Based on Koreatown in Los Angeles and the Vietnamese Field’s Corner in Boston, our aim is to understand how transnational relationships with countries of origin and settlement among the second generation affect local contestations over political legitimacy and community projects. Despite historical parallels between these two communities, the evolution of ethnic politics among the second generation has taken divergent paths – one based on accommodating the political status quo and the other operating against it. The successful efforts of Korean American leaders in broadening traditional notions of an ‘authentic’ ethnic politics hinged on their ability to create an alternative imagined community that was spiritually linked to events in their parents’ homeland and was unfettered by dependency on US government funding. In contrast, the second generation Vietnamese leadership lacked the real or imagined transnational linkages and non-governmental funding sources it needed to re-imagine and re-articulate political projects considered progressive and authentically ‘Vietnamese’.