The mailer was totally legal and I’m sure Tran checked with legal council before he sent it. Janet opened herself up to this when she sent out mail attacking Assemblyman Tran in Vietnamese. At that point election law says that Tran is able to send out mail defending himself from the attack to voters likely to have received the first mailer.

As far as Shirley Grindle is concerned, she has no credibility after she failed to lodge any complaint against Janet during her 54 day illegal legal defense fund fiasco. The photographs, identical letterheads for “Vietnam Business Association” and “Vietnam Business Alliance” and similar language asserting Janet Nguyen’s alleged “communist leanings” all come from “the Coalition Against Resolution 36” organization, who have been putting this all over the Vietnamese news for weeks now.

Shirley Grindle has no idea what she is talking about. This will result in the same thing that her complaint against Trung Nguyen did - NOTHING. She should stop wasting taxpayer resources and stop smearing our hardworking Republican Assemblyman.

As Jubal pointed out, Total Buzz gave a run-down last week on the controversy about Sup. Nguyen and this Eric Le fellow.
The claim gained momentum thanks to a letter that circulated on Vietnamese American listservs and then printed as an Op Ed in the Nguoi Viet Daily News last week. The letter was signed by Anh Son Tran, Tung Xuan Nguyen and Nhon Ky Phan, leaders of the protest of another paper, Viet Weekly.

The letter questions Supervisor Janet Nguyen’s connection with a man called Eric Le, who is supposedly president of the Vietnam Business Association. The little-known VBA organized the controversial reception for Vietnamese President Nguyen Minh Triet at the St. Regis Resort in Dana Point last June, where thousands of Vietnamese Americans gathered to protest the communist leader. Le is said to have connections with the communist government.

The letter further alleges that Janet Nguyen knew about the president’s visit before the community did and that she hid the president’s itinerary from the Little Saigon community. The letter also questions whether the supervisor is in some way connected to the Nguoi Viet protesters and whether Nguyen’s advisor, Nick Le Cong, is related to Eric Le because their Vietnamese names share common last and middle names “Le Cong.”

Shirley's complaint has merit. You don't have to read Vietnamese to see that the FPPC bars the use of Assembly resources or image for political purposes. Van, you should spend some time in Sacramento working instead of using taxpayer resources to smear his opponents. I wonder if Paul Hegyi is jealous that Van spends so much time with Dina and not with his campaign!

anon,

So all those political solicitation and "thank you" letters that I received with Congresional and the Sacramento Capitol that look like offical letterheads are illegal all these years? Yeah, right.

I read a Dina mailer that says that she favors Grindle's Orange County FPPC.

Looks like Dina's come out as a liberal on this one, too.

Shirley Grindle needs to know she can not abuse the system and hopefully she will be more infomed of the whole situations/issues pertain to this particular subject matter.