With less than three months until Election Day, one congressional candidate’s past work as an attorney representing someone accused of sexual assault is being called into question by his opponent.
That attention on previous work underscores the volatility and competitive nature of the race in California’s 45th congressional district. It also highlights just how much gender-based issues — like sexual violence and abortion — are playing a role in the 2024 elections, including this closely-watched race.
Rep. Michelle Steel‘s campaign accused Derek Tran, a Democratic challenger in the race, of designing a legal case to blame sexual assault victims for why a person accused of such was fired from a job.
Tran, an attorney, represented a former Costco employee accused of sexually assaulting three female coworkers and was subsequently fired. That former employee switched his legal representation earlier this year, but when Tran was still representing him, he wrote in a March 2022 complaint that his client was “discriminated against for his gender due to the political climate and ‘me too’ movement.”
Launched by activist Tarana Burke in 2006, the Me Too movement became widely known in 2017 after actress Alyssa Milano posted a message on Twitter (now X) encouraging her followers to write “me too” as a reply to her tweet if they’ve been “sexually harassed or assaulted.”
It became a cultural shift of sorts thereafter, empowering victims of sexual violence, abuse and harassment, particularly in the workplace, to speak out.
According to court documents, Tran’s former client was accused in 2021, while working at a San Bernardino Costco warehouse, of sexually assaulting three of his female co-workers. While he maintained they “engaged in consensual sexual acts,” Costco, according to the complaint, terminated him. He then sued Costco and the managers for allegedly unfairly firing him, alleging that they “conducted a sham investigation” and sided with the female employees without considering his explanation of what happened because of his gender. A judge recently ruled the case should go to trial.
The Steel campaign and the National Republican Congressional Committee are using the case — namely, the language used in the original complaint — in campaign emails and on social media to portray Tran’s work as “deeply disturbing.”
“For Derek Tran to craft a legal theory that actually blames the victims of rape and sexual assault simply to help him make a buck off Costco is beyond repulsive,” said Lance Trover, a spokesperson for the Steel campaign.
But Richard Hasen, a professor at UCLA School of Law, said the positions attorneys take while representing their clients don’t necessarily reflect their personal views.
“An attorney who takes on a client must zealously advocate for a client and take positions, consistent with the attorney’s ethical obligations, to put forward arguments in the client’s best interest,” Hasen said. “Such positions do not necessarily reflect the personal views of the attorney. This is especially true of criminal defense lawyers but can apply in other contexts as well.”
In 2023, Torrance-based Feher Law acquired Tran’s firm and took over all active cases in litigation, including this one. The firm “fully analyzes and vets all cases it litigates and takes to trial ensuring they are with merit,” said founding attorney Tom Feher.
“My job as workers’ rights and injury attorney is to uphold the law and obtain justice for workers and injured victims — it’s not about politics,” Feher said.
But the case has become a point in the political campaign, as have other gender-related issues.
Steel, said Orrin Evans, a spokesperson for Tran, is “the last person to be lecturing anyone on what it means to protect survivors and victims,” pointing to her votes related to equal pay and reauthorizing the Violence Against Women Act.
And the issue of reproductive health care, too, has played a role this campaign cycle.
In January, Steel was in the hot seat for adding her name as co-sponsor to legislation — nearly a year old at the time — that proponents said ensures the rights of the unborn while others likened it to a national abortion ban.
A spokesperson for Steel then said that the congresswoman is “pro-life with the exceptions of rape, incest and the health and life of the mother and does not support a national ban on abortion.”
Steel withdrew her name from the legislation two months later, saying she does not support federal restrictions on in vitro fertilization, an infertility treatment that helps women become pregnant.
During the primary, Tran’s campaign regularly alluded to Steel’s stance on abortion on social media, calling her “too extreme for California.”
Fred Smoller, associate professor of political science at Chapman University, said gender-based issues, especially abortion, have been extremely important in recent elections since Roe v. Wade, a landmark Supreme Court case that recognized abortion as a constitutional right, was overturned in June 2022.
The race in CA-45 is no different, Smoller said, pointing to the 2022 election when voters in the district backed Proposition 1, a constitutional amendment that enshrined protections for abortion rights in California’s constitution.
In November, Steel, a two-term incumbent, will face Tran, who hopes to represent CA-45 as its first Vietnamese member of Congress. CA-45, one of several Republican-held House districts that went for President Joe Biden in 2020, is home to the largest Vietnamese enclave outside of Vietnam.
While a recent poll commissioned by the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee shows Tran neck-and-neck with Steel, election analyst Cook Political Report pegs the race as “lean Republican.”
