Rep. Ken Calvert is projected to defeat Rep. Young Kim in California’s 40th Congressional District, according to preliminary results from Decision Desk HQ. The contest placed two Republican incumbents against each other after California voters approved Proposition 50 last year, bringing parts of their existing districts together.
With 69 percent reporting on November 10, Calvert had received 53.5 percent of the vote, compared with 46.5 percent for Kim. That gave him an advantage of about 7 percentage points in the preliminary count. Decision Desk HQ’s projection favored Calvert while the reported results remained incomplete.
The redrawn 40th District combines Calvert’s 41st District with Kim’s 40th. Its boundaries extend across part of Orange County and the Inland Empire in San Bernardino County. Mission Viejo, Corona, Lake Elsinore and Rancho Santa Margarita are among the cities included in the new constituency.
The matchup meant one of the two California Republicans would lose a House seat regardless of which candidate prevailed. Both lawmakers had represented substantial portions of the territory brought into the new district. Calvert, however, retained a larger share of his previous constituency within the new boundaries than Kim did.
Calvert first won election to the House in 1992 and is the longest-serving Republican in California’s congressional delegation. A lifelong Corona resident, he has served on the House Appropriations Committee as chair of its Defense Appropriations Subcommittee. He also chairs the California Republican House Delegation.
During the campaign, Calvert emphasized his conservative record and drew attention to a vote Kim cast in 2021, the Los Angeles Times reported. Kim had joined Democrats in voting against a Trump-era rule that sought to roll back regulations governing methane emissions.
Calvert also presented himself as a consistent conservative at a Murrieta rally with Republican gubernatorial candidate Steve Hilton and Republican state Assembly member Carl DeMaio. Speaking to Spectrum News in October, he said his positions had remained unchanged over three decades and pledged to continue providing common-sense governance.
Several major conservative and Republican organizations in California endorsed Calvert. His supporters also included other Republican candidates in the state, among them Hilton and Riverside County Sheriff Chad Bianco, a former gubernatorial candidate.
