Podcasts about Japanese Americans

Imagine you're six years old. You look out past a barbed wire fence at a highway in the desert, and every single car that passes by is driven by someone white. The teachers who come to your school? White. The guards in the towers above you, also white. And you think to yourself: is this America? Or is America out there?  That child was John Tateishi. He was almost three years old when the U.S. government forced his entire family - along with 120,000 other Japanese Americans - from their homes and into concentration camps on American soil. His family ended up at Manzanar. And when the war ended, they were handed $25 and told to find their way home. What John did with that childhood - with that rage, that clarity, that love of country despite everything this country did to him - is an important story in American history, and honestly one that many adults may not have even learned in their history classes growing up.  He went on to lead the Japanese American redress campaign, helping secure a formal government apology and reparations. He's the author of Redress: The Inside Story of the Successful Campaign for Japanese American Reparations. He shares a lot about what that fight means today - for the Black reparations movement, for anti-Asian hate, and for the question that sits at the center of all of it: Who gets to be American?  As we move towards a celebration of America's birthday, that question sits front and center for many of us, as we're actively being told that we're not American. These stories show us not only how we reject that narrow view, but also how to fight for ourselves and one another while loving our communities, families, and country at the same time. What to listen for: John's personal experience as a young person incarcerated at Manzanar - and what it was like returning to society The makeup of Los Angeles in the post-war period - and how different communities banded together What John sees as the differences between the successful campaign he helped lead for Japanese American reparations and the hurdles facing Black Americans, starting with HR40. About John Tateishi: Incarcerated as a child in one of America's WWII concentration camps, John Tateishi carried that memory with him when he launched the Japanese American reparations campaign in 1978. He directed the public affairs and legislative strategies of the campaign until 1986, two years before the campaign ultimately culminated with the signing of the Civil Liberties Act.  Ten years later, he led the JACL's challenge against the Bush administration's policies that targeted Arab and Muslim communities and undermined the civil liberties of all Americans. He is the author of Redress: The Inside Story of the Successful Campaign for Japanese American Reparations (2020).  

This Day in Legal History: Magna Carta Sealed at RunnymedeOn this day in 1215, in a meadow at Runnymede on the south bank of the Thames, King John of England affixed his seal to a document the rebellious English barons had drafted, in which the king conceded a series of limits on his own royal authority. We call it Magna Carta — the Great Charter. The immediate political context was a baronial revolt against John's tax exactions for his disastrous French wars, and most of the sixty-three chapters as drafted in 1215 are concerned with the highly specific grievances of a feudal aristocracy: scutage, wardship, the inheritance fees of widows, the freedom of the church, the standardization of weights and measures in the king's markets. The two chapters that the centuries have remembered are 39 and 40. Chapter 39 says that no free man shall be taken or imprisoned or dispossessed except by the lawful judgment of his peers or by the law of the land. Chapter 40 says that to no one will the king sell, deny, or delay right or justice. The Charter was annulled by Pope Innocent III within ten weeks of sealing — the pope held that John, as a vassal of the Holy See, could not be bound by a treaty extracted under duress — and the country immediately collapsed into the First Barons' War. But John died in October 1216, his nine-year-old son Henry III's regents reissued the Charter as a tactical concession the next month, it was reissued again in 1217 and 1225, and by the late thirteenth century the 1225 version had been confirmed by successive kings as a foundational statute of the realm. Edward Coke, writing in the seventeenth century, transformed Chapter 39's “law of the land” into the doctrine of due process, and the founding generation of the American Republic picked up Coke's reading and wrote it directly into the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments of the United States Constitution. The phrase “due process of law” in those amendments is the most consequential American inheritance from the Runnymede document. The principle the barons were trying to extract from a beleaguered king — that the law constrains the sovereign too — is the substrate on which everything we recognize as constitutionalism is built. Eight hundred and eleven years on, the principle is still the work.The Rhode Island travel-ban lawsuit we covered on June 8 took a sharp turn on Friday. Chief Judge John J. McConnell, Jr., of the District of Rhode Island held a status conference in Dorcas International Institute v. USCIS at which he was openly frustrated with the Justice Department for failing to immediately implement his June 5 vacatur of the four USCIS benefit-freeze policies for nationals of the thirty-nine travel-ban countries. The judge's message, in plain terms, was that vacatur under the Administrative Procedure Act is self-executing — the moment the order was entered, the policies ceased to exist, and the agency was obligated to resume processing affirmative benefits, asylum claims, and adjudicator-instruction reviews on the prior pre-freeze basis. The Trump administration, after the hearing, told the court it would comply, restart adjudications, and clear the backlog. It also did what defendants typically do when they have lost on the merits and lost again on compliance: it filed a notice of appeal with the First Circuit and asked the appellate court to stay the vacatur pending appeal. That is the live question now. The First Circuit's stay analysis runs through the standard Nken v. Holder factors — likelihood of success on the merits, irreparable harm, the balance of equities, and the public interest — and the administration's strongest argument on each is going to be familiar: the executive needs administrative breathing room to implement a travel ban, mass restoration of adjudications creates national-security risk, the harm to applicants is reversible if their adjudications are paused for a few more weeks. The plaintiffs' strongest counterarguments are also familiar: the policies were unlawful when adopted and the agency had no business adopting them, the harm to applicants from continued delay is concrete and accruing daily, and the First Circuit is not in the business of staying vacaturs of unlawful agency action in order to let the agency continue acting unlawfully. Watch the First Circuit's calendar this week. The stay motion is the next inflection point.Trump officials agree to resume asylum processing after being scolded by judge | The Washington PostGoogle filed suit on Friday in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York against a China-based cybercrime network it calls the “Outsider Enterprise,” alleging that the network's members used Google's Gemini large-language model to generate the code, copy, and templates for a phishing-as-a-service platform that has built more than nine thousand fraudulent websites and sent two and a half million scam text messages in the two weeks ending June 1 alone. The complaint is significant for two reasons. First, it is, to Google's knowledge, the first time the company has affirmatively sued threat actors for using its own generative-AI product as the input to a scaled criminal operation, as distinct from the more usual posture of suing scammers who impersonate Google brands. The legal theories are a mix of Lanham Act false-designation-of-origin and trademark-infringement counts, Computer Fraud and Abuse Act counts based on Outsider's unauthorized access to Google services, breach-of-contract counts on the Gemini terms of service, and a RICO count. Second, the factual record will be a road map for the next decade of AI-misuse litigation. The complaint describes Telegram channels in which Outsider members trade prompts that get Gemini to write phishing code, a library of two hundred and ninety prebuilt templates impersonating brands ranging from the U.S. Postal Service to state DMVs to E-ZPass, and an FBI estimate that the broader campaign Outsider participates in has stolen roughly 3.87 million card numbers and caused $1.9 billion in losses since July 2023. The remedy Google is seeking is a permanent injunction shutting the operation down, plus domain seizures and account terminations across Google's services and at major U.S. carriers, which Google says it has been coordinating with the FBI, AT&T, T-Mobile, and Verizon. The deeper legal question the case may end up clarifying is whether and to what extent platforms can use private civil suits as the front-line enforcement mechanism against AI-augmented criminal activity that the public criminal-justice system has had trouble keeping up with.Google sues Chinese cybercrime ring that weaponized Gemini AI for phishing scams | TechCrunchA federal district judge in Washington on Friday issued a preliminary injunction barring the Trump administration from continuing to implement Executive Order 14253, the order under which the National Park Service had been scrubbing exhibits, signage, and online materials at sites administered by the Department of the Interior. The judge gave the administration three weeks to restore the materials it had already removed. The order at issue, signed in March, directed federal cultural agencies to identify and remove content that, in the executive's view, reflected “improper, divisive, or anti-American ideology” or “partisan” framing. In the months that followed, the National Park Service had taken down or altered displays addressing slavery, the Civil Rights Movement, the internment of Japanese Americans during the Second World War, climate change, and the histories of Native American dispossession at sites including the Stonewall National Monument, Independence Hall, and the Manzanar National Historic Site. The case is American Historical Association v. Department of the Interior, brought by historians' professional associations and a coalition of plaintiffs that includes affected park employees and visitor-experience contractors. The legal theory pleaded was multi-strand: First Amendment viewpoint discrimination as applied to government speech that has taken on a public-forum character, Administrative Procedure Act challenges on the ground that the agency failed to provide a reasoned basis for the removals and failed to consider statutory commands under the Organic Act of 1916, and a Federal Records Act challenge to the destruction of materials that constituted federal records. The judge held that the plaintiffs were likely to succeed on the First Amendment claim and the APA claim, found irreparable harm in the ongoing loss of public access to the underlying historical materials, and found that the public interest was best served by restoration. The administration is widely expected to appeal to the D.C. Circuit. In the meantime, the three-week restoration clock is running.Judge blocks Trump national parks order, calling it “censorship” | The Washington Post This is a public episode. 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Every September, KALW welcomes a new cohort of eight fellows to our Audio Academy training program that's now in its thirteenth year. Over a span of 9 months the current cohort has been hard at work learning what it takes to report and produce sound rich audio features. Stories that allowed them to follow their curiosity, go deeper on urgent issues or celebrate the communities holding people together. Tonight we have the bittersweet honor of graduating this year's cohort, so today we're bringing you a special tribute. It's a collection of clips from their best work. ‘Finding faith in the fight against artificial super intelligence' by Arlen Levy 'The show must go on: Tito Soto and SF's iconic Oasis drag club' by Stafford Hemmer ‘In Oakland, the musical legacy of Japanese American incarceration still resonates' by Cara Nguyen ‘Goalball emboldens blind athletes on the court and in their lives' by Rachel Longan ‘Women, non-binary players tackle America's Game' by Jordan Karnes ‘How queer communities are seeing themselves reflected in tide pools' by Anna Casalme ‘Berkeley's Warming Hut offers a safe space' by Viviana Vivas ‘Who put up all those gates in the Sunset?‘ by Rae Kim 

Send us Fan MailWelcome back to Japanese America! In this episode, hosts Koji Steven Sakai and Michelle Malizaki take the podcast on location to Second Street in the heart of Little Tokyo, Los Angeles, to record inside a true culinary and cultural landmark: Kouraku. Originally opened in 1976, Kouraku was recently honored by the City of Los Angeles with an official street sign certifying it as America's oldest operating ramen shop. To celebrate this incredible 50-year milestone, Koji and Michelle sit down with the restaurant's new owner, Mamoru Tokuda-san, who stepped in to take over the reins in January 2023. Mamoru-san shares the deeply moving story of how he transitioned from a restaurant career to volunteering at Kouraku during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, eventually stepping up to preserve the space after the tragic passing of the previous owner, Hiroshi Yamauchi. We also look at the historical roots of Showa-era machi-chuka (Japanese-Chinese comfort food) and why its gentle, balanced flavors have sustained families across four generations. Note: For this episode, Koji reads the English translations of the interview so everyone can follow along with the history. However, we will also be releasing a separate, uncut companion episode featuring Mamoru-san's interview entirely in his own words in Japanese. In this episode, we discuss:The Magic of Showa-Era Nostalgia: Michelle explains why old-school Showa-era aesthetic is suddenly "cool" again and how Kouraku's vintage vibe instantly transports her back to her childhood in Japan. Preserving a 50-Year Legacy: How Mamoru-san balanced the pressure of taking over a historic business with the inspiration he drew from Kouraku's long-term staff—many of whom have dedicated 20 to 30 years to the kitchen. The Science of Machi-Chuka Flavors: The culinary reason Kouraku's stock is kept balanced and gentle, utilizing a chashu-infused soy sauce base rather than the overwhelming flavors of modern specialty shops. High-Tech Meets History: The introduction of Luna-chan, Kouraku's famous cat-themed delivery robot, and how it coexists with an irreplaceable, historic 1980s neon signboard that modern makers can no longer replicate. Food as a Cultural Time Machine: Koji and Michelle share their ultimate childhood comfort foods. Michelle reflects on making homemade gyoza with her mother, while Koji opens up about his lifelong obsession with curry rice, sharing a poignant memory of how his father's experiences in the WWII incarceration camps shaped his relationship with the dish. Links & Resources Mentioned:Visit the Restaurant: Kouraku, Little Tokyo (Los Angeles, CA) Learn more about Japanese American history: janm.orgSupport the show

Yes, this will be the last PauseCast for a while. Maybe a long while. I've decided to close this chapter of the podcast, and if "Meanderings with Trudy" comes back, it will be in a different form. So this is the last of these PauseCasts, and we dive deeply into endings. We explore why endings matter, and what that means for bringing presence to our experience. And how endings can draw attention to the soul of our being human. Please drop me a line if anything piqued your interest at meanderingswithtrudy@gmail.com. And share this episode around. Thank you for sharing your ears with me over these last six years, and these many episodes with Angie. Such conversations matter.  Episode links: Information about Angie's community event in June is via Big Stone House Two poets we talked about and read from today include: Richard Wagamese's “Embers: One Ojibway's Meditations” and David Whyte's “Consolations: The Solace, Nourishment and Underlying Meaning of Everyday Words” Marie Kondo, Japanese American expert on how to tidy, in a meaningful way. Robin Wall Kimmerer, "Braiding Sweetgrass" Liz Bucar, "Beyond Wellness" Angie's substack, "The Bigger Picture" Trudy's substack, "Meanderings with Trudy" As always, this podcast is sponsored by the guests who give of their time, and by my company, Chapman Coaching Inc.Royalty free music is gratefully received and is called Sunday Stroll – by Huma-HumaLive life joyfully, and always let kindness guide you.

Message us.Joining host Andrew Martin for this sixth episode of Season Eleven, is public historian and award-winning author Tamiko Nimura, who tells Andrew about how she got hooked on history, how she ended up deciding to publish her father's memoir of his time as an incarcerated Japanese-American child, and her thoughts on the future of archives.THE LIFE STORY - JUNICHI 'FRED' NIMURATamiko has chosen to tell the life story of her Grandfather - Junichi Nimura who was born in Hiroshima, Japan in 1885.Junichi emigrates from Japan to Mexico in 1925, before entering the US the following year. His first wife, unhappy with life in the US, returns to Japan, and so Junichi then meets his second wife via the 'picture bride' service (think; Tinder by mail). The couple stay together, and raise a family.However, when World War Two begins, Junichi, his wife, and their children, have to leave their home with whatever they could carry and move to a concentration camp at Tule Lake, California, where they lived for years.  Junichi becomes separated from his family and is taken miles away.Eventually Junichi was reunited with his family and they all left the camps for home - but everything was lost. The impact of this time never left Junichi, but his son - Tamiko's father, recalled his childhood years at the camp - which Tamiko has now published as her book 'A Place For What We Lose - A Daughter's Return To Tule Lake' (UW Press, 2026). THE BRICK WALL - JUNICHI NIMURAIt's a brick wall in Mexico that has Tamiko scratching her head.Whilst researching her Grandfather, Junichi Nimura, she found a tourist certificate in Mexican Spanish, dated 19th November 1926, which states that her 41 year old married Grandfather was traveling alone and had been permitted to spend 15 days in Mexico.Tamiko would love to know;Why was Junichi there? What did he get up to?If you think that you can offer Tamiko a research idea or clue to help her solve her brick wall, then you can send her a message at her website or via her Bluesky account, alternatively, you can send us a message and we'll pass it right along.Meanwhile, Tamiko is fascinated by Andrew and Sándor's offer of help but is it safe?---Episode Credits:Andrew Martin - Host and ProducerTamiko Nimura - GuestJohn Spike - Sándor PetőfiSupport the showThank you for listening! You can sign up to our email newsletter for the latest and behind the scenes news. You can find us on Bluesky, Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter. If you liked this episode please subscribe for free, or leave a rating or review, or consider giving us a 'tip' to keep the show funded.

