Why a Southern California congressional race hinges on Asian American voters

Little Saigon in Orange County, Calif., boasts the largest concentration of Vietnamese people outside Vietnam. Democrat and congressional hopeful Jay Chen showed up one day in September, dressed in his uniform from the U.S. Navy Reserves. He was there to visit the Museum of the Republic of Vietnam, a one-room collection of artifacts donated by veterans and refugees of the country's civil war, tucked in the back corner of one of the shopping centers.

Quân Nguyễn, one of the founders of the museum, showed Chen around. A local reporter for a Vietnamese-language paper tagged along. "When politicians come by, they always bring their own newspaper people," Nguyễn said.

Candidates come to such local highlights — and make a point of commemorating their visits in the press — because Vietnamese Americans make up the largest Asian American voting bloc in the area, a constituency that can swing an election. In the newly