(The Center Square) — With election day one week away, GOP Senate candidate Hung Cao continues to trail longtime incumbent Democratic Virginia Sen. Tim Kaine in the polls.
Despite having an endorsement from former President Donald Trump, Cao lags Kaine in the latest poll from the Washington Post and George Mason University’s Schar School of Policy and Government by 13%.
In another recent poll from Christopher Newport University, Cao trailed Kaine by 7%.
Cao, a retired U.S. Navy captain, came to the U.S. “as a refugee from Vietnam in 1975,” according to his campaign website. He served as a Special Operations Officer with the Navy and later worked for Homeland Security and the FBI Joint Terrorism Task Force.
Immigration has featured prominently in Cao’s campaign. He has called what’s happening at the border an “invasion,” advocating for a strong wall coupled with advanced technology and better support for border patrol and border states. He has also spoken often about Harris’ “socialist” policies that he says would “turn our country into the places our families escaped from.”
Cao is relatively new to politics, having run for office only once before, in 2022, against District 10 Rep. Jennifer Wexton, a Democrat. He emerged from the primary with over 52% of the vote but failed to unseat Wexton, ultimately finishing 6.5% behind the Democratic incumbent, 46.7% to her 53.2%. The district is considered one of the more competitive among Virginia’s 11 House of Representatives districts, according to the nonprofit Virginia Public Access Project, comprised mostly of Loudoun (53.8%), Prince William (25.7%) and Fauquier (10%) counties.
Kaine is practically a household name in Virginia, having maintained a position in state-level politics since 2006. He served as governor from 2006 to 2010, was Hillary Clinton’s vice presidential running mate in 2016 and has been a senator since 2013.
Voting rights, health care, education and access to high-paying jobs have played a large role in Kaine’s campaign.
“The strength of our democracy depends on people’s ability to make their voices heard. I will always fight to strengthen voting rights—a right we’ve all got to use right now in this critical election,” Kaine wrote in a recent post on X.