"What I vividly recall is after getting to Tanforan and walking into this horse stable, and Mom… putting down her suitcase and just crying.”This is the story of Japanese American incarceration.In February 1942, shortly after the United States enters the war, FDR signs Executive Order 9066, beginning the forced removal of Japanese Americans from their West Coast homes and lives. Some 120,000 civilians—many of them American citizens, none of them charged with a crime—are sent to camps across the American West and South. Their constitutional rights are denied in the name of national security.Even as families struggle to carry on inside the barbed wire, legal challenges arise. Three Japanese Americans fight their way to the Supreme Court, forcing the nation's highest court to confront a question it would rather avoid: can the Constitution be suspended for an entire ethnic group in wartime? And when the court finally rules—does the answer change anything at all?____Connect with us on HTDSpodcast.com andpreorder Prof. Jackson's new bookgo deep into episode bibliographies and book recommendationsjoin discussions in our Facebook communityget news and discounts from The HTDS Gazette come see a live showget HTDS merchor become an HTDS premium member for bonus episodes and other perks.HTDS is part of Audacy media network. Interested in advertising on the History That Doesn't Suck? Contact Audacyinc.com.

USE CODE DONK50 TO GET 50% OFF YOUR PATREON SUBSCRIPTION https://www.patreon.com/lionsledbydonkeys LISTEN TO BLOOD WORK: https://open.spotify.com/show/5jt9RZSCVMJ1KS84QHB9jJ Buy The Highlands Burn: https://www.amazon.com/Highlands-Burn-Foundling-Brigade-Saga-ebook/dp/B0GSG5CNXX Get the audiobook (read by Joe) https://www.llbdpodcast.com/products/the-highlands-burn-audiobook During WWII the US Army developed a top secret program to create racist attack dogs on a swamp island off of the coast of Mississippi. This is the story about how Japanese-American soldiers were forced to act as bait for packs of untrained, starving, and abused dogs all because a Swiss psycho, who had no experience training dogs, convinced the US Army that each race smelled differently. SOURCES: https://www.npca.org/articles/3798-the-dog-trainers-of-cat-island https://historynet.com/dog-training-pacific-war/ https://www.sunherald.com/news/state/mississippi/article277536763.html https://www.uswardogs.org/WWII https://americanhistory.si.edu/explore/stories/dogs-defense-how-skip-spot-and-rover-went-fight-world-war-ii https://www.nationalww2museum.org/war/articles/national-dog-day https://www.nps.gov/articles/000/uncle-sam-needs-to-borrow-your-dog.htm

