Is Re-election Loretta Sanchez's Most Difficult Option?

"We are looking to some unconventional districts where we believe we can draft a top-flight candidate to create additional opportunities," says Ken Spain, the National Republican Congressional Committee's communications chief.

Days earlier, Sanchez was coy with Politico.com on whether she will run for reelection, governor or the U.S. Senate. But the post indicates that if she is serious about a new office, it may out of fear of losing an eighth House campaign.

[F]or the first time since her improbable victories over Republican Bob Dornan in 1996 and 1998, she could face a tough election challenge this year: Her likely Republican opponent is a rising-star Vietnamese-American in a district with a higher percentage of Vietnamese-Americans than most any other in the country.

Politico does not name the rising-star Vietnamese-American, but that is undoubtedly a reference to Assemblyman Van Tran (R-Garden Grove), who local political watchers say has been working on an upset strategy for at least two years.

Sanchez, co-chair of the Congressional Caucus on Vietnam, shored up her Little Saigon street cred this week by supporting the Vietnam Human Rights Act of 2009, which would prohibit the U.S. from increasing non-humanitarian aid to Vietnam "unless the government secures significant civil and political liberties for the country's citizens."