Janet Nguyen and Her State Senate Run

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

With a newly redrawn district where Democrats and Republicans are split evenly and with 20% Independents,  OC County Supervisor Janet Nguyen has a favorable demographics to win the seat from the term-out Lou Correa (D).   

 

The California Republican Party is pulling out all the supports for her.   She is leading her opponents in money raised so far.    Also, the district is heavily populated by Vietnamese-Americans.   Thus, their expected high turn-out will give her a strong voting base.  Of course,  it is only 2013 but the conventional wisdom is that she will be formidable as she continues to rally the party base and reach out to indepedend voters.

Visa Bribery Scam by Hong Vo and Company

News reported by USA Today and local Denver TV station sent shocked wave to the Vietnamese-American community in Denver:

http://www.wgrz.com/news/article/223785/1/Multi-Million-Dollar-Vietnam-Visa-Scam

Hong Vo, a 27 years old  Denver resident, is among three people arrested for allegedly helping hundreds of Vietnamese citizens enter the United States illegally in a multimillion-dollar scheme.

The U.S. Attorney's Office announces that  more than 500 people paid thousands of dollars to sneak into the U.S. using fraudulent visas.

Hong Vo,  Tran Huynh, and Michael Sestak, a visa chief at the U.S. Consulate in Ho Chi Minh City in March 2012, allegedly started approving visas for a bribe between $20,000 to $70,000, according to the U.S. Attorney's Office.

Michael Sestak was the best man and Hong Vo's wedding.  It was an elaborate wedding with hundreds of guests that costed well over $300,000.   At the time of her arrest, she was living in a wealthy neighborhood with her husband and her parents.

Vietnamese-American Coalitions in San Jose Celebrated

Couple weeks ago, the Vietnamese American Communities and Coalitions of Northern California had their gala to celebrate their newly elected members and also mark their victorious support for Cindy Chavez in the recent supervisorial election.

This is the same coalitions that were formed to recall Madison Nguyen  4 years.  Even though their effort failed but they have become a powerful voice in the community and their influence is undeniable.   Cindy Chavez, under Dave Cortese's advise, reached out to them early in her election while Teresa Alvarado decided to stick with Madison Nguyen for her support.

There were about 500 people showed up for a 3-hour long party.  City councilmembers Sam Liccardo, Kansen Chu, Ash Kalra as well as supervisors Dave Cortese and Cindy Chavez were there for the celebration.  The Mayor of Milpitas was also present to help cheer the crowd.   

The 2014 city council candidate Tam Nguyen was on hand to work the crowd.  Noticeably absence was his opponent Cam Van Nguyen. 

It is a given within Little Saigon that Dave Cortese has the heart of the majority of the Vietnamese-Americans with his tremendous effort courting them in the last  4 years.  

Can he now finally win his mayoral race with his rainbow coalitions of Vietnamese-Americans, Chinese-Americans, Indo-Americans, Hispanic and White-Americans?  It is too early to tell but clearly he is the front runner for now.   LSI will be conducting a series of polls within the Vietnamese-American community to gauge the political climate starting next year.

Viet Voters and Cindy Chavez

The aftermath of the special election for county supervisor in District 2 was somewhat anti-climatic to some of the Vietnamese-American voters.   With poll indicating the majority of the Vietnamese-Americans voting for Cindy Chavez, the winning result did not come as a surprise.  Nevertheless, it was a joyous mood for the many Vietnamese-Americans who were at the party on election night. 

Many members of the Vietnamese-American Voters Federation (Viet Voters for short)  headed by Dr. Ho Vu and Phuong Le, Ph.D. (a Stanford graduate) were there to celebrate.  Ben Field, the ED for South Bay Labor Council, in his speech addressing the crowd, publicly thanked Viet Voters for their support and efforts.   Both Chavez and Field actively reached out and worked with Viet Voters to ensure that they received the important Vietnamese-American swing votes (which made up about 20% of the total votes)

Viet Voters is the same group that tried to recall Madison Nguyen in 2009.   They were actively involved in the re-election of Kansen Chu in 2012 but did not support neither Jimmy Nguyen nor Scott Pham during their respective races.    They are currently supporting Kansen Chu for his assembly race and the San Jose lawyer Tam Nguyen for his city council bid in 2014.

Bachelor's Degree for Vietnamese Language and Culture

With more than 500,000 Vietnamese-Americans living in California (About 2/3 living in either San Jose or Garden Grove/Wesminster), there is a growing interest in the Vietnamese-American communities in California of perserving the Vietnamese culture and tradition for the next generation of Vietnamese-Americans born in the US.

In a recent story NPR in southern Cal, CSU in Fullerton will launch a BA degree for Vietnamese language and culture, as well as teaching Vietnamese to teachers as foreign language. 

http://www.scpr.org/blogs/education/2013/07/19/14303/university-to-offer-vietnamese-language-ba-and-tea/

As the 10th most speaking language in the world, Vietnamese is being used widely outside of Vietnam in Viet diasporic communities throughout the world.  Besides the Western nations,  travelers could hear Vietnamese language in far away countries like Somalia, Bangeldesh, and Egypt. 

How Vietnamese-American Voters Voting

LSI conducted a scientific polling on the Vietnamese-Americans in District 1 for the July 30 special election for county supervisor between Cindy Chavez and Teresa Alvarado.  

From a representative sample of 145 registered voters who mostly likely to go to the poll, the following questions were asked:

1.  Who  do you think you know better -  CC,  TA or Don't Know?
2   Who do you view more favorable ?
3.  Who do you most likely to vote for ?

The poll was conducted from July 19 - July 22 and within a margin of +/- 3%.  Here are the results:

Question 1:   40% CC, 28% TA, 32% Don't know

Question 2:  47% CC, 36% TA, 17% Don' Know

Question 3:  54% CC, 41% TA, 5% Undecided

Alvarado Campaign Recruiting Vietnamese-Speaking Staff to Help with Precinct Walking

 

 

In a last ditch effort to help secure the Vietnamese-American votes,  Alvarado campaign is looking for more Vietnamese-speaking staff to knock on doors and get out the votes.    The campaign is paying $10/ hr.  Those who are interested can call Christine at 408-234-5404.   The posting can be viewed on Vietnamese Student Associations via Facebook.

Meanwhile, Cindy Chavez  is wrapping up her campaign in the Vietnamese-American community with the confidence that the Viet supporters of County Supervisor Dave Cortese will deliver to her the Vietnamese-American votes  needed to win the election.

Teresa Alvarado knows that her effort to secure the Vietnamese-American votes are getting tougher.  Her venerable mom also tried to reach out to some members of the Vietnamese-American Voters Foundation and their PAC. 

The election is July 30th and Labor Unions are pre-celebrating their stronger grip on the county government.