Vince Fong brings Asian representation to central California as McCarthy's replacement
Vince Fong, the son of Chinese immigrants, is the first Asian American to represent California’s 20th district in Congress.
Over the past year, Roy Sekine volunteered and helped organize fundraisers to ensure that Vince Fong became the first Asian American congressman to represent his hometown of Bakersfield in California’s 20th District, which covers the state’s deeply conservative farm belt.
Sekine, who’s Japanese American and a retired technology services supervisor, said he believes Fong embodies the changing values and politics of an Asian electorate that’s increasingly concerned with rising crime rates and costs of living and has become disillusioned with the state’s ruling party.
“Most Asians in Congress are Democrats. They always talk about Trump but they never talk about crime,” Sekine, 64, said. “I hate Asian elderly being targeted. I want an orderly society.”
Fong, a former California State Assembly member, was sworn in earlier this month to succeed former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy, securing Republicans a crucial six-seat majority in the House of Representatives. Endorsed by McCarthy and former president Donald Trump, Fong ran on a staunchly conservative platform of reining in fiscal spending, lowering taxes and bolstering law enforcement to fight crime.
Fong, 44, says progressives have “moved in a direction that’s antithetical” to principles that are important to Asian Americans.
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