A weekly magazine-style radio show featuring the voices and stories of Asians and Pacific Islanders from all corners of our community. The show is produced by a collective of media makers, deejays, and activists. Tonight's APEX Express show is focused on food justice and Asian America. First, Host Miko Lee talks with artist Macy Tran about their work on food as a form of resistance, and then she speaks with researcher Dr. Milkie Vu around her work on food insecurity and Asian American communities.   Show TRANSCRIPT [00:00:00] Opening: Apex Express Asian Pacific expression. Community and cultural coverage, music and calendar, new visions and voices, coming to you with an Asian Pacific Islander point of view. It's time to get on board the Apex Express.   [00:00:30] Miko Lee: Welcome to Apex Express. I'm your host, Miko Lee, and tonight we're talking about food justice and Asian America. First, we talk with artist Macy Tran about their work on food as a form of resistance, and then we speak with researcher Dr. Milkie Vu around her work on food insecurity and Asian American communities. Join us tonight as we delve into food justice. Welcome to Apex Express, Macy Tran, I'm so happy to meet you.    [00:01:03] Macy Tran: I'm happy to meet you as well, Miko. Thanks for having me.   [00:01:06] Miko Lee: I just wanna start with the question I ask all of my guests, which is, who are your people and what legacy do you carry with you?    [00:01:13] Macy Tran: I come from a legacy of powerful Vietnamese people who were born and raised in Vietnam and now are part of the diaspora in Minnesota. I come from food peoples and healers and chefs and creatives of all sorts who have learned how to make ends meet and to adapt and to work with what they have. I come from a long line of people who have loved through food and who have used food as a means of cultural preservation and education and survival, which has now been passed on to me. There's so much to say about who I come from. My grandparents have stories of survival and resilience throughout the American War in Vietnam. And it's only because of just their love and the decisions they've made on behalf of their love that I am here today. My parents own a restaurant in Minneapolis, Minnesota, Vietnamese restaurant called Pho 79/Caravelle That has a 40 plus year legacy of serving Chinese and Vietnamese food to the Minneapolis community. It started with my grandma's brother, and then it passed down to my grandma. And now my grandma has since passed and has passed it down to my father and my mother. And so I like to say that it's restaurant people who raised me. I grew up sleeping in the booths and all of the aunties, even though they weren't blood aunties were my aunties. Because our survival was just so foundationally just predicated on food and what we served and shared with others, and also what we ate at home and the celebrations that we would have both at the restaurant and at home. This is really what makes me.    [00:03:20] Miko Lee: Thank you for sharing. Do you wanna talk more about the legacy part?   [00:03:24] Macy Tran: I carry a legacy of peoples who really know the importance of food and the way we use food to care and support each other. Even in the most hard of times when my family was. On a boat with 200 other people and didn't know if they were going to survive when they kind of landed abroad. The shores of Indonesia, food has been with them throughout it all, and it is how I was raised to love and care for people. I see the ways that food is not just a means for sustenance, but also as joy, as creativity, as love, and I carry all of those, decisions and skills with me.    [00:04:19] Miko Lee: Thank you so much. I learned first about your book when I read a piece that you wrote for 18 million Rising, and I'm wondering if you could just talk about how that piece around food as a form of resistance, how did that come about?   [00:04:33] Macy Tran: I have a friend who works with 18 million Rising, and since the federal occupation in Minneapolis, I've been doing a lot of food justice organizing here. And it has been a way in which I have seen and expressed just the skills and love that I give to my community. I was just feeling compelled to give food. That was what I knew. In the past two months as my friends have been going out on the streets following ICE agents around legally observing, I have felt that my role in this movement is to feed frontline folks who are out doing the work and also feeding our community during a time in which it's very scary and difficult to leave your home without fear of being abducted. In Minneapolis we have created systems of, food resource sharing that have been really powerful to witness and experience and to get engaged with. And so one way that I've been doing it is I've been cooking community meals most Sundays, sometimes Saturdays that feed 200 plus people.   [00:05:47] I am providing delicious food for my friends who are out on the streets and coming home and hungry and cold. And I also helped facilitate and organize a food distribution at my parents' restaurant after the murder of Alex Preti I really wanted to not just be involved in like acting and responding to what was happening but as an artist, as a creative, I felt the need for also remembering and preserving and reflecting about what's been going on in Minneapolis. I kept being pulled in all these different directions and was organizing over here and supporting this community and doing this. And then when my friend reached out to me at 18 million Rising,. It was such a great opportunity for me to really reflect on my practice of food as resistance and food as justice. I've been a food writer in the Twin Cities for about the past three years. Food, events, I mostly cover restaurant stories and festivals and theater and all that sort of stuff in the BIPOC community here in the Twin Cities. And I realized writing this piece that this was the first time in a while, that I had written something actually for myself from my heart that was in my voice. Without an editor saying, no, you have to say it this way. No, we have to cut that part out. No, you use too many words here, and so I really took this piece as an opportunity to share what my life was like here in my own words and my own experiences. And just use it as a moment to really reflect and share the things that I'm learning and the way that I am practicing and using food as a bridge to healing and transformation during this time in which we are ripe for needing that.   [00:07:47] Miko Lee: Can you roll back a little bit and talk to me about how you got started as an organizer? What, when you first learned about social justice work and what pulled you in?   [00:07:56] Macy Tran: It definitely wasn't the way that I was raised. I was born in the us my parents were born in Vietnam and then came over to the US and they really raised me with the mentality of you just put your head down and you work hard and you don't really get involved. And like, yeah, you care for others, but mostly you care for your family. I was actually someone who was always butting heads with my family because I was like, do you not see all of these issues that are happening in the world? Like the issue, the systems that were implicated in. We have to care beyond just ourselves, and we would always butt heads about that.   [00:08:33] Miko Lee: At what age did that start?    [00:08:35] Macy Tran: Oh, probably when I was a teenager. around that time I was finding my voice. and it wasn't until college that I really started putting words and frameworks and theory into what I have already witnessed in my family and my community, which is just community care and the ways that facilitates justice and transformation I would say since college that I really started actively organizing primarily on campus. I went to a smaller liberal arts school. So organizing and just getting involved in our community in that way was pretty easy. And like after I graduated college, I spent five years in Southeast Asia, one year in Vietnam, and then four years in Thailand where I was primarily working at the intersections of education and refugee justice and environmental justice. I got to meet all sorts of organizers and activists from across the region who have taught me. Really everything, a lot of what I know about organizing and what it means to show up specifically within a Southeast Asian context and how to use kind of my feet in both worlds, both my American political identity and my Southeast Asian political identity.   [00:09:59] And to merge those for the better and for my community. So I would say that. I've always had a big heart ever since I was little. And actually my parents were always like, you are too trusting. You people are gonna take advantage of you in the world. And I was like, I just wanna live in this world with so much love. And the way that they taught me to do that was. Through food and through reliability and just what it means to show up consistently for my people. And so in some ways it was all baked into me, even though they might not see that and they might not have raised me in that way. I see the ways in which they have sacrificed for love and nourished their families through food and made incredibly scary risks for the freedom of their family and for their people, and for a new life. And I just feel like I'm walking in their footsteps, doing the same even if they might not feel that way.    [00:11:09] Miko Lee: So did you have to talk your family and the restaurant into getting involved in the food support work for activists in Minnesota?   [00:11:18] Macy Tran: it wasn't a challenging conversation to have and I was surprised by that.    [00:11:22] Miko Lee: Oh, great.    [00:11:23] Macy Tran: Um, yeah, my parents have been, actually, this is the most politically active and vocal I have seen them. It's really incredible. I would say that for a lot of actually the Vietnamese community that I've been witnessing in Minneapolis, like they're saying things that I never thought that they would say. They're putting analysis like what together? The Vietnamese community is, I would say, skews at least the older generation, I should say. The older generation of Viet folks skews pretty right wing, conservative Republican, Trump supporting. And I'm just seeing dissent for the first time. It's not always like that explicit, but it is, I would say in the past what I've seen is just like. When kind of rightwing or more Republican opinions come up, if people disagree with that, it's just like you're just quiet. But now I'm seeing a way in which like people are responding, commenting on social media, like posting publicly about it. It's just been really, really powerful. When I first started organizing in response to the federal occupation, my parents were really quite worried and they did not want me to get involved. And they didn't really understand why I felt compelled to do this. And then when Alex Prety was murdered, I. It was actually my auntie, my mom's youngest sister that brought up the idea of a food distribution because she was feeling like I just wanna do something and like, what is an avenue in which we can do something? Well, we have this restaurant. Mm-hmm. And so she proposed it to my parents first, which Oh    [00:13:05] Miko Lee: wow.   [00:13:06] Macy Tran: Love, shout out to her because    [00:13:09] Miko Lee: Thank you, auntie.    [00:13:10] Macy Tran: She did right. She did the hard work for me. I think I would've been a little more hesitant or would've taken a little bit more time to just process, like how to go about asking them, because there's just a different power dynamic there. Sure. But because my auntie is more of a peer mm-hmm. And she had this idea and she has also worked at the restaurant mm-hmm. For many, many years of her life. I think it really spoke to my parents and I think it really was a moment for them to connect the ways that this restaurant is so important to not only our family and how we show up in community, but also to our community in Minneapolis. Mm-hmm. I have traveled all across the world and have met people who have eaten at Pho 79 and have told me stories of getting engaged there, of getting a tattoo of the, like restaurant on their, on their arm. The, the logo. Yeah, the logo. It's crazy, you know, like people, and I've also heard generations of families like growing up on my parents' food. Mm-hmm. As we share food with people and they support our business, it's only because of our community that we've been able to survive this far you know?. My parents came to Minnesota with nothing, and it's only because of the kindness of other Minnesotans and other Vietnamese Minnesotans that we were able to get anywhere.   [00:14:35] In this moment they saw that and they saw that. We can, we have these resources. This won't be hard for us. We have everything here that we need. This is the channel in which we can work in. And yeah, they were just ready to do it. I think also my parents were ready to take a risk because the business was not doing well, we weren't, there were not people coming out to eat. Everyone was scared to go out to eat. People were not really spending money. And this was really ever since the pandemic and the way that has impacted the restaurant industry and particularly immigrant businesses, and then also the George Floyd uprisings and the way that just the, violence and also the transformation that happened to the street that we were on Eat Street. It just really changed the ways people saw that corridor, that business corridor. And it was a really big business impact. And so my dad was just, I think, in a place where he was really willing to take a risk and a stand for what he believed in. And my mom as well. As a way to also just like. Really be present in community and show that, hey, like we are out here and we believe in loving our community and seeing the ways that people are showing up for our community as and for our business as well. And honestly, since the food distribution business has been steady and I think. My parents are, I mean, they're definitely feeling relieved, but I'm just feeling so grateful that they stood on their values, you know, and they stood grounded in that. And as a result, like the community is reciprocating. and that is such a beautiful thing that I don't, I think my dad took a risk not knowing what would happen, because more exposure is not always good. And I've been telling him that, you know, especially with the Vietnamese community being, of, of his genera generation being more right wing and more conservative. He recognizes that and he recognizes that we had to do something. So I feel so proud of them for just being really chill and okay, and actually impassioned and compelled to do something.   [00:16:57] Miko Lee: It sounds like it brought you a little bit closer with your family too.    [00:17:00] Macy Tran: Definitely. Definitely did. Yeah. I feel like me and my family have never really been able to sit at a table and talk about politics and what's going on in the world without one of us just like getting activated or feeling defensive or not seeing each other. It is a terrible thing what has happened and what continues to happen in our city, under federal occupation and so much beauty and creativity and love has come from it. And I even feel that at the most micro scale between me and my parents.    [00:17:39] Miko Lee: Can you, share with us that are not located in Minnesota, what the experience is like of this federal occupation on a day to day? Like, we're talking today on March 2nd, and I say that because our world, everything's changing every day and this is gonna air on a separate day. So I wanna name that. So right now, what is it like when you're just walking through the streets in downtown Minneapolis ?   [00:18:01] Macy Tran: Yeah. It's interesting because when you ask me this, I think about my experience like a month ago and how different it was and it felt to walk around a month ago compared to now. A month ago. It. I was seeing a neighbor on every corner of major streets, like looking for ice. You know, I was seeing car caravans, honking and following ICE agents. It's interesting 'cause like I actually just had a friend visit from Milwaukee and. She was nervous about ice. She's Asian American as well, and she was like, should I be scared? What's actually going on? And I told her, actually, yes, what's going on is scary and violent. And I feel so safe because I am meeting neighbors I have never met before. I'm making small talk with people who are just. Out on the streets walking their dog in a way that they would not normally, I'm talking to business owners, we're talking about the impacts of this occupation. Everywhere I go, there were eyes and that felt really powerful and strong. And now that operation Metro Surge is technically over they are supposed to be withdrawing ICE agents from the city. I would say there is definitely a decrease in the number of ICE agents in our city. Activity is much slower. However I would say out in the suburbs of Minneapolis and St. Paul, they are seeing action and enforcement from ICE agents. That is. Either at the, kind of the same amount that we were receiving or escalated. The concentration is higher out in the suburbs And so even though things were quieter in the city, they were elsewhere. And    [00:19:57] Miko Lee: yeah, I just saw videos this morning of protesters that were peacefully marching that just got tackled. Actually by Minnesota Sheriff's department working in conjunction with ice. I know every state in every region is a little bit different. But I thought that was something that Governor Waltz was working on right?    [00:20:15] Macy Tran: So actually the city ordinance that you are talking about is actually on a Minneapolis City level. So that was a decision made by Mayor Fray. Oh, that's only city. So it's only MPD, Minneapolis Police Department, who is not supposed to assist in, federal and right. Federal enforcement. However, on a county level, that's different. I see. So sheriffs might be working with, I know it's like, so complic, what a mess complicated. I    [00:20:41] Miko Lee: know. This is the same, I mean, this is the same everywhere, right? Mm-hmm. It's all broken down. Okay. So, so I think I hear you saying that ICE has kind of moved on with the targeted big city approach and they're going out into the suburbs instead. Is that right?    [00:20:57] Macy Tran: Yes. There are still protestors, and observers going every day to the Whipple building. The Whipple building is where ICE agents are coming from, and so they have definitely recorded a decrease in the number of ICE vehicles. So the volume isn't as high, but the cars are still coming and we're still seeing enforcement and violence in our neighborhoods. Just the other day, just a few streets down, a person was abducted in our neighborhood in Minneapolis. And because the volume isn't as high, they're not as easily able to track. And so they're working a lot more under the radar. Yeah. Mm-hmm. And their tactics have become just a lot more. Under the radar as well. In the early days in January, it was really easy to identify ICE out-of-state license plate, tinted windows. Big vehicles like super easy. Nowadays they're putting like coexist bumper stickers and little things on their dashboards and like, you know, driving little sedans and it's definitely not as easy and they're moving a lot more covertly. And because Operation Metro Surge has technically decreased and because many of our frontline activists have been working at this for months and are getting tired. Mm-hmm. There is a really interesting transition period happening here. Mm-hmm. Where I think we're all trying to align on what is the next.   [00:22:31] What's the next step? Mm-hmm. How? How are we, what is the best way to move given that this is the way that ICE is operating now? Yeah,    [00:22:40] Miko Lee: right. Just    [00:22:41] Macy Tran: under reflection. Mm-hmm.    [00:22:42] Miko Lee: Under such sneaky circumstances, like what they recently did in New York at Columbia, showing up at Columbia University with a missing child picture of a little kid. And that's how they got entry into the dorms, which is so wrong to terrible get a student. So that's actually illegal to like misrepresent being a police officer when they're not, they're a nice officer and    [00:23:05] Macy Tran: mm-hmm.    [00:23:06] Miko Lee: Showing a photo, I mean, it's so awful.    [00:23:08] Macy Tran: Mm-hmm.    [00:23:09] Miko Lee: I'm wondering how people that don't live in Minnesota can get involved.   [00:23:14] Macy Tran: Hmm. The, greatest frontier currently that is in need of support is rent support. There are, probably hundreds of maybe thousands of people who are likely at risk of eviction in the Twin Cities, because they have not been able to work for the past two months without fear of being abducted. We're calling on Governor Waltz for an eviction moratorium, which would prevent folks from being evicted. Governor Waltz is the only person who really has jurisdiction to implement an immediate rental moratorium, and he's done that before during the pandemic, and so we're trying to make arguments that this is. A state of emergency people are like not able, they weren't able to work. Like people are going to get evicted putting calls to his office, sending emails. So that's one way to get involved from abroad, uh, or not abroad outside of Minnesota, but also abroad if you're abroad And listening to this. The other way was, is that there's a lot of hyper-local organizing that is happening within Minneapolis that I can speak to every. Neighborhood and corner, I feel like, of Minneapolis is being accounted for usually by a team of just volunteer mutual aid groups who are fundraising for rent, who are fundraising for groceries who are fundraising for utilities.   [00:24:45] And these are all like live fundraising pages on the internet. And if you have even just 10, $20 to spare to help a Minneapolis resident, um, not get evicted in the next month. Um, every dollar matters. In this moment, rent is due. Soon, we're just at the beginning of March. And if folks aren't able to pay rent now and they haven't been able to pay rent in the last couple of months, like this is only going to have a snowball effect. We cannot risk vulnerable neighbors migrants, immigrants being, like more of them being unhoused at this moment. We already in our city have so many unhoused people who are not being cared for by our city officials, who are having their encampments being taken down and who are already not receiving adequate support. Our system cannot handle an influx of more unhoused people and we can prevent this. I would say that is kind of the biggest frontier at the moment in terms of what I'm seeing organizing on the ground.    [00:26:01] Miko Lee: Would you have links that you could share with us definitely for rent support. That would be really great if, and I'll definitely, I'll add them to the Apex Express show notes so folks that wanna get involved can contribute and help support community. You wrote in your piece about books, lovely books and podcasts and things that inspired you, which I always love hearing about those things. And one of the books you wrote about was Rice and Baguette, A History of Food in Vietnam. Can you talk a little bit about it, how it deepened your understanding of food legacies and resistance?    [00:26:33] Macy Tran: Mm So I read that book while I was living in Vietnam actually. So it was really cool for me to, what I love about that book, it's a little like academic. I will say that it is a food history like you are reading history, you know, it's a little bit like dense at some points, um, for    [00:26:49] Miko Lee: the real foodie audience.    [00:26:51] Macy Tran: For real. I'm like, if, yeah, exactly. And luckily that's me. I was into it. What I loved about it were, the legends, like there were some what I, so in Vietnam when I was living there, something that I loved and was learning more was that like Vietnamese people have so many legends about folk legends about food, like the origins of the watermelon,, the origins of our bunte cake, which is the cake that we eat, the sticky rice cake we eat during, lunar New Year. There are so many Food origin stories that I just did not grow up being raised on. And so, this book talked about some of like, how did pho even get started, you know, is pho even truly Vietnamese? It's, that's a debate I'm not gonna have right now. But. I loved just hearing the greater context in which all of this existed, especially not growing up with those stories and being,    [00:27:55] Miko Lee: Hey, wait, what is the origin of watermelon?    [00:27:58] Macy Tran: So it's this like funny little. Story where, this prince essentially gets banished to an island with his wife. And then on this random island, he finds this like incredible fruit, the watermelon, and he's like, whoa, this is so delicious. I want I must show this to the people back at home, but they won't have me because I'm banished. And then he basically floats the watermelon back to the mainland and they find it and they're like, oh my gosh, this is so incredible. We must, invite this man back to the mainland.    [00:28:38] Miko Lee: How did they know it was from him? Did he like carve his name in the watermelon?    [00:28:43] Macy Tran: I don't know. It's actually been a while since I've heard this story, so I could be just like. You know, I don't know all the details. That's    [00:28:50] Miko Lee: okay. That's always better anyway.   [00:28:53] Macy Tran: just stories like that. I love to hear them. I also learned about what it was like to eat and cook during foreign occupation when, oh, you know, the French were colonizers mm-hmm. When the Chinese were colonizers. Mm-hmm. And just the incredible Vietnamese food ways that emerged from those periods of colonization. Mm-hmm. They were both brutal and violent and also full of adaptation and creativity and survival foods. And so the book just talked about all of that, and I just love knowing those stories that help me know the ways in which our people have been able to survive for this long and are now free under, foreign  occupation.    [00:29:40] Miko Lee: Speaking of, you mentioned creativity and adaptability, and you are a multihyphenate person, as an artist, as an organizer, as a writer, as a visual artist, collage maker, I'm wondering how your artistry impacts your organizing and vice versa. How do they speak to each other? How do they influence each other?    [00:30:01] Macy Tran: Hmm. I am someone who, when there is an issue or a problem that arises, I'm often just confronting it with what can I do? What can I like feasibly do? How can I show up? And I think my artistic practices actually help me slow down. Even the ways that I can show up in community and do things in community, I'm very responsive. I'm always like, okay let's do a thing. Let's organize it. Let's get our hands dirty. I am out there, I am organizing people, you know, like tangibly. And I think the ways that my artistic practices partner with that is that my artistic practices help me reflect and remember and deepen and find spiritual grounding and purpose. my art is a way that I bridge conversations with my ancestors and I bridge what it means to know myself and be a person, a community member, a Vietnamese American daughter in this moment, right? And it reminds me of the skills that I have and wanna bring to the world. It also helps me create different narratives for understanding what's happening and. For finding creative solutions and for collaborating with others. So I think I would honestly be so burnt out and exhausted and sad if it were not for my artistic practices. I think it's because of my artistic practices that I find energy, that I find belonging, that I find meaning in the work that I'm doing.    [00:31:51] Miko Lee: I love that answer. Can you share, because you brought this up, can you share about a conversation or an interaction you've had with an ancestor and how that's influenced you recently?   [00:32:03] Macy Tran: Hmm. That's such a great question. I'm going to tie this answer into Lunar New Year because, lunar New Year is a time in which our material world and the spiritual world really can converge in a meaningful way, at least for me. And every year when I celebrate Lunar New Year, I will do something different. I deepen my practices. I just kind of deepen what I know about. Folk tradition and ancestor worship. And every year I learned new things and I wanna try new things. And so this year was the first year that I built a public altar space in my living room. Usually I just have it in my bedroom or in a small corner of my home somewhere that's like usually private. But I built like. It wasn't like a tiny little altar, like it was big, you know, like I had photos of all my relatives on there. I had flowers, I had five kinds of fruits. I had, you know, little, every time I ate a meal, I was putting a meal aside for my family to eat with me. And, Some cultures you don't eat the food that you leave on the altar, but in my family we do. And the reason for that is because we get to become one with our ancestors. We get to embody what our ancestors are and eat as well and their spirits, and so this past Lunar New Year, I actually threw a, I had celebrations on both sides of the family. And then I organized a new year party for my chosen family who came from all walks of life. And the prompt for the party, it was a potluck. The prompt for the potluck was cook something or bring something that your ancestors would be just delighted to eat on the altar. And so we    [00:34:00] Miko Lee: love that.    [00:34:01] Macy Tran: Oh yeah. It was so sweet. People came out with their best work, I should say, like the food was fantastic. Our ancestors were eating well, and I was sitting there. And this altar was full of tiny little plates of food, beautiful flowers. I also asked people to bring pictures, photos of their ancestors or people that they wanna honor. Incense were lit. The room was filled with incense smoke, and I was just, there was a moment where I was just, kinda in the corner of the room just watching, you know, and I had a feeling like, wow, all of our ancestors are hanging out right now. Not only are me and my chosen family, you know, building a community and belonging for ourselves but also like. I could have never, and probably they could have never predicted that my friend's like Jewish grandpa was hanging out with my Vietnamese grandmother and grandfather, you know, or yeah, my friends like grandparents from Antigua are now hanging out with like my family members and it's, it was just a moment where I just felt not just the joy.   [00:35:16] And love in the space of connecting with my real, like my friends in that moment. But also just the miraculousness of what it meant to hold all of our ancestors in that space. And so, after that I ended up writing a piece on my substack, actually as a letter to my ancestors. I, I kept the altar up for a week, a week and a half. And on the last day I was ready to take it down and move it back upstairs into my room. But on the last day, I thought, I'm gonna light the incense one more time. And have my ancestors in the space as I write this piece to them. There were so many things I wanted to say to them. And also at the same time, I felt like as I was writing, they were saying things to me, this is what I have to teach you in this moment, is kind of what they were saying to me. This is like, this is what it's like to celebrate that under occupation. This is what it was like when we thought it wasn't even possible to celebrate Tet. Like we had literally nothing but rice and water and yet we still did, and my grandma recently passed a I mean, it's not so recent anymore, but it's been just over a year now. And she was like, One of the first like major deaths of the elder generation in my family. And Tet was the time that I could commune with her and share love with her. And, I could just feel her presence in the space and I would even, memories felt like a way that she was talking to me. The memory of just the crackle of her sesame balls, like she made the best sesame balls. They were like. Thin and crispy and fluffy, but also like so like they were not skimping on the mung bean on the inside. It was fantastic. So I'm just like, I haven't had a sesame ball from her in over a year, but I can remember how it tastes and feels, and my mouth and that memory itself is a message from her. To remember what has fed me through so many years, and how important it is to just remember the, not only just the foods that we eat, but the people that have loved that food into existence. And now me, you know,    [00:37:38] Miko Lee: have you made it the dish, the sesame balls.    [00:37:43] Macy Tran: I actually have her recipe books, so I planned to I just didn't have time, this past Tet, but me and my brother were going to, and then I think we decided we wanted to do it on just like on a lower key day, like instead of like in the midst of just like so much family celebration, there was so much to prepare and we were like, let's just plan a low key weekend where it's just me and you and there's no timeline and we don't have to get this anywhere and they don't have to be perfect. Like    [00:38:14] Miko Lee: that sounds lovely. So it's personal and it's family and Exactly. And if for a one year anniversary, death anniversary is coming up, that might be a great time to honor her.    [00:38:22] Macy Tran: Exactly. Exactly.    [00:38:24] Miko Lee: I'm wondering what was like some standout dishes from that lovely event to you?    [00:38:29] Macy Tran: Ooh. I mean, I will talk about the dish I made.   [00:38:33] Miko Lee: Okay.    [00:38:36] Macy Tran: Which I thought was fantastic and I think my friends also thought were delicious. Was delicious. Um, but a dish that is commonly eaten during the lunar new year for Vietnamese people is a tit ka, which is a caramelized, braised pork belly. This caramelized, braised pork was stewing for probably three hours. Wow. And so, yeah, and I used coconut water with it. I didn't like, straight up coconut water and it    [00:39:04] Miko Lee: no Coca-Cola.    [00:39:06] Macy Tran: No Coca-Cola not in this one. And I just made a huge, huge pot and it was basically almost all gone by the end of the night. So that was like a really good feeling. Um, my brother made an incredible duck heart lap. He works at Diane's Place, actually, it's a famous Hmong restaurant in Minneapolis. And they processed duck on the menu. And so he had like access to all these duck organs and he made an incredible loup that he brought to the party. And my, one of my little sisters, Iris, she's Puerto Rican and she made like tostones, like fried plantains and then she also made Puerto Rican rice, and she, she made like three or four dishes. So like, people really went above and beyond for their ancestors. I could really, I mean, it was probably like 20 people who came to this party, so there were so many dishes and they were all. So good. So I, I don't wanna, once I get into it, I'm gonna go into it, so I'm not gonna chat your ear off.    [00:40:13] Miko Lee: Sounds lovely. Sounds yummy. Mm-hmm. And my last question is, I'm wondering what manifestation for the year of the horse you have for yourself.    [00:40:23] Macy Tran: The 18 million rising essay that I wrote came, it was right before the lunar new year that it got published. And it came during a time where I was already thinking a lot about my creative practice and how in, in relationship my creative practice in relationship with also the ways that I organize and the ways that I cook and, organize around food. And when this opportunity for this essay emerged and just the way it has been received has been such an honor, like, because I haven't written for myself, you know, in so long and like really with my own voice I just didn't realize that people were going to resonate with it so much and find like an invitation to engage in food justice themselves and their own ancestry. And also the ways that it made them think about food and their relationship to food. And it was such a blessing for me to receive that resonance from people, you know, and to receive, just the stories that I've heard and the way it spoke to them. And I felt like that has been a blessing for me to just really expand my creative practice and be more public with it. I'm like, dang, if this little thing that I wrote impacted people in the way that they think about the world, like. I have so many more ideas I wanna share and like be in partnership with others about.   [00:41:57] And I just launched my Substack, right after the Lunar New Year and I was like, all right, you're the fire horse. Let's freaking go. I am ready, I am running. So, I just wanna be creating so much and like act manifesting and actualizing a lot of the dreams that I have, my creative dreams that I have continued to put on the back burner. Things about hosting supper clubs and doing more work around my parents' restaurant, like helping them create narrative around the restaurant and sharing our restaurant story with people. And just using my words and experiences as a way to connect with the world and also be open to the ways that people wanna connect with me. So that's kind of the ways that I'm, I'm seeing this year unfold already, and it's already started with a bang. I also wanna add that year of the fire horse for me is just a lot about movement and progress. And so in this sense movement, I think of social movements and the ways that social this particular social movement against ICE in our city will fundamentally. Impact us for the next lunar year. It happened right at the beginning of the lunar New Year and it's going to have deep effects into the year, and we will forever be changed by this. And I am so excited to see the ways in which we harness this energy for transformation, for care into something that's really meaningful.   [00:43:37] Miko Lee: Thank you so much for joining us on Apex Express. It was a delight to talk with you.    [00:43:42] Macy Tran: Thank you, Miko. This was so great. Thanks for having me.   [00:43:45] Miko Lee: Next up, listen to researcher professor, Dr. Milkie Vu, speak on her exploration on Asian Americans and food insecurities. Welcome, Dr. Milkie Vu, assistant professor at Northwestern. Welcome so much to Apex Express.    [00:44:04] Dr. Milkie Vu: Thank you. I'm delighted to be here.    [00:44:07] Miko Lee: Dr. Milkie is a mixed methods researcher focusing on community engagement and health issues, and I'm excited to talk with you today. I wanna start by first asking the question that I ask all of my guests, which is, who are your people and what legacy do you carry with you?   [00:44:24] Dr. Milkie Vu: My people are the Vietnamese community, and when I think of my people, the first word that comes to my mind is resilience. I was raised in Vietnam. I speak Vietnamese fluently and I embrace my culture very deeply. I carry the memory of my parents and grandparents who have lived to colonization multiple world. And the challenge of post-war poverty and the ability to, endure all these hardship is the legacy that I bring with me and in my day to day life it acts as a personal life of hope for me and then professionally in the. Work that I do is really a foundation and it drives my dedication and commitment to working on health solution with Asian American and immigrant communities who have similar stories of hardship, but also perseverance.   [00:45:19] Miko Lee: Thank you so much. I really appreciate how your background has informed the work that you're doing, and I wonder if you could talk a little bit more about this study, this scoping review on food insecurity among Asian Americans. Can you one first start off by breaking down what a scoping review is.   [00:45:37] Dr. Milkie Vu: Yeah, I'm happy to talk about that. So a scoping review is essentially a methodology that we use to be able to summarize existing scientific literature and try to understand how this literature. Answer research questions that we have.   [00:45:56] Miko Lee: Can you tell me what inspired this study?    [00:45:59] Dr. Milkie Vu: I've done community engaged research with, Asian American population for over a decade. In doing so, I have come to realize , as an anecdotal evidence, how food insecurity is a issue in the community. And yet that's very little that has been, done in terms of research or policy that target this problem., So for example, the US Department of Agriculture, will publish annually a report on food insecurity in America and it will include several, racial and ethnic populations, but Asian Americans are frequently ommitted from that report. So, you know, at the national level, that data doesn't exist, which then, makes it very difficult to understand what is the severity of the problem and what are some of the solutions that could be done to address them. So that's why we were interested in doing a deeper dive into summarizing the literature too be able to see what has been done about this problem and what are some of the barriers that exist, towards food security for community members, and what are some of the literature gaps? Our review was published in 2024 was the first scientific review of the literature on food insecurity among Asian Americans.    [00:47:27] Miko Lee: And what did your study uncover?    [00:47:31] Dr. Milkie Vu: We documented several important findings. There is a lack of existing data on this problem. Due to this myth of Asian Americans being the model minority. Assuming that Asian Americans are uniformly successful socioeconomically and thus not experiencing, any challenge including food insecurity. One of the things that we found is the importance of data disaggregation and looking at food insecurity in different Asian origin groups. We found that food insecurity really varied. So for example, if you look at some groups like Japanese Americans, we found the prevalence of between two to 11% of the population reporting food insecurity. But then if you look at some of the Southeast Asian groups, for example, Filipinos or Hmong American or Vietnamese, the rates are much higher. So the studies that we found report, between eight to 41% of food insecurity and among Filipino population. Close to 48% for more Hmong American, and then between 14 or 28% for Vietnamese Americans, so much higher than the rates for other groups.   [00:48:48] Data Dion is important and there shouldn't be this grouping of different Asian groups in research because then it really erased like the struggles specific communities with food insecurity. I think the other finding that was really important is looking at more systemic or structural barriers that prevent people from being food secure. Our review found that limited English proficiency is a important driver of food insecurity. The lack of appropriate language services, whether that's food pantry or for things like snap navigation. These could be important target point infusion policy or interventions that could help address food insecurity, community members. We also look at a couple of qualitative studies that found really interesting things. So for example, even when Asian American community members do use food assistance programs like snap, the benefits are often not sufficient. And they have a negative experience. There's also fear of how that might negatively impact the immigration status or application. Those are important barriers that should be acknowledge.   [00:50:08] Miko Lee: Some of these numbers are so high. You mentioned 48% with Hmong folks with, it's just so surprising, and I wonder if there's a sense of the why some of these communities have a higher food insecurity than others.    [00:50:21] Dr. Milkie Vu: Yeah, one of the things that we did point out in the conclusion was the need for just more studies focusing on these, smaller Asian groups or smaller Asian population that are done in like the appropriate language to be. From some of the experience I've had, part of it is probably shaped by, the historical conditions to which some of these, communities might have come to the us. For example, thinking about my community Vietnamese, coming to America as refugees, fleeing persecution or free fleeing war and how that, historical conditions might create structural and socioeconomic challenge in Britain, in the community. I am also curious about is the availability of service and program that are linguistically appropriate or, providing culturally relevant food for these communities. So those are important points that we can hypothesize, but obviously more research is needed to understand, the root cause of these challenge and how to address them.   [00:51:28] Miko Lee: And were you focused on specific regions or this was national?    [00:51:34] Dr. Milkie Vu: I'm really glad that you asked about this. So the review itself is, summarizing all published literature focusing on Asian Americans. All of the studies take place in the us. A lot of the, studies probably focus on data that are from the coast. So either on Asian American, on the east coast or the west coast. , But we looked at the study like from a nationwide angle and I'm also happy to talk about some of the new committee organizations in Chicago looking at food insecurity and community-based solutions to address that among Asian Americans. Part of the motivation for the follow-up study was just thinking about the lack of data focusing on the Midwest or Chicago where I live.    [00:52:20] Miko Lee: Please, I'd love to hear more about that . [00:52:23] Dr. Milkie Vu: The COVID pandemic, had brought a lot challenges for food insecurity. For people nationwide in general, but then for Asian American, there's also this, so what I call like the double, almost like a double pandemic, like the waves of entire Asian violence and hate crimes. And so thinking about how that impact food insecurity in general among, Asian American community members. About two years ago, we interviewed around, 13 organizations in Chicago. All of them are either community based organizations, social services or food pantry, working with, primarily with Asian American community members, from diverse groups: korean, Chinese, Vietnamese, Filipino, south Asian, Mongolian, et cetera throughout Chicago. And the question that we asked them was, thinking about what programs they have offered during the COVID pandemic that aim at reducing food insecurity among community members. How did they implement this program? Who are some of the vulnerable populations served by the program? How did the pandemic as far as anti-Asian racism impact the program organization? That was the first study that looked at how community organization in Chicago help address this issue of insecurity on this, the COVID pandemic.   [00:53:57] Miko Lee: And so what is the next step for this study or what is the next piece that you're working on as connected to this?    [00:54:05] Dr. Milkie Vu: Yeah. Think about the role of the community organization as grassroots organizations that work from the ground up , as opposed to more top down program structure. They're doing a lot of the heavy lifting to help community members address food insecurity, because they know the community very well. They are able to provide the in language service that community members need. They're also trusted by community members. So a lot of the time,, certain populations especially say if those with limited their English proficiency or, more newly arrived immigrants, might feel more comfortable going here as opposed to going to this organization as opposed to, another one that are more generic and don't have the staff that speak the right language. I think the other thing is, staff with the similar cultural backgrounds are able to understand. There was one quote from the study that I did in Chicago. That stuck with me. When we tell them you could go to the food bank, the American food is not quite tailored to their taste. So they will get a big chunk of cheese and they will be like, what is this? Nobody wants to eat this. Again, thinking about the role of committee organization as so important in knowing the language, knowing the cultural preferences. And then just thinking of ways that we can further support, the programs and operations that they do. This is a really challenging time for nonprofits, social service organization, both in terms of providing food as well as other social service to Asian American and immigrant communities. How can research from a place like, researchers, from academia like me, are able to partner with them to further the service that they do and be able to find the funding that support them and community members. I think that's the important step for me.   [00:56:02] Miko Lee: Dr. Vu, how can folks find out more about your work?    [00:56:06] Dr. Milkie Vu: Yeah, In order to understand more about the work that we do, so we have a website, for our lab that frequently include, you know, like our current projects as well as publications. So you can go to site, so SI ts.northwestern.edu/vu group. and you'll be able to find more information about the research that we published. We've also recently, in the beginning of the year start, to find ways to disseminate research on social media. So we also have a Facebook group for our lab that disseminates our research findings as well as include information about the community members and partners Other trainees in the lab that make this work possible. The labs Facebook group is at facebook.com/maybe give research. and then you can always reach out to me via my email milkie.vu@northwestern.edu So I'm glad to connect with people who have similar research interests or would like to learn more about the work that we do.   [00:57:06] Miko Lee: Thank you so much for joining us and sharing your information about your important work that you're doing on research with Asian American community. Appreciate hearing from you.    [00:57:15] Dr. Milkie Vu: Thank you so much.   [00:57:18] Miko Lee: Please check out our website, kpfa.org/program/apexexpress to find out more about our show and our guests tonight. We thank all of you listeners out there. Keep resisting, keep organizing, keep creating, and sharing your visions with the world because your voices are important. Apex Express is produced by Ayame Keane-Lee, Anuj Vaidya, Cheryl Truong, Isabel Li, Jalena Keane-Lee, Miko Lee, Miata Tan, Preti Mangala-Shekar and Swati Rayasam. Tonight's show was produced by me Miko Lee, and edited by Ayame Keane-Lee. Have a great night.   The post APEX Express – 6.4.26 – Food Justice appeared first on KPFA.

