 In the Garcia stood for National in the electorate and was placed 50 on their party list.He came second to Deborah Russell with 38.55% of the vote and was not ranked high enough on National's party list to be allocated a seat in Parliament.In February 2018 Garcia and several other "next in line" list candidates attended National's parliamentary caucus meeting to help ease their transition into parliament should they enter during the course of the parliamentary term.