In a bitter battle southeast of Los Angeles, Republican Rep. Michelle Steel defeated Democrat Jay Chen in a district designed specifically to give Asian Americans, who make up the largest group in the area, a stronger voice on Capitol Hill. It includes the nation’s largest Vietnamese community. East of Los Angeles, Republican Rep. Ken Calvert scored a victory over Democrat Will Rollins. With 80 percent of the vote counted, Calvert, the longest-serving Republican in California’s congressional delegation, built a nearly 5,500-vote lead in the contest. Ten state races remained undecided as vote counting continued, though only a few were considered tight enough to break either way. 218 seats are needed to control the Parliament. Republicans have so far locked up 217 seats, with Democrats up for 205. If Democrats fail to protect their fragile majority, Republican Rep. Kevin McCarthy of Bakersfield will be in line to replace Speaker Nancy Pelosi of San Francisco. In the 45th District, anchored in Orange County, Steele, a South Korean immigrant seeking a second term in Congress, faced Chen, a Navy reservist and the son of Taiwanese immigrants. The race was watched nationally for what it says about the preferences of the Asian community. The candidates initially made inflation and hate crimes against Asian Americans key issues. But the match took an ugly turn and most of it focused on class and category. Chen’s ad portrayed Steel as an extremist who would threaten abortion rights, while Republicans accused Chen of “racism” after he told supporters he needed an “interpreter” to understand Steel’s comments, claiming Chen was joking her accented English. Chen said he was referring to “convoluted talking points” that he said Steel uses to sidestep issues. The story continues Steel also distributed leaflets depicting Chen as a communist sympathizer, while Chen said his grandmother fled China to escape communist rule. In California, the main House battlegrounds are Orange County — a suburban stretch southeast of Los Angeles that was once a GOP stronghold but has become increasingly diverse and Democratic — and the Central Valley, an inland region sometimes called the country’s salad bowl for its agricultural production. The tightest remaining statewide contest emerged in the Central Valley, where Democrat Adam Gray held a narrow lead after Republican John Duarte led by 84 votes in a race for an open District 13 seat. Underscoring the closeness of the contest, Gray’s campaign has formed a committee to begin raising money to fund a potential recount. These costs, which are paid to county election officials, are borne by the campaign committee or the voter who requested a recount. In general, such requests cannot be submitted before one month after the election. The most recent returns showed Gray leading by 761 votes, with nearly 80% of the vote counted. In Orange County, one of the state’s marquee races became tighter when an updated vote count showed Republican Scott Boe cutting in half the narrow margin held by Democratic Rep. Katie Porter. Porter, a star of the party’s progressive wing, led former lawmaker Baugh by about 2,900 votes — or just over 1 percentage point — with nearly 80 percent of the vote counted. In another battleground district north of Los Angeles, Republican Rep. Mike Garcia held a comfortable lead over Democrat Christy Smith in their third straight race after Garcia claimed the first two. The most recent returns – with about two-thirds of the vote counted – showed Garcia with 54.4% to Smith’s 45.6%. In a statement on Twitter, Smith said her chances of taking the seat had “diminished significantly” and “it is likely that Garcia will retain the seat.” Democrats also held significant margins in several districts, including the Central Valley’s 9th, where Democratic Rep. Josh Harder held a nearly 13-point lead over Republican Tom Patti. In the Central Valley’s 22nd District, where about half the votes have been counted, Republican Rep. David Valadao, who voted to impeach then-President Donald Trump, had a 5-point lead over Democrat Rudy Salas.
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