City of San Diego · Statewide General Election
San Diego City Council, District 4
Draft candidate list — early preview until the state’s official list publishes on August 27, 2026.
On the ballot
- Martha Abraham — Neonatal ICU Nurse/Mother
- Henry Foster III — Councilmember · Incumbent
This person holds your district's seat on San Diego's 9-member City Council: city laws, the budget, and land use.
Incumbent Henry Foster III faces Martha Abraham, a neonatal ICU nurse, in the runoff for southeast San Diego — City Heights, Encanto, Lincoln Park, a district KPBS describes as historically underserved with a redlining legacy. Both advanced from June's primary (per the city clerk's roster).
The winner holds one of nine seats on the San Diego City Council: city ordinances, the budget, and the land-use decisions behind the district's biggest fights. A four-year term.
The district's defining task is recovery and reinvestment: the January 2024 floods hit here hardest and remain unresolved, and infrastructure gaps predate them by decades (per KPBS). The choice is an incumbent running on delivery against a first-time candidate running on lived proximity to the district's needs.
Henry Foster III
The sitting councilmember and a former District 4 chief of staff. His campaign points to investments in the district's commercial corridors and flood recovery after the January 2024 disaster; he raised about $65,000 with county- and state-level endorsements (per KPBS).
Strengths
Incumbency plus years of district staff work before it — the deepest institutional knowledge of District 4's files in the race (per KPBS).
Trade-offs
He owns the recovery record he runs on; voters still living with unresolved flood damage may read "progress" differently than City Hall does.
Keep in mind
Establishment backing (county and state endorsers, per KPBS) cuts both ways in a district whose story is being underserved by institutions.
Martha Abraham
A neonatal intensive-care nurse (her ballot designation adds "mother"), one of the challengers KPBS lists against the incumbent in a district focused on flood recovery, infrastructure, and affordability.
Strengths
A frontline healthcare profile in a district whose crises — floods, pollution, underinvestment — land hardest on public health.
Trade-offs
No documented government or elected service record in the race's press coverage; her platform's specifics are thinner on the record than the incumbent's.
Keep in mind
Making the runoff against a sitting councilmember is itself a signal of district appetite for change; her campaign materials carry the specifics this entry cannot yet cite.
Source review: Very strong (95/100) · 2 cited sources
Official records anchor this contest, with a narrow source base.
- sandiego.gov (opens in a new tab)San Diego City Clerk — 2026 election information (November runoff rosters)
- kpbs.org (opens in a new tab)KPBS — San Diego City Council races explainer, Districts 2, 4, 6, 8 (Apr 30, 2026)
Last updated August 22, 2026.