When World War II broke out, Japanese Americans, including George "Joe" Sakato and his family, were treated as threats. But Sakato still joined the Army because he wanted to protect the United States and its people. And on a hill in eastern France, he launched a one-man charge that defied military logic and changed the tides of the battle. His story is an incredible tale of loyalty and friendship against impossible odds. Binge the full season of Medal of Honor, ad-free, with a Pushkin+ subscription. Sign up and save on the Medal of Honor show page on Apple Podcasts or at pushkin.fm/plus. Use the code MOH25 for 25% off an annual subscription. Connect with the team! Follow Pushkin on social @pushkinpods Follow JR Martinez @iamjrmartinez Follow Meredith Rollins @meredithkrollins Email the team: medalofhonor@pushkin.fm Episode resources: Honor Before Glory: The Epic World War II Story of the Japanese American GIs Who Rescued the Lost Battalion by Scott McGaugh (Grand Central Publishing, 2016) “442nd Regimental Combat Team” by the Densho Encyclopedia “Going for Broke: The 442nd Regimental Combat Team” by the National World War II MuseumSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

On this episode we discuss our May 2026 pick is No-No Boy by John Okada, one of the earliest in the Asian American canon following the story of Ichiro Yamada who returns home to Seattle after serving 2 years in prison for refusing to serve in the military during the internment of Japanese Americans during World War 2. We're excited to dive into this Asian American classic from 1957, who's publication journey is just as interesting as the story itself.Books & Boba is a podcast dedicated to reading and featuring books by Asian and Asian American authorsSupport the Books & Boba Podcast by:Joining our Patreon to receive exclusive perksPurchasing books at our bookshopRocking our Books & Boba merchFollow our hosts:Reera Yoo (@reeraboo)Marvin Yueh (@marvinyueh)Follow us:InstagramTwitterGoodreadsFacebookThe Books & Boba June 2026 pick is The Chosen and the Beautiful by Nghi VoThis podcast is part of Potluck: An Asian American Podcast CollectiveMentioned in this episode:Don't miss an all AAPI production of HENRY VI: A Trilogy in Two Parts at The Public in NYCNAATCO returns to The Public with their production of Shakespeare's trilogy, HENRY VI: A TRILOGY IN TWO PARTS, adapted and directed by Stephen Brown-Fried. Condensed into two parts and performed in rep, experience this saga of a nation spinning wildly out of control. Part 1: Foreign Wars kicks off with the funeral of King Henry V, leaving his infant son on the throne and sending the country into decades of spiraling chaos both abroad and at home. Part 2: Civil Strife picks up nearly 30 years later, as nascent domestic feuds rapidly metastasize into the full-blown civil war known as the War of the Roses.Henry VI - The Public

