U.S. House of Representatives
Elections 2012 . In September 2011, Swalwell filed to run for Congress in
California's 15th congressional district. The district had previously been the 13th, represented by 20-term incumbent Democrat
Pete Stark. Swalwell took a leave of absence from the Dublin City Council to run for the seat. In the June primary, Stark finished first with 41.8% of the vote, Swalwell placed second with 36%, and independent candidate Chris Pareja third with 22.2%. In the November general election, the
San Francisco Chronicle and the
San Jose Mercury News both endorsed Swalwell. The Stark campaign accused Swalwell of being a
Tea Party candidate and refused to debate Swalwell during the campaign. In response, Swalwell organized a mock debate with an actor playing Stark, quoting him verbatim when answering the moderator. Other campaign gimmicks included rubber ducks that stood in for rubber chickens and suggested that Stark was too "chicken" to debate. Stark pointed out that the ducks were made in China and criticized Swalwell for not "buying American". Swalwell defeated Stark, 52.1% to 47.9%.
2014 Swalwell was challenged by Republican Hugh Bussell, a senior manager at
Workday, Inc., and by Democratic State Senate Majority Leader
Ellen Corbett of Hayward. Corbett, placed third in June's primary, not earning enough votes to make the general election. Swalwell defeated Bussell in the November general election, 69.8% to 30.2%. He was sworn into his second term on January 3, 2015.
2016 Swalwell was challenged by Republican Danny Reid Turner of Livermore. He defeated Turner in the November general election, 73.8% to 26.2%. He was sworn into his third term on January 3, 2017.
2018 Swalwell was challenged by Republican Rudy Peters of Livermore. He defeated Peters in the November general election, 73.0% to 27.0%. He was sworn into his fourth term on January 3, 2019.
2020 Swalwell won the
2020 election against Republican challenger Alison Hayden, 70.9% to 29.1%.
2022 In early 2022, Swalwell was
redistricted to
California's 14th congressional district. He went up against and defeated Republican Alison Hayden, 69.3% to 30.7%. He was sworn into his sixth term on January 3, 2023.
2024 Swalwell was challenged by Republican Vin Kruttiventi. He defeated Kruttiventi in the November
general election, 67.8% to 32.2%. He was sworn into his seventh and final term on January 3, 2025.
Tenure , 2020In his first term, Swalwell served on the House Committee on Homeland Security and the House Committee on Science, Space and Technology. He helped lead the fight against Transportation Security Administration administrator
John S. Pistole's decision to lift the ban on pocketknives at airport security; the decision eventually was reversed. During a House vote on June 18, 2013, Swalwell used his mobile phone to record a video of his vote against a bill that would ban abortions after 20 weeks (the video was a six-second clip of him pressing the "nay" button on the electronic voting machine) and uploaded it to
Vine, an internet video service. House rules bar "the use of mobile electronic devices that impair decorum" and provide that "No device may be used for still photography or for audio or video recording." The bill allowed Americans to deduct from their 2013 taxes any charitable donations made between January 1 and April 15, 2014, for the relief of victims in the Republic of the
Philippines of
Typhoon Haiyan. By the end of his first term, Swalwell had gotten three bills through the House and two of them signed into law—more than any other freshman. In 2014, Swalwell announced that he would serve as chairman of Maryland Governor
Martin O'Malley's O' Say Can You See PAC's Young Professionals Leadership Circle due to his friendship with O'Malley. Although he made clear that his support was about the 2014 midterm elections and not an endorsement of a potential presidential bid by O'Malley in 2016, Swalwell endorsed O'Malley for president in July 2015. on the
Epstein files on September 17, 2025. As a member of the
House Intelligence Committee, Swalwell investigated the
links between Trump associates and Russian officials during his third term. In 2018, the
U.S. Department of Justice under the
Trump administration seized Swalwell's personal data. The
record seizure also targeted
Adam Schiff, who chaired the House Intelligence Committee. Swalwell served as an
impeachment manager during President
Donald Trump's
second impeachment trial. On March 5, 2021, Swalwell filed a civil lawsuit against Trump, Trump's son
Donald Jr., Representative
Mo Brooks, and
Rudy Giuliani, seeking damages for their alleged role in inciting the
January 6 attack on the Capitol. In January 2023, Speaker
Kevin McCarthy expelled Swalwell and
Adam Schiff from the
House Intelligence Committee.
Contact with suspected Chinese spy In December 2020, Swalwell was named in an
Axios story about suspected
Chinese spy Fang Fang (), known as Christine Fang, who, since at least 2012, had been cultivating contacts with California politicians who the Chinese government believed had promising futures in politics.
Axios reported that Fang participated in fundraising for Swalwell's 2014 congressional election bid, met Swalwell at events, and helped place an intern inside his congressional office. Swalwell ended ties with Fang in 2015 after U.S. intelligence briefed him and top members of Congress on concerns that Chinese agents were attempting to infiltrate Congress.
Axios reported that Swalwell was not accused of any impropriety, and that officials did not believe that Fang had obtained
classified information from her contacts. Swalwell suggested that someone in the Trump administration may have leaked the information to the press, as he had been a vocal critic of Trump, and had served on committees involved in both of Trump's impeachments. Following the
Axios report, Swalwell received death and
rape threats against himself and his family. In March 2021, House Minority Leader
Kevin McCarthy moved to remove Swalwell from his seat on the House Intelligence Committee; his motion was tabled on a party-line vote, 218–200–3. After McCarthy became Speaker in January 2023, he announced that he would remove Swalwell from the Intelligence committee, saying, "If you got the briefing I got from the FBI, you wouldn't have Swalwell on any committee." Swalwell characterized McCarthy's action as "purely vengeance". Intelligence Committee members are term-limited and Swalwell's membership expired in January 2023. The
House Ethics Committee opened an investigation into Swalwell in April 2021. The committee wrote him in May 2023 that the investigation had been closed with no further action while also cautioning: "...members should be conscious of the possibility that foreign governments may attempt to secure improper influence through gifts and interactions."
Resignation On April 11, 2026, in the wake of
sexual misconduct allegations which caused Swalwell to drop out of the
2026 California gubernatorial election,
Axios reported that Congresswoman
Anna Paulina Luna intended to file a bill forcing the
expulsion of Swalwell and representative
Tony Gonzales, another member of the House of Representatives accused of sexual misconduct. On April 13, Swalwell announced his plan to resign from Congress. That same day, Gonzales announced his own resignation.
Committee assignments For the
119th Congress: •
Committee on Homeland Security •
Subcommittee on Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Protection (Ranking Member) •
Committee on the Judiciary •
Subcommittee on Courts, Intellectual Property, Artificial Intelligence, and the Internet •
Crime and Federal Government Surveillance Caucus memberships •
House Democratic Steering Committee (co-chair) •
American Sikh Congressional Caucus •
Black Maternal Health Caucus •
Congressional Asian Pacific American Caucus •
Congressional LGBT Equality Caucus •
Blue Collar Caucus •
Congressional Blockchain Caucus •
Congressional Ukraine Caucus •
Rare Disease Caucus == Political campaigns ==