Tran vs. Tran

The KALI-FM 106.3 switchboard sparkled like Lunar New Year fireworks as soon as Diane Vo finished interviewing Vinh and Hien Tran on July 29. The Santa Ana sisters had just recounted how attorney Van Thai Tran—Garden Grove mayor pro tem and leading candidate in the 2004 68th Assembly District race—botched a wrongful-termination suit on their behalf.

A few callers wanted more about the councilman's alleged incompetence, but most called to bash Vinh, Hien and Vo. Some accused the Tran sisters of being “American agents” intent on killing the political career of a longtime Little Saigon activist. They scolded the guests for airing anything negative about any elected Vietnamese official. One woman insisted the sisters were actresses spinning a fiction. And, of course, the C word—communist—was uttered.

The outrage over the Tran sisters might surprise outsiders, given the banality of their complaint. But in Little Saigon, as in other immigrant neighborhoods throughout American history, there's actual panic that outsiders will condemn the community for the high-profile fall of a prominent local leader.

It's a response to which Vo, who broadcasts every Tuesday night from 10:30 to 11:30 in KALI's cramped Garden Grove studios, is accustomed—and that she's attempting to change through the Tran vs. Tran case.

“People want a Vietnamese political voice,” she said. “For many, Mr. Tran is it. And when you attack that one voice, people get mad.”

The sisters paid Tran an $8,000 retainer in 1999 to file a wrongful-termination lawsuit against Oakley Corporation. But Tran failed to file the suit before the deadline in 2002. He offered to return the retainer in March, but Hien and Vinh refused the offer, reasoning his inaction had cost them thousands. They're now suing him for undisclosed damages.

Tran doesn't deny the sisters' claims, but wishes they hadn't aired their grievances on Vo's hugely popular radio show.

“Clients don't go to the press and blab when they have a problem, especially when the attorneys of both parties are trying to settle,” he said. “The Tran sisters? They're nice women. My offer is still outstanding to the Tran sisters. At the end of the day, this matter will be resolved privately, and that's how it should be. What's happening now is a political hack job.”

Tran says he's a victim of a yearlong smear campaign by Vo—a feisty businesswoman who successfully sued the city of Garden Grove to lift its restrictions on cyber-cafés. But he gave few examples. He insists Vo is manipulating the sisters to tarnish his name among Little Saigon voters.

“It's quite obvious Vo is orchestrating this,” Tran maintained. “The timing—given the fact that I'm the frontrunner in the Assembly race and Vo isn't supporting me—is really suspicious. Publicizing the case serves absolutely no purpose other than to skewer me.”

“I had no fun doing this,” Vo said. “But Mr. Tran holds himself as a man of integrity. He champions himself as an underdog. What he did to [the Tran sisters] was uncalled for. And he doesn't want this to get out? It's my responsibility as a radio host to report this.”

Vo thinks listeners were intrigued not so much by the councilman's failure to assist the sisters as by someone daring to speak out against Little Saigon's most prominent politician. In fact, Vo took the show an extra half-hour to field the multitude of calls that followed her interview.

“If stories like these come out, older Vietnamese are afraid that young people will be deterred from politics,” Vo said. “Bottom line: he's supposed to represent the Vietnamese community. But if he can't help two refugee sisters, how can Vietnamese expect Tran to help them as a whole? That will cost Mr. Tran a lot of votes and support.”

That's what worries Van Tran most. “There's a lot of expectation for me to do well and to succeed and to represent the Vietnamese community, to be the hopes and dreams of a generation,” he says. “I enjoy and understand that extra burden,” he said, brushing off any possibility that the pending lawsuit will sully his campaign. “Whether it will hurt or not hurt my reputation will be up to the voters, but I can tell you that they support me and they support me for a reason.

But then, reconsidering his own thoughts, he confessed: “I can see my political opponents [getting hold] of this issue and doing a mailer. That would be unfortunate.”

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