For the Memorial Day Weekend, we feature a number of conversations from the TDS Archive, beginning with a chat over coffee Tim had with his 98-year old neighbor & WW II veteran Nick Pileggi a few years ago. Montel Williams (former TV talk show host and Marine & Navy veteran) shares about his book The Sailing of the Intrepid: The Incredible Wartime Voyage of the Navy's Iconic Aircraft Carrier. Williams currently hosts "Military Makeover with Montel" on Lifetime. Karin Tanabe & Victoria Kelly (journalists & authors) team up to share about their documentary "Atomic Echoes: Untold Stories of World War II." Tanabe is a first-generation Japanese-American whose uncle was the first president of Hiroshima University, while Kelly's grandfather is a WWII atomic veteran--one of the first Americans to enter Nagasaki after the atomic bomb. We close out the show with Meathead, one of several dozen living Barbecue Hall of Famers and publisher of the most popular grilling & BBQ website in the world (www.AmazingRibs.com) regarding his book The Meathead Method: A BBQ Hall of Famer's Secrets and Science on BBQ, Grilling, and Outdoor Cooking with 114 Recipes.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

In October 1943, the Gripsholm—a Swedish ocean liner—and the Teia Maru—a Japanese troop ship—sat in Mormugao, a port in Portuguese India. There, the two ships exchanged their passengers: Allied civilians stuck in Japanese territory after Pearl Harbor , and an assortment of Japanese, Japanese-American, and other Japanese-ethnic people from the Americas.The trade capped a long and fraught diplomatic exchange between the U.S. and Japan, two countries at war. Evelyn Iritani's book Safe Passage: The Untold Story of Diplomatic Intrigue, Betrayal, and the Exchange of American and Japanese Civilians by Sea During World War II (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2026) tells the story of how this exchange came about: How U.S. civilians tried to survive in Japan or occupied Hong Kong, or how the U.S. government pressured Japanese Americans, housed in internment camps, to accept repatriation to Japan, a country many had never known. Evelyn is a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist. Her previous book, An Ocean Between Us: The Changing Relationship of Japan and the United States Told in Four Stories From the Life of An American Town (William Morrow and Company: 1994), won a Washington Governor's Writers Day Award. Evelyn began her career at the Seattle Post-Intelligencer and moved to the Los Angeles Times in 1995 to cover international economics. Her reporting garnered numerous awards, including the 2004 Pulitzer Prize for National Reporting and the George Polk Award for Economics Reporting for a series she co-authored on Wal-Mart.She can be found on her website, Facebook, LinkedIn and Instagram. You can find more reviews, excerpts, interviews, and essays at The Asian Review of Books, including its review of Safe Passage. Follow on Twitter at @BookReviewsAsia.  Nicholas Gordon is an editor for a global magazine, and a reviewer for the Asian Review of Books. He can be found on Twitter at @nickrigordon. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/new-books-network

In October 1943, the Gripsholm—a Swedish ocean liner—and the Teia Maru—a Japanese troop ship—sat in Mormugao, a port in Portuguese India. There, the two ships exchanged their passengers: Allied civilians stuck in Japanese territory after Pearl Harbor , and an assortment of Japanese, Japanese-American, and other Japanese-ethnic people from the Americas.The trade capped a long and fraught diplomatic exchange between the U.S. and Japan, two countries at war. Evelyn Iritani's book Safe Passage: The Untold Story of Diplomatic Intrigue, Betrayal, and the Exchange of American and Japanese Civilians by Sea During World War II (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2026) tells the story of how this exchange came about: How U.S. civilians tried to survive in Japan or occupied Hong Kong, or how the U.S. government pressured Japanese Americans, housed in internment camps, to accept repatriation to Japan, a country many had never known. Evelyn is a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist. Her previous book, An Ocean Between Us: The Changing Relationship of Japan and the United States Told in Four Stories From the Life of An American Town (William Morrow and Company: 1994), won a Washington Governor's Writers Day Award. Evelyn began her career at the Seattle Post-Intelligencer and moved to the Los Angeles Times in 1995 to cover international economics. Her reporting garnered numerous awards, including the 2004 Pulitzer Prize for National Reporting and the George Polk Award for Economics Reporting for a series she co-authored on Wal-Mart.She can be found on her website, Facebook, LinkedIn and Instagram. You can find more reviews, excerpts, interviews, and essays at The Asian Review of Books, including its review of Safe Passage. Follow on Twitter at @BookReviewsAsia.  Nicholas Gordon is an editor for a global magazine, and a reviewer for the Asian Review of Books. He can be found on Twitter at @nickrigordon. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/military-history

In October 1943, the Gripsholm—a Swedish ocean liner—and the Teia Maru—a Japanese troop ship—sat in Mormugao, a port in Portuguese India. There, the two ships exchanged their passengers: Allied civilians stuck in Japanese territory after Pearl Harbor , and an assortment of Japanese, Japanese-American, and other Japanese-ethnic people from the Americas.The trade capped a long and fraught diplomatic exchange between the U.S. and Japan, two countries at war. Evelyn Iritani's book Safe Passage: The Untold Story of Diplomatic Intrigue, Betrayal, and the Exchange of American and Japanese Civilians by Sea During World War II (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2026) tells the story of how this exchange came about: How U.S. civilians tried to survive in Japan or occupied Hong Kong, or how the U.S. government pressured Japanese Americans, housed in internment camps, to accept repatriation to Japan, a country many had never known. Evelyn is a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist. Her previous book, An Ocean Between Us: The Changing Relationship of Japan and the United States Told in Four Stories From the Life of An American Town (William Morrow and Company: 1994), won a Washington Governor's Writers Day Award. Evelyn began her career at the Seattle Post-Intelligencer and moved to the Los Angeles Times in 1995 to cover international economics. Her reporting garnered numerous awards, including the 2004 Pulitzer Prize for National Reporting and the George Polk Award for Economics Reporting for a series she co-authored on Wal-Mart.She can be found on her website, Facebook, LinkedIn and Instagram. You can find more reviews, excerpts, interviews, and essays at The Asian Review of Books, including its review of Safe Passage. Follow on Twitter at @BookReviewsAsia.  Nicholas Gordon is an editor for a global magazine, and a reviewer for the Asian Review of Books. He can be found on Twitter at @nickrigordon. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/american-studies

In October 1943, the Gripsholm—a Swedish ocean liner—and the Teia Maru—a Japanese troop ship—sat in Mormugao, a port in Portuguese India. There, the two ships exchanged their passengers: Allied civilians stuck in Japanese territory after Pearl Harbor , and an assortment of Japanese, Japanese-American, and other Japanese-ethnic people from the Americas.The trade capped a long and fraught diplomatic exchange between the U.S. and Japan, two countries at war. Evelyn Iritani's book Safe Passage: The Untold Story of Diplomatic Intrigue, Betrayal, and the Exchange of American and Japanese Civilians by Sea During World War II (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2026) tells the story of how this exchange came about: How U.S. civilians tried to survive in Japan or occupied Hong Kong, or how the U.S. government pressured Japanese Americans, housed in internment camps, to accept repatriation to Japan, a country many had never known. Evelyn is a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist. Her previous book, An Ocean Between Us: The Changing Relationship of Japan and the United States Told in Four Stories From the Life of An American Town (William Morrow and Company: 1994), won a Washington Governor's Writers Day Award. Evelyn began her career at the Seattle Post-Intelligencer and moved to the Los Angeles Times in 1995 to cover international economics. Her reporting garnered numerous awards, including the 2004 Pulitzer Prize for National Reporting and the George Polk Award for Economics Reporting for a series she co-authored on Wal-Mart.She can be found on her website, Facebook, LinkedIn and Instagram. You can find more reviews, excerpts, interviews, and essays at The Asian Review of Books, including its review of Safe Passage. Follow on Twitter at @BookReviewsAsia.  Nicholas Gordon is an editor for a global magazine, and a reviewer for the Asian Review of Books. He can be found on Twitter at @nickrigordon. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In October 1943, the Gripsholm—a Swedish ocean liner—and the Teia Maru—a Japanese troop ship—sat in Mormugao, a port in Portuguese India. There, the two ships exchanged their passengers: Allied civilians stuck in Japanese territory after Pearl Harbor , and an assortment of Japanese, Japanese-American, and other Japanese-ethnic people from the Americas.The trade capped a long and fraught diplomatic exchange between the U.S. and Japan, two countries at war. Evelyn Iritani's book Safe Passage: The Untold Story of Diplomatic Intrigue, Betrayal, and the Exchange of American and Japanese Civilians by Sea During World War II (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2026) tells the story of how this exchange came about: How U.S. civilians tried to survive in Japan or occupied Hong Kong, or how the U.S. government pressured Japanese Americans, housed in internment camps, to accept repatriation to Japan, a country many had never known. Evelyn is a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist. Her previous book, An Ocean Between Us: The Changing Relationship of Japan and the United States Told in Four Stories From the Life of An American Town (William Morrow and Company: 1994), won a Washington Governor's Writers Day Award. Evelyn began her career at the Seattle Post-Intelligencer and moved to the Los Angeles Times in 1995 to cover international economics. Her reporting garnered numerous awards, including the 2004 Pulitzer Prize for National Reporting and the George Polk Award for Economics Reporting for a series she co-authored on Wal-Mart.She can be found on her website, Facebook, LinkedIn and Instagram. You can find more reviews, excerpts, interviews, and essays at The Asian Review of Books, including its review of Safe Passage. Follow on Twitter at @BookReviewsAsia.  Nicholas Gordon is an editor for a global magazine, and a reviewer for the Asian Review of Books. He can be found on Twitter at @nickrigordon. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/asian-review

In October 1943, the Gripsholm—a Swedish ocean liner—and the Teia Maru—a Japanese troop ship—sat in Mormugao, a port in Portuguese India. There, the two ships exchanged their passengers: Allied civilians stuck in Japanese territory after Pearl Harbor , and an assortment of Japanese, Japanese-American, and other Japanese-ethnic people from the Americas.The trade capped a long and fraught diplomatic exchange between the U.S. and Japan, two countries at war. Evelyn Iritani's book Safe Passage: The Untold Story of Diplomatic Intrigue, Betrayal, and the Exchange of American and Japanese Civilians by Sea During World War II (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2026) tells the story of how this exchange came about: How U.S. civilians tried to survive in Japan or occupied Hong Kong, or how the U.S. government pressured Japanese Americans, housed in internment camps, to accept repatriation to Japan, a country many had never known. Evelyn is a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist. Her previous book, An Ocean Between Us: The Changing Relationship of Japan and the United States Told in Four Stories From the Life of An American Town (William Morrow and Company: 1994), won a Washington Governor's Writers Day Award. Evelyn began her career at the Seattle Post-Intelligencer and moved to the Los Angeles Times in 1995 to cover international economics. Her reporting garnered numerous awards, including the 2004 Pulitzer Prize for National Reporting and the George Polk Award for Economics Reporting for a series she co-authored on Wal-Mart.She can be found on her website, Facebook, LinkedIn and Instagram. You can find more reviews, excerpts, interviews, and essays at The Asian Review of Books, including its review of Safe Passage. Follow on Twitter at @BookReviewsAsia.  Nicholas Gordon is an editor for a global magazine, and a reviewer for the Asian Review of Books. He can be found on Twitter at @nickrigordon. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/japanese-studies

Tacoma author Tamiko Nimura's father died when she was just 10 years old. Among the things he left behind was an unpublished manuscript about his family’s incarceration at the Tule Lake camp for Japanese Americans. Nimura ultimately made a pilgrimage to Tule Lake in 2014, to see where her father was forced to spend part of his childhood. She used her father's manuscript and her own experience to write a new book called “A Place for What We Lose: A Daughter’s Return to Tule Lake,” which is out now. GuestTamiko Nimura, author, “A Place for What We Lose: A Daughter’s Return to Tule Lake”Related LinksExploring Tamiko Nimura’s New Book “A Place For What We Lose” - DenshoNimura's event in Seattle on June 6th Thank you to the supporters of KUOW, you help make this show possible! If you want to help out, go to kuow.org/donate/soundsidenotes Soundside is a production of KUOW in Seattle, a proud member of the NPR Network. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

GUEST: Kelsi Umeko, filmmaker, shares her forthcoming film, “I am American,” which explores the internment of Japanese Americans during WWII, an experience her own family lived through // Choosing Joy! A positive attitude may help you live longer. // SCENARIOS!

In 1942, Executive Order 9066 laid the foundation for the mass removal and subsequent incarceration of over 125,000 Japanese and Japanese Americans. The federal government built ten concentration camps throughout the interior of the country where they incarcerated the majority of the Japanese Americans removed from the West Coast. This year marks the 80th anniversary of the closure of the camps. Join IKARite Brian Rosenbaum, Kristen Hayashi (Curator and Director of Collections at the Japanese American National Museum), and J.A.N.M. community members, whose family members were incarcerated, for a discussion about this shameful moment in US history, the echoes of which reverberate today.

An Oakland musician challenges traditions, while also keeping them alive. Today, the music of World War 2 incarceration camps that helped Japanese Americans protest, connect, and heal. Then, Hrishikesh Hirway, host of the hit podcast Song Exploder, shares how the show, and his new album, came to be.

Today we start with this question: What are the first sounds that come to mind when you think about war? If you happen to say music  - you're not alone. Oakland musician Shirley Kazuyo Muramoto would agree.She is a beloved musician who has played music her whole life. And it's music deeply influenced by her family's history. She's the descendant of Japanese immigrants who were incarcerated during World War 2. Even after nearly seven decades of performing, Muramoto still shares the songs, and histories, with anyone who wants to listen. KALW's Cara Nguyen wanted to know more.

