Derek Tran

Born in Los Angeles County, California on December 22, 1980,^[2][3] Tran grew up in the San Gabriel Valley as the son of Vietnamese refugees.^[4] His father fled Vietnam after the 1975 Fall of Saigon as a boat person. Their boat capsized, killing his wife and children. Later, his father returned to Vietnam where he would meet Tran's mother, after which they immigrated to the United States together.^[5]

When he turned 18, Tran enlisted in the United States Army.^[6][7] He spent eight years serving.^[8] Afterward, Tran attended Bentley University, graduating with a B.S., and a J.D. from Glendale University College of Law.^[9] In 2012, he moved to Orange County, California.^[10]

Tran has worked as an attorney since 2014; he started his own firm called Tran Firm in Huntington Beach in 2020.^[11] Specifically, he has worked as a consumer rights, labor rights, and personal injury attorney.^[12] In 2023, Feher Law, a practice in Torrance, acquired Tran's firm.^[13]

Tran has served on the board of the Consumer Attorneys Association of America.^[10] He has also served as a traffic commissioner for Orange.^[14] With his wife, he co-owns a pharmacy in Anaheim and tutors underprivileged children at a nearby school.^[15]

During the 2024 House election, Tran was under fire for previously supporting legal clients who had employment terminated due to workplace incidents such as sexual harassment, sexual assault, and hanging a noose.^[16]

At the end of 2023, Tran announced that he would enter the Democratic primary in a bid to become the party's nominee for the U.S. Representative seat in California's 45th congressional district.^[15] In March, Tran secured his position as the Democratic nominee, beating another candidate, Kim Nguyen-Penaloza, by 366 votes.^[17]

After winning the March primary, Tran became the Democratic nominee to challenge Michelle Steel, a Republican running for a third term.^[18] The district is considered a "battleground district" insofar as it was won by Joe Biden in 2020 but has its seat occupied by a member of the Republican Party.^[19] Tran's campaign has emphasized the centrality of his Vietnamese American identity to his bid, as the district encompasses parts of Los Angeles County and Orange County and is considered a majority-minority district, including cities Westminster and Garden Grove, which have predominantly Vietnamese American communities, as well as Artesia and Cerritos where Asian Americans are the largest demographic by race.^[20][21] ABC 7 reported that the district was 39% Asian.^[22]

Both Steel and Tran vied for support from the district's Vietnamese community, with Steel claiming she understood and worked with the Vietnamese community in the district much better than Tran provoking Tran to respond that the claim was "insulting and disgraceful."^[22] The Asian American Action Fund subsequently condemned Steel's comments.^[19] In August 2024, the New York Post called out Tran for bringing a translator with him to interviews and events, questioning whether he was actually fluent in Vietnamese.^[23] Steel's campaign additionally used Tran's false claims of proficiency as a point of criticism.^[24] At the end of August, Tran admitted to the Los Angeles Times that he had lost his childhood fluency and has since spoken "broken Vietnamese."^[8] However, Tran's campaign additionally provided a series of video clips in which Tran occasionally spoke Vietnamese on television.^[25]

The candidates exchanged accusations of communist sympathies. Tran accused Steel's husband, Shawn, of accepting bribes from the Chinese Communist Party in exchange for information, stating that Steel thus could not be trusted with political office in the United States.^[5][26] He also drew distinctions between his own family background to that of Steel's, stating that Steel immigrated to the United States for "economic gain" while his family were refugees fleeing communism.^[27] Several Asian American leaders and organizations subsequently condemned the comment.^[28] Later, on October 22, 2024, the Los Angeles Times reported that Steel's campaign was sending out campaign mailers associating Tran with Mao Zedong and accusing him of supporting socialism. Following Tran's disclosure in August that he held cryptocurrencies, Steel also claimed that his cryptocurrency assets were bound up in China.^[5] Steel defended her accusation asserting it was provoked by Tran's earlier messaging.^[29] The mutual accusations caused several Asian American nonprofits to pen a letter to both parties stating that such rhetoric should not be used in the race.^[22]

In October, Hakeem Jeffries stumped for Tran at a party event in Anaheim, stating that the race would be close.^[30] Later in the month, Bill Clinton appeared in Orange County to stump for Tran as well as Dave Min, a state senator in a similarly tight race.^[31]

Tran lives in Orange with his wife, Michelle, and their three children.^[4][35] He is a fan of electronic dance music.^[14] Tran is a Buddhist.^[36]