Pearce launches bid for Fresno County supervisor in District 5 race

Diane Pearce has stepped into one of Fresno County’s most consequential local races early, moving to challenge for the District 5 seat on the Fresno County Board of Supervisors as Clovis and the county brace for a possible power shift.

Pearce, Clovis’s mayor pro tem and a City Council member in District 4, said she is aiming first for a 2027 special election and then the full term in 2028, if Supervisor Nathan Magsig wins his campaign for California State Senate District 12 and leaves the county seat open. That makes her announcement more than a placeholder for later next year. It puts a familiar Clovis official in position to compete for control of a board seat that has helped anchor the county’s conservative governing bloc.

The District 5 seat matters because it reaches far beyond one city hall. It covers Clovis, southeast Fresno, Sanger and foothill communities including Auberry, Huntington Lake, Shaver Lake, Hume Lake and Pine Flat. That mix means the race will have to speak to suburban Clovis homeowners, southeast Fresno voters, rural families, and mountain and recreation communities that rely on county roads, fire protection and public services. Growth, public safety and taxes are likely to sit near the center of the debate, especially in a district where development pressure in and around Clovis meets the slower-paced realities of the foothills.

Pearce’s pitch leans on a record she says includes lower recycling and organic waste costs, more police and fire staffing, tougher penalties for copper wire and catalytic-converter theft, and opposition to materials she inappropriate in children’s library sections. She also framed the race around public safety, immigration cooperation and community values, warning against Fresno County drifting toward what she described as “San Francisco or Los Angeles.” Whether that message lands will depend on how voters across the district weigh growth, crime and local identity against the county’s changing demographics.

The timing is also significant in Clovis itself. The city began moving from at-large elections to by-district voting in October 2024 because of the California Voting Rights Act, and it selected its first district map on March 4, 2025. The city says each district is built around roughly 24,000 residents. Pearce’s county bid comes as that overhaul is still settling in, and her departure from Council District 4 would open another local contest, especially with fellow council member Matt Basgall now running for reelection. Magsig’s current county term runs until Jan. 8, 2029, but District 5 is already emerging as an early test of who controls Fresno County’s next political chapter.