Send us Fan MailSeattle artist Erin Shigaki joins Chino y Chicano to discuss her mural Never Again Is Now, created for Bellevue College in 2020. The artwork depicts two Japanese American children in World War II incarceration camps and originally included an informational panel about businessman Miller Freeman and his role in promoting anti-Japanese sentiment in the Pacific Northwest.After the mural's unveiling, Bellevue College removed the reference to Freeman, triggering public backlash and ultimately contributing to the resignations of then-president Jerry Weber and vice president Gayle Colston Barge.Now, as the mural is set for rededication six years later, controversy has resurfaced following a racist voicemail and renewed questions about why the college was slow to publicly address it. In this episode, Shigaki reflects on art, historical memory, institutional accountability, and why these conversations remain urgent today.Read: https://southseattleemerald.org/voices/2025/07/22/masked-men-are-detaining-people-when-will-washingtons-leaders-protect-usRead: https://nieman.harvard.edu/mark-trahant-wins-the-2025-i-f-stone-medal-for-journalistic-independence/Read: https://www.24thstreet.org/blog/2025/1/17/letting-goRead:https://www.amazon.com/Harbingers-January-Charlottesville-American-Democracy/dp/1586424017Read: https://www.mapresearch.org/2024-dei-report "Dismantling DEI: A Coordinated Attack on American Values"https://www.forbes.com/sites/conormurray/2025/01/07/these-companies-have-rolled-back-dei-policies-mcdonalds-is-latest-to-abandon-diversity-standards/https://www.chronicle.com/package/the-assault-on-dei  Chronicle of Higher Education https://www.courts.wa.gov/appellate_trial_courts/supreme/bios/?fa=scbios.display_file&fileID=gonzalezRead: https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/obituaries/chinatown-international-district-activist-matt-chan-dead-at-71/Hear Rick Shenkman on the BBC Radio Program Sideways:https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m001xdg0Read: https://www.thedailybeast.com/i-stuck-with-nixon-heres-why-science-said-i-did-itRead: https://www.washcog.org/in-the-news/your-right-to-knowRead: https://www.seattletimes.com/opinion/the-legislatures-sunshine-committee-has-fallen-into-darkness/Read: https://www.cascadiadaily.com/2024/feb/2...

Send us Fan MailIn honor of Asian American and Pacific Islander (AAPI) Heritage Month, hosts Koji Steven Sakai and Michelle Malizaki take the podcast on the road to the Japanese American National Museum (JANM) in Little Tokyo. In this special archival episode, they dive into a landmark 2024 conversation with the legendary George Takei, recorded by Sharon Yamato during the Tule Lake Pilgrimage. George reflects on his family's cross-country odyssey through the American concentration camp system, from the swamps of Rohwer, Arkansas, to the high-security Segregation Center at Tule Lake. He provides a visceral description of Tule Lake as the most militarized of all ten camps—complete with three layers of barbed wire, machine gun towers, and tanks patrolling the perimeter. The heart of the episode explores the "logic of dissent" and the "no-win" nature of Question 28 in the government's Loyalty Questionnaire. George also shares the profound lessons he learned from his father about "participatory democracy" and the responsibility of citizens to ensure that a "government of the people" does not slide into autocracy. Highlights include:The origins of his bestselling graphic novel, They Called Us Enemy, and his children's book, My Lost Freedom. The reality of life inside the Tule Lake stockade and the "incompetence of racism" found in the government's literacy traps. A powerful warning for 2026: Why democracy is a choice that requires active participation every single day. Tune in for a deep look at the fragility of American ideals and the enduring strength of the Japanese American spirit.CREDITSThe music was created by Jalen BlankWritten by Koji Steven SakaiHosts: Michelle Malazaki and Koji Steven SakaiEdited by Koji Steven SakaiProduced by Koji Steven Sakai in conjunction with the Japanese American National MuseumSupport the show

What turns an ordinary person into a legend? Host and Army veteran J.R. Martinez returns with stories of split-second decisions that changed the course of history. Hear about harrowing escapes from prisoner-of-war-camps, daring flights to the farthest reaches of the globe, miraculous rescues, and acts of self sacrifice that will never be forgotten. These stories are about what it takes to become a hero and what happens after. Binge the full season of Medal of Honor, ad-free, with a Pushkin+ subscription. Sign up on the Medal of Honor show page in Apple or at Pushkin.fm/plus and use the code MOH25 for 25% off an annual subscription. This season, you’ll hear the stories of: James Fleming: the Vietnam pilot who flew a helicopter into a death trap to save his men. Edouard Izac: the WWI sailor who escaped a U-boat and a moving train to deliver enemy secrets. George Sakato: the Japanese-American soldier who turned grief into a one-man army for the 442nd Regimental Combat Team. Richard Byrd: The world’s most famous explorer who might’ve faked his flight to the North Pole. Florent Groberg: The man who tackled a suicide bomber to save his team in Afghanistan. Richard Pittman: The one-eyed Marine who tricked his way into Vietnam to hold a jungle trail alone. Joseph Rodriguez: the Korean War soldier whose bravery was fueled by his love for a girl back home Clarence Sasser: The combat medic who crawled through a flooded rice paddy trying to help as many soldiers as he could. Joshua Chamberlain: The college professor whose bayonet charge saved the Union at Gettysburg. The Four Chaplains: Four men of different faiths who sacrificed themselves to save their fellow soldiers See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Recessions, trade wars, labor unrest — in moments of societal crisis in the United States, Asian-Americans have been perennially targeted, from the destruction of Chinatowns by white mobs, to the mass internment of Japanese-Americans during WW2, to attacks against Asians during Covid. Historian Scott Kurashige reflects on more than 175 years of anti-Asian violence and its connection to U.S. empire abroad and a divided working class at home. Scott Kurashige, American Peril: The Violent History of Anti-Asian Racism UC Press, 2026 Photo by Jason Leung on Unsplash The post U.S. Capitalism, Empire, and Anti-Asian Violence appeared first on KPFA.

Questions 27 & 28 by Karen Tei Yamashita blends history and fiction to bring to light the experiences of Japanese Americans incarcerated on U.S. soil during WWII, delving into the two questions that stirred division and shaped the future of families. Karen joins us to talk about archival research, storytelling, Jane Austen and more with host Miwa Messer. This episode of Poured Over was hosted by Miwa Messer and mixed by Harry Liang.                     New episodes land Tuesdays and Thursdays (with occasional Saturdays) here and on your favorite podcast app. Featured Books (Episode): Questions 27 & 28 by Karen Tei Yamashita I Hotel by Karen Tei Yamashita Sansei and Sensibility by Karen Tei Yamashita Tropic of Orange by Karen Tei Yamashita Letters to Memory by Karen Tei Yamashita Years of Infamy: The Untold Story of America's Concentration Camps by Michi Nishiura Weglyn Farewell to Manzanar by Jeanne Wakatsuki Houston No-No Boy by John Okada U.S.A.: The Complete Trilogy by John Dos Passos Moderation by Elaine Castillo  

Here we go!  Another little bit of history that really matters.  In 1942, following Pearl Harbor, Franklin Roosevelt signed executive order 9066 which allowed  the military designated Military zones and control who lived in them in the United States.  The order did not mention Japanese American citizens or concentration camps by name, but effectively that'w who was targeted and what was created in this executive order.  Japanese Citizens were rounded up, sent to camps and forced to live in old horse stalls or worse before being transferred to some of the worst hellholes in the country.  This is after many were blocked from citizenship or owning land.  We go into the why's and howfores in this special Abolish ICE we've seen this crap before episode of the Family Plot Podcast!Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/family-plot--4670465/support.

On Monday's show: We learn why the Texas Medical Board sanctioned three doctors for delaying care of two pregnant women, which the state board says contributed to their deaths, as reported by Pro Publica.Also this hour: We revisit a conversation with actor George Takei, who shared his family's experiences with Japanese-American internment during World War II.Then, veterinarian Dr. Lori Teller answers listener questions about their pets.And, we get an update on the Rockets' playoff series with the Lakers, and the Astros' weekend series with the Cardinals, as we chat with Bleav in Astros podcast co-host Jeff Balke.Watch

