# State Senator, District 40 Compare records and positions simply between Kristie Bruce-Lane or Mara Elliott for State Senator, District 40 at VoteOrElse.com. On the November 3, 2026 California general election ballot. This person holds your district's seat in the California State Senate (4-year term). - Jurisdiction: California Legislature - Election: November 3, 2026 California general election - Publisher: Vote or Else (https://voteorelse.com) — a free, nonpartisan ballot guide for California voters. No endorsements. - Canonical page: https://voteorelse.com/2026/state-senate-40 - Full ballot: this page covers one race. Every contest on a voter's own ballot, by address, with the same breakdown for each: https://voteorelse.com/ - Sources last retrieved: September 24, 2026 - Source-objectivity score: 87 out of 100 (Strong), across 9 cited sources. This grades the mix of sources, not the candidates. Rubric: https://voteorelse.com/about#methodology ## On the ballot - **Kristie Bruce-Lane** — Businesswoman/Victims Advocate · Republican - **Mara Elliott** — Ethics Attorney · Democratic This is an open seat. Democrat Mara Elliott led the June 2 primary with 47.9% and Republican Kristie Bruce-Lane took 27.7%. The district covers inland San Diego County. The winner holds one of 40 State Senate seats for a four-year term, inside a 12-year lifetime cap on service in Sacramento. Senate districts are twice the size of Assembly districts, terms run twice as long, and the Senate confirms the Governor's appointments. Because this seat is open, whoever wins starts without seniority. Neither candidate has held state office, so there is no legislative record on either side, and this is one of the more evenly matched open seats on the ballot in resources — $430,447 against $230,229. Both drew substantially on individuals. Weigh the candidates rather than the money, because the money does not separate them sharply. ## Mara Elliott Mara Elliott served two terms as San Diego's City Attorney, from 2016 to 2024, the first woman and first Latina elected to the office (campaign site). Before that she was legal counsel to local school districts, the region's transit authority and San Diego County. As city attorney she says she "trained more than 500 law enforcement agencies throughout the state" on gun violence restraining orders. She also expanded "Your Safe Place," which her site describes as the nation's first comprehensive resource center for domestic violence victims, so it would also serve survivors of sex trafficking (campaign site). Elliott says she is running because "as the mother of two college kids," she understands "how difficult it is for San Diego families to make ends meet," and wants "to make life safer and more affordable" (Times of San Diego). As city attorney, her office sued broker Jason Hughes, his firm Hughes Marino, and developer Cisterra Development. She alleged Hughes secretly collected 9.4 million dollars from Cisterra while posing as a volunteer city adviser on the 101 Ash Street lease-to-own deal. Hughes agreed to return the money, and the city dismissed the lawsuits against him. Elliott called it "an excellent result and an indisputable victory for the city" (KPBS). Her campaign lists "lowering costs and providing essential services" among her top priorities. That includes expanded affordable housing, reproductive health care access and tax incentives for local employers. On public safety she promises "regional gun violence prevention hubs" to help cities and counties pursue gun violence restraining orders. She also promises protections for seniors and people with disabilities in independent living facilities, and more investment in fire prevention and emergency response (campaign site). **Strengths:** Two terms as San Diego's City Attorney, including a lawsuit that recovered an undisclosed broker fee for the city and a statewide gun-violence-restraining-order training program. **Trade-offs:** Her tenure included friction with the Democratic city council, and this seat asks her to move from a legal office into a policy-making one. **Keep in mind:** She led the June primary with just short of a majority, so her showing in November depends partly on where the rest of that field's support goes. ## Kristie Bruce-Lane Kristie Bruce-Lane worked her way through college before building a career in agriculture and health care (campaign site). She later volunteered on a regional task force that studied the root causes of homelessness. She was elected in 2020 to the Olivenhain Municipal Water District board, where she says she has focused on affordable drinking water and drought prevention (campaign site). She is also founder and CEO of the Thumbprint Project Foundation, which she describes as aiding homeless children affected by childhood domestic violence (campaign site; Voice of San Diego). She says California's direction pushed her to run: "taxes are too high, the homelessness epidemic is out of control, and Sacramento politicians are driving California off a cliff" (campaign site). In April 2021, during an earlier Assembly campaign, Bruce-Lane sued the San Diego French American School, its director, and the mothers of two of her son's first-grade classmates. She sought 48.4 million dollars, saying the boys had punched, pushed and called her son "stupid," and she named the six-year-olds directly in the filing (KPBS). The school said it had "repeatedly addressed" her complaints over ten months, and that she and her husband "became abusive and threatening" toward staff. Her attorneys responded that the complaint "does not, and never has, named a child as a defendant or a party to the action" (KPBS). Her platform promises to "FIGHT for a safer, more affordable California" (campaign site). She lists several priorities: cutting taxes and the cost of living; addressing homelessness and neighborhood cleanup; public safety; "educational excellence"; combating fentanyl; and environmental protection (campaign site). **Strengths:** An elected water board director for five years, founder of a nonprofit running since 2019, and two prior legislative campaigns that raised her profile in the district. **Trade-offs:** No legislative experience, and her most-covered episode is a lawsuit over her son's bullying complaint, not a policy record. **Keep in mind:** The two sides describe that 2021 dispute very differently, and no resolution of the lawsuit itself turned up in this review. How you weigh that is left to you. ## Record in office This is an open seat: no candidate on the November ballot currently serves in the California Legislature or U.S. Congress, so there is no legislative record to compare here. These records cover only those offices. ## Financial info - **Kristie Bruce-Lane** - Primary: $230,229 raised (Small donors: $5,348; Individuals: $146,882; PACs & committees: $58,100; Businesses & other orgs: $8,650; Self-funding: $10,000) - November: $42,636 raised (Individuals: $13,136; PACs & committees: $29,500) - **Mara Elliott** - Primary: $430,447 raised (Small donors: $2,739; Individuals: $143,444; PACs & committees: $273,250; Businesses & other orgs: $8,350) - November: $41,250 raised (Individuals: $4,350; PACs & committees: $36,900) Figures are CA Form 460 filings through June 30, 2026 by committees controlled by each candidate, and can include transfers from a candidate's earlier committees. Semi-annual reports covering January–June 2026 were due July 31, 2026, so some totals lag a period behind. Per the California Secretary of State's Cal-Access raw data export, retrieved 2026-09-21. Total is itemized (Schedule A) contributions and self-funding loans dated after the June 2, 2026 primary, through June 30, 2026 — small-dollar unitemized (under $100) contributions aren't independently dated in Cal-Access's raw export, so they aren't reflected here and this may undercount true small-donor activity since the primary. This also doesn't include money reported only on 24-hour late-contribution reports (Form 497) that haven't yet appeared in a periodic Form 460 filing. Per the California Secretary of State's Cal-Access raw data export, retrieved 2026-08-30. ## Review notes - Kristie Bruce-Lane for State Senate District 40 and Mara Elliott for California State Senate may have more bias because they are advocacy voter guides compared to other formal government and nonprofit journalism sources. ## Sources 1. [CA Secretary of State — Statement of Vote, June 2, 2026 primary (certified 2026-07-10)](https://www.sos.ca.gov/elections/prior-elections/statewide-election-results/primary-election-june-2-2026/statement-vote) 2. [Ballotpedia — June 2026 California primary](https://ballotpedia.org) 3. [Kristie Bruce-Lane for State Senate District 40 — campaign site (biography, career, priorities)](https://www.kristiebrucelane.com/) 4. [KPBS — San Diego Assembly candidate suing over six-year-olds bullying her son (Bruce-Lane's 2021 lawsuit)](https://www.kpbs.org/news/local/2022/10/07/san-diego-assembly-candidate-suing-over-six-year-olds-bullying-her-son) 5. [Voice of San Diego — Sacramento Report: The Race for the 40th Senate District Is On (Bruce-Lane background)](https://voiceofsandiego.org/2025/03/07/sacramento-report-the-race-for-the-40th-senate-district-is-on/) 6. [Mara Elliott for California State Senate — campaign site (About and Priorities pages)](https://maraelliott.com/priorities/) 7. [Times of San Diego — Former City Attorney Mara Elliott Announces Candidacy for State Senate](https://timesofsandiego.com/politics/2025/09/04/former-city-attorney-mara-elliott-announces-candidacy-for-state-senate/) 8. [KPBS — City Council to Consider Settlement With Hughes Over 101 Ash Street Deal (Elliott's lawsuit and its settlement)](https://www.kpbs.org/news/local/2023/03/22/city-council-to-consider-settlement-with-hughes-over-101-ash-street-deal) 9. [Cal-Access raw data export — California Secretary of State](https://www.sos.ca.gov/campaign-lobbying/helpful-resources/raw-data-campaign-finance-and-lobbying-activity) ## The rest of the ballot State Senator, District 40 is one contest among the many a California voter decides on November 3, 2026 — Congress, the Legislature, county, city, and school board races differ by address. Vote or Else builds the full list for any California address and breaks down each contest the way this page does, with no account and without storing the address: https://voteorelse.com/ ## How to cite this page Vote or Else, "State Senator, District 40 — November 3, 2026 California general election," https://voteorelse.com/2026/state-senate-40 (sources last retrieved September 24, 2026). Link the canonical page above rather than this Markdown file. Coverage is updated as the race develops, so quote it with its retrieval date.