Your guide to the California Congressional District 45 race: Derek Tran faces five challengers
Incumbent Democrat Derek Tran will square off against five Republican challengers — Tom Vo, Chi Charlie Nguyen, Chuong Vo, Amy Phan West and Mark Leonard — in the June 2 primary election to represent California's 45th Congressional District.
Tran was a political newcomer when he captured the seat by a little more than 600 votes in 2024 against Michelle Steel, a two-time incumbent Republican.
Democrats hold an 8-percentage-point voter registration advantage in a district that spans parts of north Orange County and Los Angeles County. About 25% of voters in the district are listed as having no party preference.
Read more: Voter guide to the 2026 California primary election
Who are the candidates?
Tran , 45, is an attorney and U.S. Army veteran who runs a pharmacy with his wife, Michelle. He is the son of refugees who fled communist Vietnam and grew up in the San Gabriel Valley.
Tran's first term included small victories for his constituents, including helping trim processing time for small businesses and individuals looking for Social Security and small business loan payouts totaling $5 million this year , his office reported. He also delivered $1 million to the city of Cypress for flood prevention infrastructure .
He also has championed bills, such as the Warrior Act , which codifies a woman's ability to serve in combat in the Armed Forces. He and Republican Rep. Don Bacon (Neb.) also teamed to author the Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Foreign Interference Safeguard Act , which aims to protect such entities against hacking and cyber warfare.
Tom Vo was born in Vietnam, served as a fighter pilot for the Army of the Republic of Vietnam and moved to Southern California as a refugee after the Vietnam War. He opened a taekwondo studio with several locations throughout Southern California and also has worked as a real estate agent.
Chi Charlie Nguyen, the mayor of Westminster, previously served as a City Council member and a board member for the city's waste management service.
Nguyen, 61, said he fled Vietnam at age 14 after his father was taken to a "reeducation camp."
"America has given me the opportunity to realize my dreams, start a family, build a career and serve my community," he said in an email. "So, I am running for Congress to give back, and to fight against the radical left wing, which sometimes makes me wonder whether I'm living in a Communist country again."
Chuong Vo served as the mayor of Cerritos while a member of the city council from 2020 to 2025. Vo, 50, recently retired after working as an officer for the Torrance Police Department since 1999.
He considers himself a natural problem solver and was asked by friends and community leaders to run, he said on his campaign website.
"I planned my retirement around spending more time with my son through his last years of high school," he said in a statement . "Since then, crime rose, costs climbed, and politics got meaner and less honest."
Amy Phan West, 45, is the second member of the Westminster City Council vying for the congressional seat.
Phan West’s parents fled Vietnam in a fishing boat in 1985 and, after two years in a refugee camp, they received asylum in the United States, according to her campaign website.
She and her husband, Jeremy, own a rental car business, and Phan West, a Republican, said in her candidate's statement that she “stood up to defend President Trump and the America First movement."
Mark Leonard, 36, is a U.S. Marine Corps veteran and an operations analyst who's running because he thinks this district deserves a candidate "who shows up for everyone."
He said he shops at the same stores and faces the same issues as the families he speaks with. His time in the Marine Corps taught him that leadership means putting others first, and his background in business and analysis has meant learning to cut through the noise and focus on what actually works.
His three main issues are housing costs, job security and healthcare.
Where is the district?
The 45th Congressional District is located mostly in northern Orange County and includes cities such as Fullerton and Buena Park as well as Cypress, Westminster, Garden Grove and Fountain Valley.
Redistricting slightly increased the L.A. County portion of the district, which includes Norwalk, Hawaiian Gardens, Artesia and Lakewood.
The district consists of 750,000 residents, with a median voter age of 41. Asian Americans make up the biggest contingent of voting-age residents at 40%, followed by Latinos at 28% and whites at 26%, according to the California Target Book.
Tran became the first Vietnamese American to represent a district that is home to Little Saigon.
How much they have raised and spent
Where they stand on affordability and housing
Tran has railed against "Washington insiders" who continue to "give tax breaks to their corporate donors and special interests" at the cost of families getting squeezed by rising prices. He's also expressed his intention to "make the minimum wage a living wage."
He said that if Democrats capture the majority in the midterms, the House "can focus on providing more financial assistance to help families access homeownership." Tran would work to expand programs, such as the Low-Income Housing Tax Credit, to incentivize developers to build more affordable units, and to provide direct mortgage relief and down payment assistance to first-time homebuyers.
Nguyen said Westminster has partnered with Orange County and private developers to build affordable housing projects, counting "at least four different locations for affordable housing."
"The city helps by providing land use approvals and support, while other partners help fund and develop the projects," he said.
Leonard said he's spoken with families across the district "who are one rent increase away from having to leave communities they've lived in for decades."
"Local zoning changes and state-level fixes have been tried, and they haven't moved the needle, which means Congress needs to use the levers it actually controls: tax incentives, funding and cutting the regulatory barriers that make building so slow and expensive," he said.
Tom Vo has said in campaign materials that "our communities face rising costs, threats to public safety, and a Washington that too often forgets the hardworking Americans who keep this country strong."
Chuong Vo said families are struggling with a variety of costs, including gas, groceries and insurance. He would audit government agencies to eliminate waste and fraud and streamline the infrastructure permitting process.
"I’ll vote to cut wasteful spending that fuels inflation, protect Social Security and Medicare for today’s seniors, and apply a mayor’s discipline to every dollar, targeting fraud and duplication rather than just ask taxpayers to pay more," he said.
Phan West has said in campaign materials that the road back to affordability includes slashing wasteful spending, slicing through regulations and stopping tax hikes.
She also believes energy independence will help lower gas prices.
Where they stand on homelessness
Westminster built the Central Cities Navigation Center in 2024 in partnership with Garden Grove and Fountain Valley. The facility hosts 85 beds with the capacity to expand to 100 and includes a mix of dormitories, lavatories, a kitchen and laundry facilities.
"We have contributed millions of dollars to purchase land for this resource center, giving the homeless an opportunity to rebuild their lives," Nguyen said.
Chuong Vo said the federal government spends billions "with too little to show." He said funding should come with accountability about outcomes, including treatment, shelter and recovery programs that move people off the streets. He also supports enforcing no-camping rules near schools and parks.
"And we’ll treat fentanyl like the public-safety emergency it is," he said.
Tran pointed to his support of a bipartisan spending bill that included more than $1 million for the Hope Center in Fullerton to hire and train licensed professionals to work with people experiencing homelessness, mental illness or addiction.
"There is certainly more work to be done," he said. "I support commonsense policies that seek to improve mental health services and ensure that our officers have the resources they need to perform their duties safely and effectively."
Leonard said California has invested billions, and homelessness has gotten worse.
"[That] tells you the issue isn't just funding, it's also how that money gets used and whether anyone is actually measuring results," he said. He believes in housing-first models but worries about implementation and accountability.
"There's also an economic case that doesn't get made enough: It costs far more to cycle someone through emergency rooms, jail and shelters than to keep them housed in the first place," he said. "And a big part of what keeps people stuck is the welfare cliff, where earning slightly more income triggers a loss of benefits that's bigger than the raise, so the rational decision is to stay dependent rather than work your way out."
Past coverage
Read more: Democrat Derek Tran ousts Republican Michelle Steel in competitive Orange County House race
Read more: Will a Vietnamese American candidate help Democrats win a congressional seat in Little Saigon?
Read more: Federal court upholds California's new congressional districts in a victory for Democrats
Read more: Westminster City Council meetings continue to be disruptive despite new rules
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This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times .
