LOS ANGELES (NEWSnet/AP) — California Gov. Gavin Newsom has set a March 19 special election date to fill the 20th Congressional House seat vacated by former Speaker Kevin McCarthy.

This is two weeks after California’s March 5 presidential primary.

If no candidate wins a majority of the vote, the top two vote-getters would advance to a May 21 ballot to choose the new representative.

The term for the seat vacated by McCarthy runs through January 2025.

McCarthy's departure set off a scramble to replace him that is being sorted out in court.

Despite that process, the seat is expected to stay in Republican hands. The district is anchored in Bakersfield, which cuts through parts of several counties in the state's interior farm belt.

A group of hard-right conservatives had engineered McCarthy’s removal as speaker in October; and he announced in December that he would also leave Congress.

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