The last few weeks here in Washington have been good ones for Asian Pacific American voter empowerment, but not very good from the perspective of voter empowerment generally.
A gala for presumptive Democratic presidential nominee John Kerry brought almost a thousand APAs to a major gala last week in Washington. And APAIVote.org — the national coalition of non-partisan, nonprofit organizations that encourage civic participation — announced several ambitious projects to get out the APA vote this November.
On the down side, the American Political Science Association meeting here in Washington issued a strongly worded report, calling for “a vigorous campaign to expand participation and make our government responsive to the many, rather than just the privileged few.”
On Friday, June 18, Sen. Kerry joined Washington State Gov. Gary Locke, California Congressman Mike Honda and the Board of the Asian American Action Fund for a gala that showed momentum is building for Kerry’s presidential campaign as the Democratic National Convention and the November election draw nearer. After the gala, Kerry held a conference call with house party guests to thank them for their efforts and to encourage them to stay active in the campaign.
Seeking to dispel media observations that the Kerry inner circle is not as diverse as the party itself, Kerry and his staff have added APAs and other people of color to top campaign positions. According to Victoria Lai, director of Asian Pacific Islander American outreach for the John Kerry for President campaign, there are over 22 APAs working on the campaign as paid staffers. Mona Pasquil, a Filipino American, directs the campaign’s outreach to APAs, women, Hispanics, African Americans, communities of faith and the LGBT community. Another high-ranking APA in the campaign, Jin Chon, directs special media efforts for Kerry. (The Republican Party also has an Asian American/ Pacific Islander outreach group, headed by outreach coordinator Noe Garcia at the Republican National Committee headquarters in Washington.)
While Kerry has done a good job of getting outreach staff in place, the measure of success for participation by any community is not simply how much it is courted for money and votes, but also how seriously its issues are addressed in policy discussions at the highest levels. By this standard, the jury is still out until the Democrats, Republicans and other parties draw up their campaign platforms this summer.
The Democratic Party is moving in the right direction, however, because Kerry has met with members of the APA Congressional Caucus, as well as with key APA officials, such as Locke (a potential cabinet level appointee), to seek policy advice.
Outside of the Kerry campaign, the Democrats have bestowed the highest possible honor on an APA: Rep. Robert Matsui, a Japanese American congressman from California with 25 years of experience on Capitol Hill, has been chosen as chair of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee. In this role, he and his staff coordinate the election and re-election efforts of Democratic congressional candidates in over 435 state and territorial districts. In effect, Democratic candidates all over the country are pinning their hopes of re-taking the House from Republican hands on this seasoned APA political strategist.
Meanwhile, not waiting for either of the major parties, a group of nonprofit, non-partisan APA community organizations has banded together to form APIAVote (www.apiavote.org). Its mission is to encourage civic participation and a better understanding of public policy and the electoral process among APA community members. They have hired lawyer Janelle Hu to coordinate their website and outreach efforts, and have kicked off voter registration and education, youth outreach, and voter research projects that will bear fruit in November 2004 and well beyond.
But while APAs are starting to flex their muscles politically in a significant way in this 2004 election, democracy itself is not doing very well these days, according to the experts at the American Political Science Association.
“[T]he voices of American citizens are raised and heard unequally,” said the members of the blue-ribbon APSA task force on inequality and American democracy. “The privileged participate more than others and are increasingly well-organized to press their demands on the government. Public officials, in turn, are much more responsive to the privileged than to average citizens and the least affluent.”
While only 12 percent of American households had incomes over $100,000 in 2000, 95 percent of the donors who made “substantial contributions” to political activity were from those wealthy households.
While we should continue our efforts to gain full political participation for ourselves, we also must remember that democracy is not secure for any of us unless we guarantee it for all.
Reach Phil Tajitsu Nash at asianweek(AT)nashinteractive.com.