Ash Kalra
Ash Kalra is one of Sacramento's most consequential progressive voices — a barrier-breaking legislator, former public defender, and longtime San José community leader who has represented the heart of Silicon Valley in the California State Assembly since 2016. He is the first Hindu and Indian American to serve in the California State Legislature, a historic distinction that reflects both the diversity of the district he serves and the changing face of California politics.
Kalra was born in Toronto, Canada, and moved to California in 1978 as a young child, settling in the South San José neighborhood where he grew up and still resides today. His family immigrated to the United States from the Punjab region of India. He attended San José public schools and graduated from Oak Grove High School before going on to earn his Bachelor of Arts in Communications from UC Santa Barbara in 1993. He then earned his law degree from Georgetown University, setting the stage for a legal career defined by advocacy for those without power or resources.
After passing the bar, Kalra spent over a decade as one of the most committed public defenders in Santa Clara County. He served as a Deputy Public Defender for Santa Clara County for 11 years, representing indigent clients in both felony and misdemeanor matters, and much of his time was spent in drug treatment court where clients were given the opportunity to complete a rehabilitation program and turn their lives around. That experience — sitting beside clients whom the system had often failed long before they entered a courtroom — became the moral foundation of his entire political career. He also served as an instructor at both San José State University and Lincoln Law School of San José.
Before reaching Sacramento, Kalra built a strong record at City Hall. He served on the San José City Council from 2008 to 2016, representing the East Side and becoming one of its most progressive voices on housing, workers' rights, and immigrant communities. He was first elected to the California State Assembly in 2016, succeeding term-limited Democrat Nora Campos, and was reelected to his fifth term in 2024. His current term ends in December 2026.
Kalra currently chairs the Assembly Committee on Judiciary and serves as a member of the Housing and Community Development, Labor and Employment, Natural Resources, and Utilities and Energy Committees. He is Chair Emeritus of the California Legislative Progressive Caucus.
His legislative legacy is broad and substantial. He authored the landmark California Racial Justice Act of 2020 — AB 2542 — a historic bill addressing racial discrimination in criminal sentencing and convictions, followed by a 2022 bill to apply the Act retroactively for people with past convictions. As a champion of universal health care, he introduced AB 1400 in 2021 and AB 2200 in 2024 — known as CalCare — which would guarantee comprehensive health care for all Californians as a human right. On the environment, he authored AB 3030 in 2019, making California the first state to commit to protecting 30% of its lands and coastal waters by 2030 to preserve biodiversity and combat climate change, and authored the Migratory Bird Protection Act to ensure federal bird protections continued to be enforced in California regardless of federal rollbacks.
He has secured over $200 million in state budget funds for Californians, including over $72 million for Assembly District 25. He is a vegan and chairs the Assembly Select Committee on Alternative Protein Innovation — a fitting role for someone whose personal values and public policies are consistently intertwined. Most recently, he championed legislation to designate a stretch of Highway 101 in San José as the "Little Saigon Freeway," honoring the Vietnamese-American community that has made the East Side its home. Kalra remains one of the most authentic and ideologically consistent legislators in California — a man whose politics were forged not in political strategy sessions but in the courtrooms and communities of San José's East Side.