Democrat Derek Tran has defeated Republican incumbent Michelle Steel for a House seat representing California’s Orange County and Los Angeles, NBC News projects, after a contentious race that centered on the candidates’ Asian American identities and use of aggressive anti-China messaging.
Tran, an Army veteran, narrowly won in a race that came down to just a few hundred votes. His victory over Steel flips the 45th Congressional District blue, making it one of two districts to do so in a state that has largely shifted right.
The results come after an expensive race, with more than $34 million spent in the district, according to OpenSecrets, an organization that tracks spending in politics. Tran has performed better with voters in Los Angeles County, where he has had a significant lead over Steel. But the race is tighter in Orange County, the bulk of the district, where voters have repeatedly flipped between red and blue over the past election cycles.
Throughout their campaigns, Tran and Steel aggressively courted Asian Americans, who make up 39% of the population as the largest racial demographic in the area. The pair have opened up about their own backgrounds in an effort to cast themselves as the best representatives of the group.
Steel, 69, who in 2020 became one of the first three Korean American women elected to Congress, immigrated to the U.S. in her early 20s, opening a clothing store with her family. She previously served as a supervisor and chairwoman of the Orange County Board of Supervisors before running for Congress.
“From the moment I came to the United States, I knew that giving back to the country that welcomed me with open arms would be part of my future,” Steel said in a post to X on Wednesday. “The journey to work on behalf of legal immigrants and struggling families took me somewhere I never could have imagined — and for which I will always be grateful — the United States Congress.”
“I owe a debt of gratitude to my supporters, my staff, my family, my daughters and especially my husband, Shawn, for standing by me through endless campaigns. To my volunteers, we would never have made it this far without your tireless efforts,” she continued. “And, to the voters, thank you.”
Tran, 44, the son of Vietnamese refugees, is a newcomer to running for public office. After serving in the military, Tran worked as a consumer rights attorney and currently sits on the board of the Consumer Attorneys of California.
Tran’s Vietnamese heritage has been a large focus of his campaign in a race in which both candidates are vying for the Vietnamese electorate, the largest Asian ethnicity in Orange County. Steel said in an October interview with VietFace TV that she is “more Vietnamese than my opponent.”
“My opponent might have a Vietnamese name, but I understand the Vietnamese community,” Steel said.
Tran described the comments as “deplorable and insulting to our entire Vietnamese-American community.”
“My father lost his first wife and four children escaping Vietnam,” Tran wrote on X. “Michelle can’t steal our identity or experiences.”
While running on different platforms, the two contenders both heavily turned to anti-communist and anti-China messaging to capture the Vietnamese community, a largely refugee population who have reported in the past that their votes have, in part, been informed by experiences fleeing communism. Tran has promised to stand firm against “Chinese Communist rule.” Steel similarly said that she is committed to “standing up to Communist China.”
The messaging has divided Asian Americans in the district, with voters and organizations criticizing the candidates, saying they were “red-baiting,” or accusing each other of having communist ties as an attack. Don Luong, a history teacher and longtime Orange County voter, said the back-and-forth has distracted from the candidates’ actual platforms.
“I think it’s disrespectful to me as a voter, as an American, because you can just throw these catchphrases out there that really are emotional,” Luong said. “We’re not even talking about their issues or anything.”
Despite their shared attitudes toward communism, the candidates have exchanged jabs on the subject, connecting each other to China through mailers and ads.
Steel has linked Tran to socialism in previous mailers. Tran did not respond to NBC News’ request for comment, but he previously labeled Steel’s ads as “xenophobic.” He had also posted Facebook ads linking Steel’s husband to Chinese spies, based on a 2020 Wall Street Journal report.
Steel’s campaign did not expand on the red-baiting accusations, but pointed to a previous letter to Tran that condemned his accusations that Steel wasn’t a refugee and didn’t flee communism.
Luong said that while red-baiting can be effective among older Asian Americans, particularly those who fled Vietnam themselves, it isn’t appealing to all voters in the area. And as younger generations become more politically active, Luong said that candidates will have to shift away from relying on anti-communist and anti-China rhetoric to make a difference.
“People my age, I’m in my 40s now, everyone sees the red-baiting,” Luong said. “They see it for what it is.”
In an open letter signed by more than a dozen groups, nonprofit leaders called on both parties in Orange County to caution candidates against using rhetoric that “implies falsely that political candidates of Asian descent or those perceived to be of Asian descent are national security threats.”
“There is no excuse for political candidates using racialized scapegoating to attack their opponents,” the letter said. “Voters see through the scapegoating and are looking for solutions, not for finger-pointing. Words have consequences, and the consequences can and have been fatal.”
Tran’s victory is a rare shift toward the left in a state that largely moved right. Notably, California voters also demonstrated a shift toward more conservative crime policies.
Oakland Mayor Sheng Thao and Alameda County District Attorney Pamela Price were ousted by roughly 2 to 1 in races earlier this month, largely due to voters’ discontent around the Bay Area’s sense of safety. California voters also overwhelmingly favored Proposition 36, which heightens punishments for certain misdemeanors, and they rejected a ban on forced labor in any form, including prisons.
Separately, Republican Rep. Mariannette Miller-Meeks won re-election in her House race for Iowa’s 1st Congressional District, NBC News also projected Wednesday. She narrowly fended off Democratic challenger Christina Bohannan, holding onto her seat by less than one percentage point. Miller-Meeks also faced Bohannan in 2022 but won by a wider margin of nearly seven percentage points.
In a statement on X, Miller-Meeks said she was “looking forward to getting back to work in Washington to lower prices at the gas pump grocery store and on prescription drugs, secure the border and help farmers.”
This article was originally published on NBCNews.com
