California State Board of Equalization representing the 4th district, which encompasses Imperial, Orange, Riverside, and San Diego counties, as well as small portions of Los Angeles and San Bernardino counties. She came in second place in the June 3 nonpartisan blanket primary with 34.0% of the vote, and subsequently won the November general election by a margin of 61.6% to 38.4%. In 2017 she was selected by her colleagues on the board to serve as board chair. She chose not to seek reelection in 2018, choosing instead to run for Congress to represent California's 49th congressional district. Her term on the board ended in January 2019. Tenure Harkey represents the communities of Aliso Viejo, Coto De Caza, Dana Point, Ladera Ranch, Laguna Hills, Laguna Niguel, Mission Viejo, Rancho Santa Margarita, California, San Clemente, San Juan Capistrano, and Trabuco Canyon. Harkey has been an outspoken opponent of California High-Speed Rail, introducing several pieces of legislation to defund the project. In 2017, the California Department of Finance audited the Board of Equalization and found a conference in Harkey's district had brought in 98 board employees to perform duties including "registration, parking lot duty, and break area facilitation". Harkey denied that she was involved in redirecting staff to these activities. In 2017, a California State Personnel Board audit of the California State Board of Equalization recommended the dismissal of one of Harkey's aides. The audit found that the aide was allowed to work from the agency's New York office, and that Harkey's staff "used their positions of authority to improperly influence, and arguably pressure, BOE executives to ensure placement" of the aide to a permanent civil service position. Interest group ratings As of 2008, Harkey had received an "A" lifetime rating from the NRA. As of 2013, Harkey had a 100% rating from the Capitol Resource Institute, a socially conservative interest group in California. In a March 2016 opinion piece, Harkey noted that while gas prices around the U.S. had recently dropped dramatically, California prices had stayed high. She pointed out that even though the State Board of Equalization had approved decreases in the state gas tax, prices had not gone down accordingly. The reason for this, she explained, was "overreaching regulatory policies", such as "the cap and trade and low-carbon fuel fees". Harkey has a 100% rating from the California Taxpayers Association, and an "A−" grade from the anti-tax Howard Jarvis Taxpayers