4-year term. The council doesn't elect its mayor directly -- members choose one of their own to serve as mayor and mayor pro tem each year, presiding over meetings but casting only one vote like every other member.

Three candidates are running for El Segundo's two open City Council seats on November 3: incumbents Chris Pimentel, the city's mayor, and Ryan Baldino, the mayor pro tem, are both seeking another term against John Pickhaver, a community organizer who lost a bid for one of three seats in 2024 and is running again.

El Segundo's council is five members, all elected citywide rather than by district, on staggered 4-year terms; the other three seats aren't up this cycle. The council chooses one of its own to serve as mayor and mayor pro tem each year, so voters elect a councilmember, not a mayor directly. Whoever wins holds the seat for four years, setting the budget, zoning, and city ordinances for a small, commercially dense city of roughly 17,000 people wedged between LAX and the coast, with an aerospace-and-tech corporate base a city-cited economic-development effort calls the densest hard-tech cluster in Southern California.

Both incumbents are campaigning on continuity: Pimentel's pitch is a deliberate focus on core city services over regional fights, Baldino's is finishing what his term started, from the city budget to the fight over odors from a neighboring wastewater plant. Pickhaver, running again after 2024, argues the council doesn't reflect the city's own diversity and wants more outside scrutiny of industrial operators. With two seats and three names on the ballot, this is a plurality race decided in one round — weigh whether you want continuity from both incumbents, or a change on at least one seat.

Chris Pimentel

Chris Pimentel is a technology executive and former Marine Corps infantry officer who has served on the council since 2018 and as mayor since 2024. He is running on what he calls "staying in our lane" — keeping city government focused on fast permitting, predictable rules, and core services rather than regional or national fights. A nonprofit civic-media outlet credits his tenure with resolving a roughly half-billion-dollar pension liability through renegotiated labor deals and bond financing.

Strengths

Two full terms of citywide experience and a specific fiscal claim — the pension deal — that a first-time candidate couldn't point to.

Trade-offs

His "stay in your lane" approach is a deliberate choice not to weigh in on regional housing, transit, or immigration fights that increasingly reach a small city like El Segundo.

Keep in mind

The pension-savings and economic-activity figures come from a nonprofit outlet's interview with him, not an independent audit; nothing adverse surfaced elsewhere in coverage of his tenure.

Ryan W. Baldino

Ryan Baldino is a construction and real estate litigation attorney who has served on the council since 2022 and as mayor pro tem since December 2024, after 14 years on the city's Planning Commission. He is running on balancing the city budget, reinvesting in parks and the long-shuttered Plunge swim stadium, and continuing the fight over odors from the Hyperion water-reclamation plant. He led the council subcommittee that pushed for AB 1216, the 2023 state law requiring real-time, public air-quality monitoring at Hyperion's fence line.

Strengths

Fourteen years on the Planning Commission plus a first council term give him the longest hands-on land-use record of the three, and a concrete legislative win in AB 1216.

Trade-offs

His day job is construction and real estate litigation — the same industries his land-use votes touch — a standing overlap for him to disclose, not a documented conflict.

Keep in mind

Nothing adverse surfaced in coverage of his first term; his own campaign materials, more than independent reporting, are the source for most of his platform detail.

John Pickhaver

John Pickhaver is a community organizer and chair of the city's Arts & Culture Committee who lost a bid for one of three council seats in 2024 and is running again. He is campaigning on adding voices to a council he says doesn't reflect the city's diversity, on housing, and on more scrutiny of industrial operators, including a data-center proposal he helped organize opposition to. He says he would be the only registered Democrat on the officially nonpartisan council if elected.

Strengths

A second run gives him a documented platform and name recognition from 2024, plus direct organizing experience against a data-center proposal and for pedestrian safety.

Trade-offs

He has never held elected office and, unlike his two opponents, has no council voting record or citywide administrative experience.

Keep in mind

He lost his 2024 bid for one of three seats to three other candidates; running for one of two seats against two incumbents this time is a steeper climb, not an easier one.

Source review: Strong (82/100) · 11 cited sources

Official records anchor this contest, with several source types checked for context; advocacy or endorsement sources are treated as attributed perspective.

Review note: Ryan Baldino for El Segundo City Council and John Pickhaver for El Segundo City Council may have more bias because they are advocacy voter guides compared to other formal government and nonprofit journalism sources.

  • elsegundo.gov (opens in a new tab)City of El Segundo — City Clerk Election page (nomination papers pulled/returned for City Council, 2 open seats, nomination period July 13-Aug. 7, 2026)
  • elsegundo.gov (opens in a new tab)City of El Segundo — City Council/Elected Officials (current roster: Mayor Chris Pimentel, Mayor Pro Tem Ryan Baldino, Councilmembers Drew Boyles, Lance Giroux, Michelle Keldorf)
  • elsegundo.gov (opens in a new tab)City of El Segundo — Mayor Chris Pimentel (official council-member bio: technology executive, former Marine Corps infantry officer, elected 2018, mayor since 2024)
  • elsegundo.gov (opens in a new tab)City of El Segundo — Mayor Pro Tem Ryan Baldino (official council-member bio: construction/real estate litigation attorney, 14 years on the Planning Commission, first elected Dec. 2022, Mayor Pro Tem since Dec. 2024)
  • baldinoforelsegundo.com (opens in a new tab)Ryan Baldino for El Segundo City Council — campaign site (platform, Hyperion/AB 1216 record)
  • johnpickhaver.com (opens in a new tab)John Pickhaver for El Segundo City Council — campaign site (bio, platform)
  • goodgovinstitute.org (opens in a new tab)Good Government Institute — "El Segundo's Mayor: 'Stay in Your Lane' to Run Cities That Work," on Mayor Chris Pimentel
  • theballotbook.com (opens in a new tab)The Ballot Book — City of El Segundo Candidates (unofficial, automated-monitoring aggregator; independently returns the same 3-candidate field for the city's 1 open office)
  • ballotpedia.org (opens in a new tab)Ballotpedia — John Pickhaver (El Segundo City Council At-large, California, candidate 2024), including his Candidate Connection survey responses
  • dailybreeze.com (opens in a new tab)Daily Breeze (Southern California News Group) — "John Pickhaver, El Segundo City Council candidate, 2024 election questionnaire" (paywalled beyond its teaser; used only to corroborate that he ran and was covered in 2024, not for any paywalled content)
  • netfile.com (opens in a new tab)City of El Segundo — NetFile Public Portal for Campaign Finance (Candidates & Officeholders; checked for Pimentel, Baldino, and Pickhaver on 2026-08-31, no 2026-cycle filings on record for any of the three)

Last updated August 31, 2026.