Van Tran for Congress

Orange County Register: Tea Party Express Endorses Tran for Sanchez Seat

For the full article visit: http://totalbuzz.ocregister.com/2010/07/30/tea-party-endorses-tran-for-sanchez-seat/38559/

Sanchez Challenged On Vietnam Credentials

Politico.com
By: Kasie Hunt
July 28, 2010

“…There’s a big debate in the community whether she’s effective or not — whether she’s doing it for lip service or for votes, because the big question is, after 14 years in the House, what substantial and tangible results can she show in terms of advancing Vietnamese democracy and human rights,” Tran told POLITICO in an interview Tuesday. “Show us your accomplishments — what bills, what legislation, what political prisoners?”

Tran is a popular, term-limited state assemblyman whose political power rests squarely with the rapidly growing Vietnamese American community centered in Little Saigon, a neighborhood of Vietnamese shops, grocery stores and restaurants spanning the Orange County cities of Westminster and Garden Grove.

His constituency has more than doubled in the years since Sanchez was first elected to the House in 1996: Then, Vietnamese Americans accounted for less than 10 percent of the electorate. Now, they comprise almost 25 percent of the district’s voters.

National Republicans were watching — Vietnamese Americans in the district tend to vote GOP — and they pushed Tran hard to get into the race. California Rep. Kevin McCarthy, who heads the National Republican Congressional Committee’s recruitment efforts this cycle, can’t stop talking about Tran’s potential.

Sanchez has taken careful notice. Aside from her work in Congress, she appears each year at Little Saigon’s Tet festival wearing traditional Vietnamese garb, and she has traveled to Vietnam…

…But visiting the country is actually controversial within the Vietnamese community.

…Tran is closely followed by the ethnic press: There are four Vietnamese TV stations, several Vietnamese-language newspapers and numerous closely followed Vietnamese radio stations. He regularly appears on Vietnamese radio, a cheap and effective way to reach voters. “You can buy radio really cheap on some of these stations — if you’re on the air for half an hour for $180,” said Adam Probolsky, an Orange County pollster and consultant.

And although Sanchez does coordinated outreach to the Vietnamese press, Tran has the lingustic advantage: Sanchez does not speak Vietnamese. “So 7 p.m. at night, you’re talking politics with Van, and he’s on the air for half an hour while people are driving home,” said Probolsky, who ran a campaign in June for a local judge. “We bought Vietnamese press — print and radio, as cheap as can be — but it had a huge impact on the outcome,” he said.

For the full article visit: http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0710/40366.html

Instant GOP Stars

Politico.com
By: Kasie Hunt
July 23, 2010

“A key success? Van Tran, a California assemblyman running against Democratic Rep. Loretta Sanchez. Tran, an immigrant whose parents left Vietnam on a military plane in the days before Saigon fell, lives in California’s 47th District, which has the highest concentration of Vietnamese-Americans in the country.

When McCarthy sat down to find someone to challenge Sanchez in a district that gave 60 percent of its vote to Obama in 2008 but voted for Bush in 2004, Tran was a natural fit: a popular elected official with a natural base beyond the party itself.

“You have to encourage the right people in the right districts,” McCarthy says.

He recalls a top House Democrat approaching him after Tran announced he would run, acknowledging the seat would become more difficult for Democrats to hold: “Van Tran - now that one hurt,” the Democrat said.”

Click here for the full article: http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0710/40023.html

Huck PAC Endorses Van Tran For Congress From California’s 47th CD

July 21, 2010
by Mike Huckabee
HuckPAC.com

Huck PAC and I are pleased to announce our support of Assemblyman Van Tran for Congress. Van is committed to using common-sense solutions to solve the current problems in California, and around the Nation. He wants to balance the budget deficit by putting a restraint on reckless spending and eliminating waste in Washington bureaucracy.

Van’s personal history is truly the American Dream. His family first came to America in 1975, having been evacuated by the U.S. Army a week before the fall of Saigon. Before serving the people of the 68th Assembly District in Orange County, Van was the managing partner of his own law practice. Van also served on the Garden Gove Planning Commission and served as Vice-Mayor of Garden Grove before being elected to the California State Assembly in 2004. In fact, Van became the first Vietnamese-American elected to any state’s legislature.

Assemblyman Van Tran has fought hard for his constituents in Sacramento with public safety as one of his top priorities. Serving as vice-chair of the Judiciary Committee as well as sitting on the Banking and Finance and Governmental Organization Committees – Van has the right knowledge and expertise to affect real positive change in the 47th district, all of California and Washington, D.C.

I hope you’ll join me in supporting Van Tran for Congress.

http://www.huckpac.com/?Fuseaction=Blogs.View&Blog_id=3160