Tan D. Nguyen

On February 14, 2011, Nguyen was sentenced by United States District Judge David O. Carter to 366 days in federal prison followed by six months in a halfway house for lying to investigators about his knowledge of a letter to intimidate Latino voters from voting in his 2006 race.

Despite the California Attorney General declining to press charges against Nguyen, a federal grand jury indicted him on a charge of obstruction of justice brought against him by the United States Attorney's Office for the Central District of California and the Civil Rights Division of the U.S. Justice Department. There were two jury trials which were presided over by United States District Court Judge David O. Carter. Nguyen was found guilty by a jury and was sentenced in February 2011 by Carter to one year in prison and six months in a halfway house.

On May 16, 2007, the California Department of Justice investigation determined there was no evidence that Nguyen's campaign had an intent to intimidate those legally entitled to vote. The investigation had found that the original draft of the letter (in English) had warned illegals and those with green cards against voting, but elsewhere had encouraged those with U.S. citizenship to vote. The phrase "those with green cards" had then been translated into "emigrado" for the Spanish-language letter that was mailed; this had later been translated back into English as "immigrant" when the letter was brought to light in the media. Senior Assistant Attorney General Gary Schons stated the investigation found that Nguyen did, in fact, know about the letter before it was mailed, in contradiction to Nguyen's repeated assertions that he was not aware of it. Nguyen, who continued to deny involvement with the letter, in other respects, stated satisfaction with the investigation results and considered himself exonerated.

Nguyen won the Republican Party's endorsement to run for the 47th Congressional District of California in the June 6, 2006 primary election with 55.4% of the votes in a three-way race. Nguyen lost to incumbent Loretta Sanchez in the November election, receiving 37.6% of the votes.

Nguyen's campaign was linked to a Spanish-language mailing of 14,000 letters allegedly warning immigrants not to vote, threatening them with prison or deportation. The letter was received by registered Hispanic voters the weekend of October 15, 2006 and sent to then-California Attorney General Bill Lockyer, who launched an investigation into the source of the letter on Monday, October 17, 2006. As translated in the press at the time, it read in part:

In 2004, Nguyen lost the 46th district Democratic primary to Jim Brandt, who lost to incumbent Republican Dana Rohrabacher by a 30% margin.

Tan Duc Nguyen (born 1973) is an American former politician. He twice stood as a candidate for the U.S. House of Representatives in California. In 2006, he ran as a Republican against incumbent Democrat Loretta Sanchez in California's 47th congressional district.