Cate ran against three other opponents during the primary; and ran against Carol Kim during the general election. Cate was first elected to office in the 2014 election, the first election to use the new boundaries for this district following 2010 redistricting. District 6 includes the neighborhoods of Clairemont Mesa, Kearny Mesa, Mira Mesa, North Clairemont, and Rancho Peñasquitos. The redistricting effort included an effort by Asian Pacific Islanders to create a district that represented the inclusion of their more diverse population. When Cate took office, he was the first Asian American elected to the city council in several decades. In 2015, at the age of 32, Cate was the youngest serving city councilmember in San Diego. Cate is only the second Asian American to be elected to the San Diego City Council, the first being Tom Hom. In 2016, Cate received national attention as the Chargers attacked him for his opposition to Measure C, a ballot initiative to provide public funding for a new stadium for the team. The measure failed to achieve the two-thirds needed to pass, receiving less than a majority of the vote; Cate said of the vote "San Diego voters know a bad deal when they see it,". For his willingness to lead the opposition, the Voice of San Diego wrote positively of Cate. After the election, Cate supported an effort to lease the Qualcomm Stadium site for a dollar, but the Chargers instead decided in 2017 to relocate to Los Angeles. In his first year in office, Cate's district saw a growth of the brewing industry in his district, with part of it being called the "beer belt". In 2016, while other members of the city council were looking to ban vacation rentals, Cate advanced a proposal to allow for regulated vacation rentals. In February 2017, Cate supported tax reform for Internet taxes, in an effort to ensure the city was receiving a proportionate share of the state's internet tax revenue; Cate argues that with increase commerce online, the city is losing out funding for city services. According to the San Diego Office of the City Clerk, Cate is a member of the following committees and sub-committees:
In 2016, Cate was criticized in the San Diego Reader for accepting a five-thousand dollar donation from San Diego Gas & Electric for a charity event, which the paper claimed was an attempt to purchase influence.
2017 SoccerCity Memo Leak
In June 2017, Cate leaked a confidential 16-page memo regarding legal questions related to the SoccerCity initiative to the initiative's funders, FS Investors. San Diego City AttorneyMara Elliott called the leak “an egregious breach of public trust”. In October 2017, facing questions from a related lawsuit, Cate admitted he was the one to leak the memo, and that he would not resign. The California Attorney General was handed the case by the San Diego City Attorney. In December 2017, San Diego's Ethics Commission levied its maximum fine of $5,000 for the leak, which Cate paid. In 2018, Cate was informed that he would not face criminal charges.
