Three SF Supes Endorse Bradley
Yaki cites Bradley’s ‘vision’
By Jason Ma

Less than two months before the California Primary, San Francisco Supervisors Michael Yaki, Tom Ammiano and Gavin Newsom announced Monday morning their endorsement of Vice President Al Gore’s Democratic challenger, former Senator Bill Bradley, for president.

Bradley, whose campaign has been gaining more momentum nationwide in recent months, has been lagging in polls in California, which controls the most delegates in the country for party nomination and thus is highly coveted by candidates.

The most recent numbers in a Field poll conducted last month show that Gore is ahead by 44 percent in California, compared to Bradley’s 17 percent, and 39 percent remain undecided. Although Bradley has closed the gap since August -- when he trailed Gore by 51 to 18 percent -- Gore’s current lead has been stable for the past three months.

However, Yaki said he hopes that an upset win in New Hampshire next month will provide the Bradley campaign with a boost before the California Primary on March 7.

“It’s about what we as Californians and Asian Americans want in our president,” said Yaki. “Bradley is about bold ideas, bold leadership.”

Among those ideas, Yaki noted Bradley’s $65 billion health care proposal and his plan to eliminate poverty among children.

The Gore campaign, however, has issued competing proposals and has criticized Bradley’s plans as being too expensive, saying it would “break the budget.”

Nevertheless, Yaki said that his support for the former New Jersey Senator was also based on what he called Bradley’s commitment to better race relations and the inclusion of more Asian Americans in decision-making roles.

“I am confident of Senator Bradley’s strong commitment to involving the talents of Asian Pacific Americans throughout his administration,” he said. “He understands the enormous contribution that Asian Pacific American entrepreneurs can make to our nation’s economic strategy.”

He added that he is a member of a policy team on the Bradley campaign to get out the issues that are of importance to the Asian American community and would go around the state to speak on Bradley’s behalf.

The presidential candidate has promised to include Asian Americans at various levels of his administration and will make sure they have a “seat at the table” during policy decisions, according to the campaign’s California state spokesperson Julie Wong.

However, Wong could not say whether or not Bradley would appoint an Asian American to a cabinet-level position, nor could she specify any Asian Americans he was considering for his administration.

During an interview with AsianWeek last November, Gore said that while he could not promise to appoint an Asian American to a cabinet-level position, he said there should be one.

The Gore campaign commended Bradley on receiving the endorsements but pointed out that the vice president has visited San Francisco frequently and has the endorsements of many of the city’s politicians, including San Francisco Supervisors Amos Brown, Leslie Katz, and Mark Leno and Mayor Willie Brown. Among state and federal politicians, Gore has received endorsements from Gov. Gray Davis and Sens. Dianne Feinstein and Barbara Boxer.

“It is clear that the overwhelming majority of California’s community leaders want Gore in their corner fighting on education, health care, the environment and the economy,” said the campaign’s California spokesperson David Chai.

Supervisor Leland Yee, another one of the three Asian American members of the Board, has yet to make a formal endorsement for president, though he said he has been contacted by the Bradley campaign.

“I haven’t made any decisions on that at all yet,” he said.

A spokesperson for Supervisor Mabel Teng said she has not made an endorsement yet either.

Yaki’s endorsement of Bradley on Monday represents a shift from his past support for Gore. During the 1992 and 1996 presidential elections, he worked on the Clinton-Gore campaigns to help turn out the Asian American vote while he was chief of staff of for Congresswoman Nancy Pelosi.

“The switch is because I’ve always supported the candidate who had vision,” Yaki said. “We have a clear choice this time.”

He also noted that Gore’s involvement in the campaign finance scandal in 1996 played a “small part” in swaying him toward endorsing Bradley. Citing the “Gore-dominated” Democratic National Committee’s reimbursements of campaign contributions to Asian American donors, Yaki said “I did not think that was very cool.”

Chai responded by saying, “We’re going to focus on the issues in California. We’re not going to get sidetracked on the past.”