In Orange County, a Key House Race Could Come Down to Little Saigon Voters

Representative Michelle Steel is facing her toughest fight yet in a crucial swing district in Orange County, Calif., where Vietnamese American voters hold so much sway that Little Saigon has become the center of the campaign.

Ms. Steel, a two-term Republican congresswoman, is facing Derek Tran, a Democrat who served in the Army and is a second-generation Vietnamese American. Democrats are hoping that the veteran son of Vietnamese refugees will be a compelling sell to Vietnamese American voters in California’s 45th District.

In the final weeks before the election, the race has grown hostile, and Ms. Steel has taken the unexpected tack of insisting that she is more attuned to Vietnamese Americans as a first-generation Korean American whose parents fled Communist-run North Korea. She says that she has long represented Little Saigon, an enclave that bridges the cities of Westminster and Garden Grove, and knows the neighborhood better than her opponent.

She has also tried to portray Mr. Tran as a Communist sympathizer despite having little evidence, a tactic heavily criticized as “redbaiting” that she used to great effect two years ago when she beat another Democratic challenger who was Asian American.

Mr. Tran, a consumer rights lawyer, has leaned heavily on his Vietnamese roots. His main campaign sign echoes the yellow and red-striped flag of South Vietnam — intended to remind voters that the candidate with one of the most common Vietnamese surnames is one of their own.

He has taken particular umbrage at Ms. Steel’s claim to Vietnamese authenticity.

“She comes into our community and she tells us, ‘I know what it’s like to be an immigrant like you all,’” Mr. Tran said in an interview this month at a restaurant in Little Saigon. “No, you do not. You did not lose your country.”