On June 24, 1942, he announced his candidacy for the 39th Assembly District and won both the Democratic and Republican nominations leading him to run unopposed in the general election.

[7] The first legislation he proposed in the state Assembly was a resolution requesting the federal government to grant funds to help in the construction of the Madera and Friant-Kern canals.

[8] Following the riot on Hollywood Black Friday in 1945, he served on a committee investigation into the Conference of Studio Unions and accused them of being guilty of conspiracy.

[9] Werdel submitted a resolution to condemn Attorney General Robert W. Kenny that accused him of being an associate of subversive communist groups, but was overwhelmingly rejected by a vote of 57 to 19 in the Assembly.

[15] In the general election he easily defeated the Progressive nominee; he was one of the four Republican gains that year, and would serve in the Eighty-first and Eighty-second Congresses from 1949 to 1953.