Southern California is home to a half-dozen congressional districts where the fate of Republican seats could help decide which of the two major parties wins control of the U.S. House.

Nearly all of the districts are in Orange County, the once staunchly conservative region undergoing demographic changes that are nudging the county more to the left.

In 2016, for the first time in 80 years, Orange County favored a Democrat for president. Two incumbent GOP congressmen — Darrell Issa and Ed Royce — announced earlier this year that they were stepping down from office.

Their decision opened up the field to a rush of congressional hopefuls from both parties. Larry speaks with a panel of political experts to break down the ballot. Click here for KPCC’s guide to key congressional races.

Ready for Election Day? Get up to speed on what you need to know with KPCC’s Voter Game Plan.  Read up on the candidates and ballot measures, find out about registration deadlines and ask us your questions.

Guests:

Libby Denkmann, KPCC’s veterans and military reporter; she tweets 

Dan Walters, long-time California politics observer with CALmatters, a nonprofit public interest publication

Dan Schnur, professor in UC Berkeley’s department of political science and USC’s Annenberg School for Communication; he is also founder of the USC / Los Angeles Times statewide political poll and director of Sacramento Bee’s 2018 “California Influencer” project, a virtual panel of 60 state leaders discussing the biggest challenges in California’s future; he tweets 

Jaime Regalado, professor emeritus of political science at Cal State LA; he was executive director of the Pat Brown Institute at Cal State LA from 1991-2011

Tom Campbell, professor of economics and law at Chapman University; a member of the United States Congress from 1989-1993 and 1995-2001; a member of the California State Senate from 1993-1995; and the director of the California Department of Finance from 2004-2005

Raphe Sonenshein, executive director of the Pat Brown Institute at Cal State LA

Fernando Guerra, professor and director of the Center for the Study of Los Angeles at Loyola Marymount University

Michael Alvarez, professor of political science at CalTech; he is spearheading CalTech’s research project with Orange County working to develop tools and measures to understand voting and election integrity

Norberto Santana, Jr., publisher for Voice of OC, Orange County’s nonprofit newsroom; he tweets