FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Friday, January 20, 2012
Contact: Carl Fogliani 916-365-4050 x203
 
 
(Newport Beach, CA)—The 72nd Assembly District campaign for nationally renowned engineer and self-made Republican businessman Long Pham will report a strong year-end fundraising total, in part bolstered by Dr. Pham’s personal commitment to ensure his campaign has funding needed for victory.
 
Pham, who entered the race late in December, loaned his campaign $100,000 for the period ending December 31, 2011.
 
“Entering the race late, Long Pham has quickly put together an impressive finance team, including business owners in and around Orange County who are now helping bring in new funds,” said Long Pham Strategist Tim Clark. “Long has also made a personal commitment to this race, which elevates him to the strong front-runner position for this safe Republican seat.”
 
Long Pham is well known in Orange County circles, where in 2008 he handily won County-wide election to the Orange County Board of Education. Pham was also elected by over 120,000 peers nationally to serve as Vice Chair of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME).
 
Coming to America shortly after the Vietnam War, Long Pham worked his way through an engineering degree at Penn State University. He then moved his family to Southern California where he joined Bechtel as part of their nuclear power plant design team. After the Space Shuttle Challenger disaster, Long Pham was hired by Rockwell International to create the pressure vessel certification program that improved safety for NASA. He then conducted the final certification of the new shuttle Endeavour in 1992. Following the success of that project, Dr. Pham joined Southern California Edison (SCE) as a nuclear engineer.
 
In 1996, Dr. Pham was appointed by then Governor Pete Wilson to the Regulatory Reform Roundtable Task Force. The group’s efforts resulted in repeal of 3,900 outdated regulations and simplification of over 1,700 more, as documented in Executive Order W-144-97.
 
In 2000, Long was elected nationwide (by over 125,000 engineers) as Vice President of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME) where he was a key player in fighting for and passing the federal higher education tax credit. He still serves ASME today as an advisor on education and business regulatory issues.
 
Dr. Pham is a prominent leader in the Orange County Vietnamese community. In 1995, Long joined with Van Tran to form the Vietnamese American Voters Coalition, an organization dedicated to educating and engaging Vietnamese Americans in the political process. He also was a founder of the Vietnamese Affinity Group at Southern California Edison that recently helped raise $50,000 to purchase 900 new wheelchairs for the disabled.
 
Long has spent much of his spare time volunteering at inner-city schools teaching math and science to disadvantaged kids and has been honored by CSU-Fullerton and by the County of Orange for his volunteer work in the community.
 
Long and Mary Pham have been married for 36 years and have four grown children, including his son who joined the U.S. Air Force in 2006 and a daughter who joined the Navy in 2011. They make their home in Fountain Valley.