Raul Campillo

Raul Armando Campillo^[1] (born October 4, 1987) is an American attorney and politician who has served as a member of the San Diego City Council since 2020, representing District 7.

A member of the Democratic Party, he represents the neighborhoods of Allied Gardens, Del Cerro, Linda Vista, Grantville, San Carlos, Serra Mesa, Tierrasanta, Lake Murray, and parts of Mission Valley.^[2]

Campillo was born in San Diego, California and raised in El Cajon. He graduated from University of San Diego High School in 2005, where he was valedictorian. He then obtained a Bachelor of Arts degree in government, cum laude, from Harvard University.^[3][4]

Campillo taught as a fifth grade teacher in Las Vegas, Nevada, while completing a Master's degree in education at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas. He later returned to Harvard, where he earned a Juris Doctor from Harvard Law School.^[5]

After law school, he joined the law firm O'Melveny & Myers,^[6] where he practiced litigation and conducted white-collar criminal investigations. He later returned to San Diego to work as a Deputy City Attorney under then-San Diego City Attorney Mara Elliott.^[4]

In 2020, Campillo ran for the district 7 seat on the San Diego City Council vacated by Scott Sherman, who was ineligible for re-election due to term limits. He finished first in the nonpartisan primary election with 35.8% of the vote. He went on to defeat Republican Noli Zosa in the November 2020 general election with 55.0% of the vote.^[7]

Campillo ran unopposed for re-election in the 2024 San Diego City Council election, winning the election outright in the March 2024 primary.^[8] In January 2025, Campillo stated that he was “seriously considering” a run for mayor of San Diego in the 2028 election.^[9]

Campillo voted in favor of a city council ordinance in 2023 that allowed police to remove homeless encampments on public property if city shelter beds were available, which passed in a 5–4 vote.^[10] Campillo has been a proponent of creating "safe sleeping" sites where individuals who live out of their vehicles can park instead of parking within residential neighborhoods, saying "[e]very safe parking lot we’ve had in the City of San Diego has been a success, a smart investment, actually spending money in the right way."^[11]

Campillo was a vocal opponent of the City Council's decision to charge for trash collection for the first time in a century. Campillo labeled the fee a "bait-and-switch" after the public was led to believe the fee would be a maximum of $29 per month in 2022, when the final total was over $43 per month.^[12]

Campillo has supported strengthening public safety through policing and technology. Notably, Campillo amended a city ordinance to allow San Diego Police Department's collaboration with federal task forces on issues ranging from firearm trafficking to child trafficking.^[13] Campillo has voted in support of Flock Safety automatic number-plate recognition cameras used by the San Diego Police Department for the purposes of identifying cars involved in serious crimes while also voting to prohibit dissemination of that data with out-of-state law enforcement agencies.^[14][15][16]

Campillo lives in the Del Cerro neighborhood of San Diego with his wife, Nadia Farjood, and their son and daughter. Campillo is Catholic.^[4][17]

In 2023, Campillo and his family were hit in a vehicle collision involving a drunk driver, though no serious injuries were reported.^[18]