LOS ANGELES — Orange County Reps. Ken Calvert (R-CA) and Young Kim (R-CA), whose districts were carved up under California’s new congressional map, are vying for the top two positions in the race for the state’s 40th Congressional District. Calvert was officially declared as one of the winners on Tuesday night. With 52% of the votes counted as of early Wednesday morning, Calvert was at 36.1% and 41,082 votes, according to the Associated Press. Kim has not yet been officially declared the second-place winner, but currently has a sizable lead over Democrat Esther Kim-Varet. The most updated results show Kim at 21.6% and 24,605 votes, and Kim-Varet at 15.6% and 17,792 votes. The campaign for the state’s 40th Congressional District has been a bruising, and at times, deeply personal primary. If Kim holds off the Democratic challenger, two Republicans would head into the general election to determine which incumbent keeps their seat in Congress.Both candidates staked their political survival on proving unwavering loyalty to President Donald Trump in the primary. It is unclear if their stance will soften leading up to the Nov. 3 general election.
If Kim holds on to her lead, the loser of the intraparty clash in November will become one of the Republican casualties of California voters’ passage of Proposition 50, a 2025 ballot measure backed by Gov. Gavin Newsom (D-CA) and state Democrats that aimed to further shrink GOP representation in an already deep-blue state. Democrats currently dominate California’s U.S. House delegation 43-9, and under district lines taking effect in the 2026 cycle, they could plausibly expand that advantage to 48 seats.
