Representative Tran Questions Vietnamese American Navy Secretary Hung Cao in Historic Armed Services Committee Hearing

Washington, DC – Today, U.S. Representative Derek Tran (CA-45) made history as the first Vietnamese American Congressmember to question a Vietnamese American official before the House Armed Services Committee on Capitol Hill. Representative Tran urged Hung Cao, Acting Secretary of the Navy and the highest-ranking Vietnamese American in the U.S. Armed Services, to join him in the fight to free political prisoners in Vietnam.
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As the son of Vietnamese refugees who escaped brutal communist repression in Vietnam, Representative Tran marked his historic questioning of Secretary Cao as a testament to the Vietnamese community’s resilience in the face of the ongoing struggle for freedom. Tran highlighted the responsibility he shares with Cao to fight back against Vietnam’s human rights abuses and to liberate those wrongfully imprisoned by the communist government.
An excerpt of Representative Tran’s question line is as follows:
Representative Tran: Thank you for being here. Mr. Secretary, congratulations on your appointment. Today is a historic day. For the first time, a Vietnamese American defense official stands before a Vietnamese American Member of Congress. This moment belongs to our parents and every soul who traded everything for a chance at liberty. You and I carry the weight of a diaspora that has never forgotten the sting of oppression. We are the living voice for those silenced by the communist Vietnamese government. We have a moral mandate to hold that regime accountable for its relentless human rights violations. I pray you will stand with me in that fight. We must also ensure the freedom we found here reaches across the Pacific. We must maintain a presence so formidable, the Chinese Communist Party understands the Indo-Pacific will never be surrendered to autocracy. This is our moment to lead, not just for our country, but for the legacy and the freedom we were chosen to protect. Mr. Secretary, as you know, I represent the largest Vietnamese community outside of Vietnam. Our community remains deeply concerned about the communist Vietnamese government's unlawful jailing of political prisoners. Will you commit to joining me in calling for Vietnam to free political prisoners and prisoners of conscience?
Secretary Cao: Congressman, thank you so much for your kind words, sir. Again, I owe this country everything, and I've bled for this country. And I will die for this country, for everything that has given me. And again, a lot of my family members were imprisoned wrongfully, and we need to always stand up against oppression. And that's our job as the United States – we didn't ask for this. We didn't ask to be the policeman of the world. We didn't ask to defend. But that's how it is, sir. And we will always fight injustice in this country.
Representative Tran: Sir, thank you. I appreciate you standing with me on this.
As the first Vietnamese American elected to represent the world’s largest Vietnamese diaspora, Representative Tran is committed to preserving and amplifying the Vietnamese community’s history on the national stage. Tran introduced a congressional resolution to formally mark April 30, 2026, as the 51st anniversary of Black April, and, in April 2025, held a series of events in commemoration of the 50th anniversary of the fall of Saigon. Tran, a vocal advocate for advancing human rights in Vietnam, co-led H.R. 3122, the bipartisan Vietnam Human Rights Act, to hold Vietnamese communist officials accountable for human rights abuses and establish human rights and fair-trade priorities for U.S.-Vietnam relations. Representative Tran serves as the official sponsor of Le Huu Minh Tuan, a Vietnamese journalist who was wrongfully imprisoned by the communist government, through the Tom Lantos Human Rights Commission’s Defending Freedoms Project and continues to fight for the release of prisoners of conscience around the world.
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Congressman Derek Tran represents California’s 45th Congressional District. Serving his first term in Congress, Congressman Tran is a member of the House Armed Services Committee and House Small Business Committee, where he is Ranking Member of the Oversight, Investigations, and Regulations Subcommittee. Congressman Tran is the son of Vietnamese refugees, a Veteran, and fought for consumers as an attorney before entering Congress.