Thought leaders in the Asian American Pacific Islander (AAPI) Community came together for a virtual town hall in support of Joe Biden on Wednesday evening.
“We just conducted our 2020 Asian American Voter Survey and we’ve seen that we have higher enthusiasm than we have ever seen before and 76% plan on voting early in person or by mail. They’re motivated to vote early," said Christine Chen, summarising the electoral emotion among the AAPI Community.
“When I hear ‘Build Back Better,’ I thought about how that relates to so many of our stories and our families stories – Asian Americans definitely know how to build back better, especially those of us who are immigrants who have left behind a life and come here and experiment with new ways of building up our own communities and families," said Sayu Bhojwani, founder and President of 'New American Leaders'.
Bhojwani, a democracy activist and immigrant rights advocated stated that with the upcoming elections, there are three, inherently 'American' things at stake.
“First, we’re voting for ourselves and to see ourselves represented in the White House. We’re voting to ensure that those issues that matter to our communities – issues of safety and access to education and healthcare – to ensure that all those issues are represented in ways that are really being thrown to the curbside in this administration."
“Finally, we are voting for the country that many of us or our ancestors came to. What is very much at stake is not just freedom and access to opportunity but the idea of what American can be. And for many of us, America is an aspiration. What’s on the ballot is the aspiration of an America that represents all of us and includes all of us.”
“This ticket is not just a replacement for the old president but actually it’s a very exciting opportunity – when Kamala came onto the ticket, it took it to a whole another level for us,”said popular television actor, BD Wong.
“Representation now has a name. Diversity now has a name that it did not have when I was a kid. We now have a name for this thing that we are talking about that is our frustration about not being represented. As a young Asian American kid, I wanted to be an actor but could not find myself on television. I entered a field that was really challenging because of that lack of representation.”
“And here we are with our first Black and Asian woman VP candidate – an incredible moment of history is happening. That representation means the world to me and it has got to mean the world to our community at large – our family – because we have never had a voice like this so high up in government," he continued.
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