APEX Express is a weekly magazine-style radio show featuring the voices and stories of Asians and Pacific Islanders from all corners of our community. The show is produced by a collective of media makers, deejays, and activists. On this episode, host Miata Tan speaks with three guests from Tsuru for Solidarity, a nationwide organization working to end immigration detention in the United States. They discuss the current state of the system, the conditions facing immigrant and asylum-seeking families, and how Tsuru's Japanese American roots shape their approach to this work. Get Involved with Tsuru for Solidarity Join a campaign Mailing list Instagram | Facebook | YouTube Website   Transcript ​[00:00:00]  Miata Tan: Hello and welcome. I'm your host Miata Tan, and you are tuning into APEX Express, a weekly radio show that uplifts the voices and stories of Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders. The United States runs the largest immigration detention system in the world. Earlier this year, the US Immigration and Customs Enforcement, also known as ICE, [00:01:00] held a record. 73,000 people in immigration detention the highest number in the agency's 23 year history. Since January 20, 25, over 6,200 kids have passed through ICE detention. Tonight we hear from a community who are shining a light on this issue and working to end the ongoing detention of immigrant and asylum seeking families.  Rob Buscher: The Japanese American story and Asian American story are just one chapter in this much larger chronicle of state violence, and we. See our role as, as also helping to connect the dots and be the connective tissue. Miata Tan: That was the voice of Rob Buscher, the Director of Operations at Tsuru for Solidarity, a nationwide organization with a mission to educate, advocate, and protest to close all US detention site. And bring an end to inhumane immigration policies. Tsuru for Solidarity is led by [00:02:00] the survivors and descendants of Japanese Americans who are incarcerated in concentration camps by the US government in World War ii. Our three guests tonight are shaping the future of this work at Tsuru for Solidarity. They share with us how the legacy of Japanese American wartime incarceration is deeply intertwined with the present day realities that many immigrant communities are facing. First up is Mike Ishii, the Executive Director of Tsuru for Solidarity. Here's Mike taking us back to the inception of this organization and national movement. Mike Ishii: In 2016 the Obama administration decided to really lean into. A deterrence policy of immigration. When they had first entered office, we thought they may actually provide some relief for immigrants. But in fact, what they ended up doing was weaponizing the immigration policy at the southern border against immigrants. And they built [00:03:00] Karnes and Dilley, which were the first family detention centers. Carl Takei, one of the founding members of Tsuru for Solidarity. In fact, I think he was just honored by, the Asian Bar Association for his longtime advocacy work in community spaces. Well, in 2016 when the Obama administration really opened Karnes and Dilley, Carl was working at the A CLU in immigration and the Obama administration had the audacity to want to invite advocates from all over the country to show off their new detention centers. And so when Carl entered into those sites, what he encountered was a room that was. Full of giant cabinets floor to ceiling. And when they opened the doors, what he saw inside were thousands of shoes for infants. And it took his breath away and he realized, oh my God, these are concentration camps for children. And you know, this really. Resonated with his [00:04:00] own family's history of mass incarceration during World War ii. So what he did was he immediately called Dr. Satsuki Ina, Dr. Ina is very famous. For a number of things. One is that she is really the preeminent community trauma specialist in the Japanese American community. She was born inside of the Tula Lake Segregation Center, a concentration camp. She would grow up to become a very, well-known psychotherapist in the Japanese American community. Dr. Ina. Is really like Carl's auntie, and so he said, this is happening at the southern border. I want you to come have a look. She went inside and she was actually able to meet with families and their children, and she of course can do a psychological assessment  She began to advocate. Against these camps because what she realized was that the conditions, the experiences, the trauma that these children were experiencing was very similar to what our own survivors had experienced as children during World War ii in the US concentration caps. [00:05:00] So there's one of the genesis prongs of Tsuru for solidarity. If you fast forward. To 2018, you have the zero tolerance policy under Trump, administration, 1.0. And if you remember, at that time, as an extension. of deterrence, they were separating children from their families at the southern border. These are families who were seeking refugee status, who were seeking asylum, who were presenting for asylum. That's a constitutional and human right, protected by the Geneva Conventions. They would take those families, they would literally strip the children away from their parents. They deported the parents. Purposefully they did not record where they were sending them often deported not to countries of origin. So in many cases, we still have not reunited those families. We don't know where the parents are and the children are still here, nine, 10 years later, With unaccompanied status because they purposefully destroyed the connections and the ability to [00:06:00] trace and reunite those families. That's Trump 1.0. And when they were doing that they were also expanding these large congregate concentration caps for children. They were calling them influx centers and saying, oh, they'll only be processed through these, and then we'll release children into. Custody of family members, et cetera. That was not true. They were actually prisons for children and they were literal concentration camps. It's violating the due process laws of the United States. there's no accountability. There's no oversight. And so Tsuru for Solidarity emerged in 2018 as an organization of Japanese Americans, really led by survivors who were children in camps and their descendants.  My own mother was incarcerated in a concentration camp in Idaho with her family. During World War ii, she was 10 years old at that time. She had two younger sisters and her youngest sister was born inside of the Minidoka concentration camp and experienced birth trauma because they had no doctors. She was, um, birthed by a veterinarian [00:07:00] and ex experienced, um, lack of oxygen And so she lived a life of tremendous suffering and, and disability. Um, that was often unrecognized as trauma from a concentration camp. She attempted to commit suicide multiple times. Eventually would die an early death from mental health. Complications. That's the legacy of the camps of World War ii, and understanding that multi-generational impact is partly why suited for solidarity emerged in 2018 when we recognized that they were repeating our history, and that's why we're here today. Miata Tan: That was Mike Ishii, Executive Director at Tsuru for Solidarity. Mike described how Tsuru's work grew in response to the ongoing detention of immigrant children in the United States. As he mentioned, many Japanese Americans have deep roots in this country. Now let's hear from Rob Buscher Tsuru's, Director of [00:08:00] Operations. He's a mixed race yonsei or fourth generation Japanese American. You may hear him use terms like yonsei to describe different generations. Now, here's Rob Unpacking the legacy of Japanese American incarceration, including the Civil Liberties Act of 1988, which issued a formal apology and reparations and what that history means for other communities today. Rob Buscher: In 2018 and 2019, our community was not the one that was at risk of being detained. We were not the ones who were being targeted by the state violence of immigrant detention and enforcement. and yet we had this ability to kind of think about and talk about. Multi-generational impacts of the trauma from World War ii. Um, it's not just the survivors of camp and the children of camp. It's the children and grandchildren of this experience who continue to suffer multi-generational effects of trauma, whether it be higher, uh, incidents of anxiety and stress leading to a [00:09:00] variety of health issues, uh, substance abuse issues the forced assimilation that resulted in the aftermath of our resettlement into the broader American society has also resulted in a great deal of assimilation trauma. So for a number of sansei and yonsei and gosei now trying to understand, uh, what is our history and heritage? How can we relate to something that was forcibly removed from us and really navigating this idea that at sometimes feels like a racial imposter syndrome, uh, when we don't know our own histories because it was forcibly taken from us. In a variety of ways, uh, I think that the Japanese American community's role, and specifically through Tsuru, has been rooted in this idea of solidarity and collective liberation because we understand that the effects. Our trauma, we're part of this much longer continuum of anti-black racism, of anti indigenous genocide, of white supremacy in the United States. The [00:10:00] Japanese American story and Asian American story are just one chapter in this much larger chronicle of state violence, and we. See our role as, as also helping to connect the dots and be the connective tissue. In some cases, when communities who have experienced these kinds of traumas across many decades aren't always in communication with each other, aren't always in conversation, but the complexity and nuance of the American story actually lends itself to a number of parallels to have conversations around things like. Black reparations. And you know, this is another part of the work that Tsuru does in solidarity with black reparations and African American communities, descendants of chattel slavery and others who have suffered Jim Crow and other forms of state violence against black and brown communities. understanding that the, the redress story and the story of Japanese Americans receiving our own reparations. Uh, is part of this longer narrative around, uh, what does it mean to have reparative [00:11:00] justice? And, um, as some of the few people who have received reparations from the United States government, uh, many of us also see it as our obligation and duty to stand in solidarity with black reparations.  Mike Ishii: if I could just add on to that, you know. There's an intersectional history in the United States of forced removals, you know, on the enslavement blocks enforcing people on forced death marches from their home lands to reservations. In the prison system of the us The largest prison system in the world. It's forced removal, it's separation of families, it's mass incarceration it's surveillance and it's murder. And the Japanese American chapter of that history is actually a very similar story that just as, as Rob said, just keeps being repeated over and over again, but it's created in new iterations. So, just to give you a small example related to the Japanese American story. Dylan Meyer, who ran the war relocation authority, he was responsible [00:12:00] for the 10 largest, the most well known of the Japanese American concentration camps. There were actually over 75, sites of detention for Japanese Americans during World War ii. Most people don't realize that. what we were put into that system during World War II was based on the reservation model, um, of how they remove indigenous people from their homelands and then force them onto reservation lands. That model was exported. By the Nazis to build their concentration camps. So like people think, oh, Nazi Germany invented that. No, it was, that model was invented in the United States. It was then exported to Nazi Germany. It was then tailored further on Japanese American communities. And then with the forced assimilation, we were, our people were not allowed to go back to their homes initially. Dylan Meyer wrote about it in his biography. He considered the force assimilation one of his greatest accomplishments. So what he was doing was he was dispersing us and destroying us in one generation of force removal. We lost our homes, we lost our farms. We lost the nijo Mai, the Japan towns. We [00:13:00] lost our language. We lost our culture, and perhaps most importantly. We lost each other because they pitted our community against each other with a series of very divisive questionnaires that really turned people on each other, More than 84 years since the opening of the camp. We're still trying to repair the fractures of that. They're not healed yet. And so that's what Rob, when Rob refers to multi-generational trauma, we're a fractured community. Still trying to repair the implosion that was. Really dropped on us by the United States government, this is what they do repeatedly to community after community. So with the force assimilation after World War ii, they saw how that worked. Then they, they took that back and they weaponized it against, um, indigenous communities and saying, we're gonna move people off the reservations. We're gonna resettle them in cities Further isolating people away from their home communities, taking away their languages, taking them and breaking their connections to family and community. Right? Setting people up for failure in a city away from their [00:14:00] people. in poverty., And what we're witnessing right now is a culmination of hundreds of years in this of white supremacy, weaponized against our communities. More openly, more brazenly than ever before, with the full power of the United States government behind it. Miata Tan: That was Mike Ishii, Executive Director at Tsuru for Solidarity. As Mike described mass surveillance programs, the World War II, incarceration of Japanese Americans and post-war pressures to assimilate left lasting impacts on this community. In the present, Tsuru for Solidarity connects the Japanese American history to ongoing immigration detention in the United States. Here's Mike describing some of Tsuru's past and ongoing campaigns focused on closing specific detention sites, what they call site fights.  Mike Ishii: Dilley and Karnes, which are the original two sites and the largest sites in Texas, which are now in the news again, [00:15:00] because they're being reused again by the Trump administration very openly. But under Biden, we had forced 'em to close those basically functionally for families. They were using them in other ways. Which is not good. but we had forced them to stop detaining families officially. we had stopped the expansion of these large congregate sites for unaccompanied migrant children. Uh, we stopped them from opening a large one in Greensboro, North Carolina. They wanted to open what they called the Piedmont Academy. Site of the former National Jewish School that school closed. And so they had leased the property and they were gonna. Open their largest detention site for unaccompanied migrant children and call it an academy. we slowed it down and forced them to reconsider it long enough to where it became an unworkable, policy for them. And they abandoned it. We stopped them from expanding Fort Bliss. In El Paso, which is a military base that was also used as a Japanese American incarceration site [00:16:00] during World War ii. it's currently being used again. It's being called Camp East Montana, by the Trump 2.0 administration. And when they were incarcerating children there during the first Trump administration, children were literally forgotten. Their cases were forgotten, and there were children languIshiing in there for like. Up to a year at a time, and nobody knew they were there because no one cared. There were allegations of sexual abuse, uh, rotten food, children who never were allowed outside. Children covered in lice, children taking care of younger children because nobody took care of them, lack of medical care. And so if that's shocking for what was happening under the first Trump administration, it's. Also happening now. And, and there is even less oversight or accountability now than there was, during the first Trump administration because as broken as that system was, then it had more accountability because there were [00:17:00] advocates and legal representatives for children, which is almost non-existent now. They've done away with the funding for that. We have three year olds representing themselves in immigration courts now because they did away with the congressional funding to support that. That's sort of the, the constellation of. Of the work that we emerged into when we came into formation, um, under the first Trump administration. And, it, it has just continued to evolve. We've been involved in, I think it's eight site fights now. And as difficult as this moment is right now, I always wanna tell people, and frame it this way, when you fight back, you win. We closed the Berks Family Detention Center permanently. We stopped the Piedmont Academy from opening in Greensboro. Tsuru's first major action was to go to Fort Sill in Oklahoma in 2019. Um, we led two protests there. The first one went [00:18:00] sort of viral on democracy now in cause they accompanied us. They embedded themselves with us. This is the first thing we ever did in a large scale and had no idea what we were doing at that point. We just were just angry and we, and full of, passion and said we have to go there and stop them from opening. A new concentration camp for 1600 children. And so we did that. Um, as a result, United we dream joined us along with AIM Indian Territory, with Black Lives Matter, Oklahoma City. Um, with Dream Action now Oklahoma with Veterans for Peace and with many of the local tribes. We came back a month later and staged a massive, massive demonstration shut down the highway into the fort. We brought 25 Buddhist priests and nuns with us. Who chanted the heart suture at the gate, um, while DACA young people took the highway and shut it down. After that action, the governor and the two senators from Oklahoma made an announcement the next day and they said, we've decided not to open this site here because we [00:19:00] said if you move ahead with. This is just the beginning. You think this is bad. We are gonna bring thousands of people here and we will make sure this site never opens. we proved through solidarity and community organizing in that moment that when you organize in solidarity against state violence, you win. You know, it's a bad moment. Right now they're proposing what, 23, 25 new warehouse detention sites, but actually. At least three or four of them have been curtailed already because community came together and said, not in my neighborhood, not in my town, not in my city. We will oppose you. And we're getting very smart about how we work together. I think Chicago and Minneapolis, LA have really lifted up the idea that change and transformation comes from the ground up. when we wait for our. Governments to change policy for the better of people and humanity. It doesn't happen. It's [00:20:00] when it's when the grassroots decide. We band together. We protect ourselves, we care for ourselves. We organize, we stand in solidarity against state violence. Then we can move things and we can stop things. Miata Tan: That was Mike Ishii, Executive Director at Tsuru for Solidarity. As Mike described, Tsuru organizes creative nonviolent actions to challenge immigration detention and bring people into collective resistance. Stay tuned to learn more about this movement and they're opposing inhumane practices against immigrant communities. Miata Tan: [00:21:00] [00:22:00] That was Forevermore by Yuna. You are tuned into APEX Express on 94.1 KPFA, a weekly radio show uplifting the voices and stories of Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders. I'm your host, Miata Tan. Tonight we're centering the work of Tsuru for Solidarity, a nationwide organization with a mission to close all US detention sites and bring an end to inhumane immigration policies. Sophie Sarkar is the Bay Area organizer with Tsuru for Solidarity. Here's Sophie speaking about their approach using non-cooperation as a guiding strategy. Sophie Sarkar: Non-cooperation is the idea that. I guess there's this larger model for [00:23:00] authoritarianism. And that an authoritarian regime is actually a lot more fragile than we think because it is upheld by many different pillars of society. So for example. The authoritarian regime cannot function unless it has a military force that is supporting it, unless it has a media that's supporting it unless it has elected officials corporations, police forces. And so when we think about strategy, we're really thinking about these specific pillars. Um, instead of just like, how can we take down this, uh, authoritarian regime? We think about like, okay let's choose a pillar and let's unpack all the different layers within that pillar. So, for example, if we choose the pillar of corporations, you know, there are many different corporations that we know are supporting, working in concert and supporting ICE and the Department of Homeland Security, like enterprise, like [00:24:00] Hilton, target, home Depot. And within each of those. , Well, there are the consumers, and then there are the workers, the managers, and then the CEOs. So we try to create strategies that kind of work from at a grassroots level. So starting with the outer layer of like the consumers through boycotts to workers, labor strikes and so forth. When we're talking about non-cooperation, we're really talking about strategies that help us support people to, to dissent and to stop actually working with the regime. we learned a lot from Minneapolis where folks were calling up enterprise, um, and booking booking cars so that ICE couldn't. rent them and then just canceling last minute. Miata Tan: That was Sophie Sarkar Bay Area organizer at Tsuru for Solidarity. As Sophie described, Tsuru uses a framework of [00:25:00] non-cooperation to guide its organizing work. Their campaigns include a range of non-violent actions, letter writing, public demonstrations, and continued pressure efforts. Now returning to my conversation with Rob Buscher, Tsuru's, Director of Operations. I wanted to know how Tsuru is organizing together, how they are thinking about this strategy nationwide.  Rob Buscher: We are all remote workers, so Mike and Becca, our Director of organizing, is based in New York City. Uh, and they frequently travel, uh, every other week traveling across the country to the campaign hubs that are mainly located in the West Coast, where we have a larger Japanese American community. Seattle, Portland, San Francisco Bay Area. Those are kind of our big hubs, and that's where the bulk of Tsuru's volunteer members are located. So much of this work is campaign driven, it's really work that is ideated together [00:26:00] as, as a committee consensus based decision making that takes place both from campaign level, but also regional leaders within each one of those hubs. looking at child and family detention, looking at police prisons and detention as our two detention campaigns. Healing Justice as Mike was talking about, including Resiliency and arts as well as the core healing circles Practice that has been a, a part of our practice since the beginning. And also the solidarity with black reparations campaign. So between each of those four campaigns, we have co-chairs that lead that work. Um, they form our leadership council, which is essentially the, the board of sudu. And together with our six staff, we work very closely with the leadership council to create a plan for the organization at a larger national level. But the day-to-day operations is largely being done by our volunteer members in each one of those locations. We have busy seasons, of course. the Day of Remembrance on February 19th is a, a major focal point for a lot of [00:27:00] our historic remembrance around the anniversary of Franklin Roosevelt signing Executive order 9 0 6 6, which laid the legislative groundwork for the forced removal of our communities from the west coast and that. Has become, not just within Tsuru, but within the Japanese American community. A launch point for revisiting this history from the lens of today and trying to understand what is the role of the survivors and descendants of the Japanese American community as we see parallels to what occurred, happening to families. And individuals around the country in real time. A member of my own family was arrested under the Alien Enemies Act in 1942, and we're seeing the same kind of legislation being used against Venezuelans and other folks from Latin America. you know, when we kind of think about the role that we play today. As staff, we hold a lot of the this work from like a planning standpoint, but the actual boots on the grounds are the volunteer members of the organization. Miata Tan: That was Rob Buscher, the Director of operations at Tsuru for [00:28:00] Solidarity. Now let's return to Sophie Sarkar, the Bay Area organizer for this nationwide movement. Here Sophie reflects on Tsuru's volunteer network and the anti deportation campaigns they help to coordinate across the Bay Area. Sophie Sarkar: So our volunteers are largely Japanese American, world War ii, prison camp survivors and descendants as well as allies. And It's an amazing volunteer base to work with because it is so intergenerational. So for example, we had a strategy retreat for our leaders and our youngest participant was 21 and our oldest participant was 95. And. All the ages in between as well. that's one of the reasons I love working with this group so much because I think it's pretty rare to be in such intergenerational spaces organizing together. Yeah. And, uh, we have volunteers all across the Bay [00:29:00] Area. We have folks that. Our artists that have law degrees that, have an organizing background that have never organized before in their lives. Um, we really try to make ourselves accessible to anyone who's interested in participating. So even if um, someone is just really starting to understand the realities of the systemic violence, against immigrants in this country we, we make space for that and we really try to, offer a lot of political education to folks so. Yeah, at any level they can engage. Yeah, and we have faith leaders. We have folks who have experience with labor unions. So it is a pretty wide variety. But yeah, most of us come together with this shared historical experience of, some people themselves or their families being incarcerated during World War II i, myself am a descendant of, [00:30:00] folks who are incarcerated at Manzanar and Tulle Lake. My family were also so folks who were coerced into renunciation and quote self deportation unquote after the war. I feel so many different various connections to my own family's experiences and what's happening today. And so it just feels like a really deep yeah, just a, a deep opportunity to get to, I. Ground in my, my ancestral historical experience as, as an organizer for Tsuru. I think for many of us by really being able to show up in solidarity with groups that are facing State violence it looks different today in some ways. But it's kind of the same playbook as we might say of how the government treated our family members. And it's really an opportunity for us to. really address the [00:31:00] impacts of what happened to our families on us, across generations to address our trauma, to face it to heal from it. Miata Tan: Definitely. Could you share a little bit about what your day-to-day looks like as a organizer?  Sophie Sarkar: My role is really to work with our volunteer leaders and to support them in, , building out campaigns here in the Bay Area. So in the Bay Area we have, we are part of the ICE out of Dublin coalition and we have our own Tsuru campaign around preventing the reopening of FCI Dublin as an ice detention facility. there is currently no ice detention facility in Northern California, so that would have a huge impact on the entire Bay Area and Northern California in general. So we spend a lot of time on that, working on that campaign. we also have part in Refugees campaign where we have supported individuals at risk of [00:32:00] deportation, um, with kind of mutual aid and wraparound care. And we also have a Palestine working group that is Supporting the J eight community in the Bay Area to organize folks around the genocide and Palestine, and now the war in Lebanon and Iran. And so we will be participating, for example, in a interfaith march, and pilgrimage in May as part of that we have a child and family detention campaign that's more national. we organize monthly general meetings so that folks have a place to land with us. And at those general meetings we, give campaign updates, but we also, really try to do something engaging and like take an action together. So, at the last couple, um, general meetings, we folded paper dolls as part of a Paper Dolls campaign to raise awareness about child and family detention and the [00:33:00] 6,000 families that are currently detained by ICE. Miata Tan: That was Sophie Sarkar the Bay Area organizer at Tsuru for Solidarity. As you heard, children and families detained by US Immigration and Customs Enforcement are central to their campaign work. One example is the Paper Dolls to Free families Campaign that Sophie mentioned. Tsuru for Solidarity is leading this effort alongside partners in the National Coalition to End Family and Child Detention. The campaign invites people across the country to create paper dolls with little messages of solidarity, which the coalition will deliver to members of Congress. He is Tsuru's Executive Director Mike Ishii, reflecting on the thinking behind this work. Mike Ishii: We have to recognize that great violence has taken place between people and between our groups. But the only way we're going to reconcile this and actually transform it is if we try to repair it in a [00:34:00] transformative way. You know, part of the work that we're doing right now, in the National Coalition to End Family and Child Detention is a campaign that we call free families. And here's what it does, it recognizes that we are trying to free the families who are inside detention. Uh, you know, Liam Ramos, right? The five-year-old with the bunny backpack who was put in Dilley. He's the face of 3,800 children detained in the last year by the Trump administration. It's probably much higher than that because they don't actually report truthfully, the statistics  That really moved people when they saw Liam's face. But what we're trying to do is have it, his story, be connected to a greater story about families and children, because what we know in our own research. And when we look at the voting patterns and why people voted for the Trump administration in the last election, what we see is really angry. People who feel left behind um, well, the system has left behind people. [00:35:00] Healthcare. Food stamps prenatal care, Medicare education, you name it. Housing, all of the things that affect working people who are struggling more and more as prices go up in this country. As the future starts to narrow and people don't see an open feature for themselves but this 1% is getting more and more enriched by the policies. And the violence that they're enacting on communities. And so the Free Families Campaign is really a campaign not just for immigrant to free immigrant families and children. It's really to recenter the the importance and the sAACREdness of families and to organize families across the country for their common purpose, their common good. I was a part of a study and, advisory council that did research about how do we change the narrative on child and family detention nationally. What we found is that the majority of the country holds a value of the sAACREd. Importance of protecting children and the [00:36:00] sanctity of the family. And when we organize and get people into conversation about that, about their own families and about their own children and what it's like to try to survive in this time, what we realize is that there's this great common denominator of parents actually who are struggling in a system that's leaving people behind everywhere, We think that's where the future of movement and solidarity work needs to go. It's about kitchen table issues. It's about opening a future for the next generation. if you look at the, research and sort of the feedback that you hear from younger generations about their future, it's really bleak. What they say, what they're sharing is that they feel betrayed by the adults. Who are leaving them a world full of climate crisis and war and lack of opportunity, lack of rights. And so the organizing work that we're involved in right now, you say, oh, it's immigrant rights work, it's anti detention work. It's actually about revising the [00:37:00] future for really our whole society. As things fall and burn, it's the old order. It's so based in your rationality that it's collapsing and on some level you can't stop it from falling. And so our work in this moment is to get people out of the way. And save as many people as this system collapses. And then to vision the new system that actually is the beloved community that does provide equity, for all people that has been denied to so many of our communities. And what's important in that work, along with the organizing and the intervention work against state violence, is the work around repair and healing. We're part of, a national cohort that's been, um, sort of think tanking and doing work and sharing, across our organizations, our methods and trying to help develop new templates, new forms of how to take healing and repair, especially around multi-generational trauma. And to share it broadly so that people are resourced and have more [00:38:00] access to the skillset and the tools for healing multi-generational trauma as part of regular everyday organizing in communities across the country. Miata Tan: That was Mike Ishii, Executive Director at Tsuru for Solidarity. Miata Tan: The namesake of Tsuru for Solidarity is deeply symbolic, Tsuru meaning crane in Japanese is described as a creature of transformation. A symbol of healing and repair, not only for the Japanese American community, but all communities. You are tuned into APEX Express, a weekly radio show, uplifting the voices and stories of Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders. You'll hear more from the Tsuru for Solidarity team after this, stay with us. Miata Tan: [00:39:00] [00:40:00] [00:41:00] That [00:42:00] was Nobody by the one and only Mitski You are tuned into APEX Express on 94.1 KPFA, a weekly radio show uplifting the voices and stories of Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders. I'm your host, Miata Tan. Tonight we are talking about deportation and the communities fighting back. Tsuru for Solidarity, they're a nationwide organization working to close all US detention sites and end inhumane immigration policies We're diving into the Japanese American legacy behind Soda's work and what's driving their fight against deportation. Here's their Executive Director, Mike Ishii. Mike Ishii: We actually have what. Probably more than 12 or 13,000 people at this point who are connected to us in our network. But then on the ground, boots in action, we have hundreds of people who are active and when we call on people like, we need you to come to this major action, we can get [00:43:00] thousands of people to turn out. So this has been a really beautiful evolution of community organizing. We often say. We want to be the allies that our people needed during World War II when they were removed and disappeared from the community. And so that's really our intention that guides us here. in doing so, our work is rooted in relationship building. That's really what that means. Like my mom didn't know that anyone cared about her as a 10-year-old. No one came to the fences of Minidoka. Um, nobody marched in the streets and protested. There were very few people who were fighting for her freedom. And so she didn't know, she didn't have a relationship. So our work is in building relationships within our own community. To Decolonize from white assimilationist forced assimilation policies that are multi-generational, that have positioned us to be inculcated and manipulated as part of a model minority dynamic. We are the group that was used as the poster [00:44:00] child by Ronald Reagan when you rolled out that term. Unwinding that dynamic that has a stranglehold on our community. Because this is a community that was terrified for its survival, and it was grasping for straws of survival and being wildly manipulated by the society in the aftermath of the war. We get to do that work. it's exciting for, for us to get to do that work. And actually, Rob, that's part of his job is to lean into that organizing that we're going to be launching in a fuller manner now that we're here at AACRE. We also get to really build more on what it means to be in solidarity practice. And that's the work I often to get to do with our external partners, what I call our cousins and our siblings in the movement space. And to me, it's some of the most fulfilling work I've ever gotten to do in my life because it breaks your internal isolation that comes from your historical trauma. if you. Have ever woken feeling, how do we go forward? How do we stop this? How do I ever not feel like we're fighting alone? Do this [00:45:00] work because you get daily evidence actually that you're not alone. That we can win when we fight back, and that there are people who care deeply and I get to do that work. I'm very fortunate. As part of the organization our, you know, Becca, who is our Director of organizing, is an incredible strategist and gets to think tactically with our many incredible, incredible volunteers on the ground across the country. I'm fortunate that I know some of them because I was very involved in that work early on. And all I can say is that as a result of having had a chance to be at the frontline in that kind of, deep work with our folks is that I love my people. Oh my God, I love my people. Like I'm just, so moved by the stories of people and their families and survival, and then also their courage to understand that we're a group that achieved a certain amount of privilege in the years since forced assimilation and. The [00:46:00] willingness to understand that's not really something you hold onto, that you actually want to let go of that for your own benefit, and also because it's the right thing to do in the movement toward equity. And so to get to be a part of that movement with my people. Is really a central part of our healing and to get to be a part of that in this organization at this moment, in this moment when we need to step up in, in ways that are so deeply important for the future of really the globe. Whether or not we'll go into an abyss of darkness or we're gonna transform this incredible escalated violence right now, I think we're born for this moment. I really don't think it's an accident. And if we. Each have that choice and opportunity to step into this moment and play a role there. How lucky are we to get to be born right now? So that's a little bit about how I see our role as an organization as we come into [00:47:00] AACRE and as we continue to evolve in this space.  Miata Tan : That's really beautiful. And, and thank you for tying us back into AACRE, which is the Asian Americans for Civil Rights and Equality, a network of progressive Asian American organizations uh, soon be joining. Rob, could you share what you are excited for now that Tsuru will be joining Aker and, the future work that is coming up.  Rob Buscher: Thanks for that question. You know, I think there's so many incredible organizations that are already under AACREs fiscal sponsorship, so just even in some of the preliminary meetings that we've had with other AACRE group leadership and being in conversation with people that. Oftentimes we've already known for, for many years. You know, I, Eddie Zang, um, and, and others who are, are involved peripherally, as funders are people that I've known since the film festival days. I recently learned. Kaen, who's part of the HR staff at AACRE, a filmmaker that I worked with well over a decade [00:48:00] ago on a Muslim Youth Voices Project here in Philadelphia is also part of the team. You know, just having these little connection points has been pointing us towards the direction that we're meant to be here. This feels like the right moment for Tsuru to be joining Aker. Uh, It feels like there's a lot of, , capacity and bandwidth that we haven't had under our current circumstances. But, um, really with the energy and enthusiasm of all of these groups coming together, I, I feel like we can really make an even bigger impact than we are in these programs. Um, as far as, you know, future. Ideas and, and programs that we have coming up on the horizon. we're very excited about the Kintsugi Healing Conference. Uh, as Mike has spoken about the role of healing within our work. Obviously there's a need for repairing the divides that exist within our own Japanese American community and before we can truly be in, in solidarity and, and do collective liberation work. Being able to heal those divides within our own community needs to take [00:49:00] precedent. So Kintsugi is a way of acknowledging that through this healing, resilience based conference allowing us to turn inwards and really think about the long-term effects of intergenerational trauma, how it's shaped all of our families and individual pathways, and how we can ultimately come together to heal those divides. Um, while also learning more about and training up some of our people around these ideas of collective liberation. it's gonna be taking place in San Francisco's Japan town and we're very excited about that. We'll announce the dates very shortly for October, 2026. Some of the other things that we're working on, as I mentioned earlier, we have our black reparations campaign. Tsuru has been doing this sort of work really in many ways since the beginning, but formalized during the, the summer of 2020 in the aftermath of the George Floyd Uprisings, the Black Reparations Campaign as one of the major work areas, with a number of other Japanese American organizations like New UK Progressives and the Japanese American Citizens League, San Jose Resistors. as part of [00:50:00] this national coalition to, uh, achieve redress and reparations for in solidarity with the descendants of chattel slavery. Our campaign actually had the opportunity to travel to Washington DC last May to participate in National Reparation Networks national Reparations Rally that was attended by over a hundred different, organizations that are working on this issue.  Currently. We're in the process of launching a new project called the 4 0 7 Conversations, or a 4 0 7 project. It's acknowledging that 2026 is 407 years since the beginning of chattel slavery in North America in 1619, and the goal is to have at least 407 conversations about reparations in this calendar year. So it's a way to sort of normalize the topic of reparations within not just Japanese American. community spaces, but sort of in the broader conversation about what does it mean to do reparative justice work. As we look towards the future, we're gonna be doing more [00:51:00] narrative campaign work too. We had the opportunity during the day of Remembrance to launch a, nationwide campaign that reimagined the instructions to all persons of Japanese ancestry poster that was placed in our Japan towns. That signaled the beginning of the so-called evacuation, the forced removal of our communities in our new instructions to persons of Japanese ancestry. It was an opportunity to call people in and to, uh, mobilize and activate our community in defense of the frontline communities that are facing the brunt of state violence today. So as we continue to strengthen and build We're hoping to do even more of these large scale national mobilizations. And I'm just excited that we're gonna be able to do this work together, uh, under AACREs banner. Miata Tan: That was Rob Buscher, Director of Operations at Tsuru for Solidarity. As Rob shared from aiding the movement toward black reparations to anti-ice mobilizations. The team at [00:52:00] Tsuru is gearing up for some important campaigns this year To close out, let's return to Sophie aka their Bay Area organizer. I ask Sophie what work she's most looking forward to in 2026. Sophie Sarkar: I am very excited about our, well, yeah, I'm very excited about a lot of things. I think I'm just excited about the ways in which am able to see as an organizer for Tsuru, just like Japanese American community really coming out and mobilizing and working together in coalition. I think, in this time, as we are all trying to figure out ways to dismantle this authoritarian regime and to resist it's really important for us That like we are moving beyond the kind of hierarchical structure that the regime uses and figuring out how to work in coalition and to really find our lane, find what our role is [00:53:00] as an organization, as individuals. And for me it's really exciting to see that the Japanese American community Is doing that is like really trying to work more and more in coalition and I'm excited to continue to support that. for example, we will be leading a non-cooperation training. With other JA organizations in a few months. to, yeah, really support us as a community to understand what non-cooperation looks like and how we can practice that in our various campaigns. And yeah, I see like the japantown organizations we're part of a, Nihon Machi Coalition there. Getting really serious about preparing for and when ICE comes and doing the workup. Upfront now to really train in knowing your rights and non-cooperation and security, just to get prepared as a collective. This year we're also, Tsuru is also organizing our healing justice [00:54:00] conference in the Bay Area called Kintsugi, that will take place in the fall. As part of that we hope to have a day of direct action. So I'm really excited to have the opportunity to kind of bring together our healing justice work, our healing arts work, and our direct action just integrating the three of those. And hopefully planning a really beautiful and healing and powerful action for us all to take together. Miata Tan: That's really lovely. you've mentioned Healing Justice a few times in your own personal background and experience with Tsuru, but also these fantastic campaigns that we are looking forward to. Could you speak a little bit about how the Japanese American community and the wider Tsuru for Solidarity Network is taking care of each other during this moment? Sophie Sarkar: Yeah, such a good question. I feel like that's something that I just notice our community is so good at [00:55:00] doing. Like, I think, you know, we really try to approach organizing from a relational perspective. So. Folks in little ways, like checking in on each other, making each other lunch. I know I had like afternoon at one of our volunteers houses the other day, just like eating lunch together and venting. But you know, it's just the little ways or like folding origami, yeah, I think on that kind of level, relational level of just checking in and remembering that we are human and really need that kind of connection with each other in these times, especially when it can feel really scary and isolating. Zoomed out a little bit more, you know, like our general meetings and our trainings and those kinds of larger gathering opportunities are just a really nice way. Also, we always have a potluck dinner and feed each other. Like, it's just a really nice way to Offer that kind of care and nourishment to one [00:56:00] another and connect as well. Miata Tan: Love that. It's Always great to gather over food.  Sophie Sarkar: always. Miata Tan: That was Sophie Sarkar the Bay Area organizer at Tsuru for Solidarity, reflecting on her communities and how they're taking care of each other during this time. This is APEX Express on 94.1 KPFA, A weekly radio show uplifting the voices and stories of Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders. APEX Express is every Thursday evening at 7:00 PM and with that, we're at the end of our time here. We really appreciate you tuning in tonight and a special thanks for Tsuru for Solidarity for sharing their time and work with us. For a transcript of today's episode, please visit our website. That's kpfa.org/program/APEX Express. [00:57:00] We've also added links to Tsuru for Solidarity's website, their social media channels, and where you can go to learn more about their ongoing campaigns. Be sure to check that out. APEX Express is produced by Ayame Keane-Lee, Anuj Vaidya, Cheryl Truong, Isabel Li, Jalena Keane-Lee, Miko Lee, Miata Tan, Preeti Mangala Shekar and Swati Rayasam. Tonight's show was produced by me, Miata Tan. Get some rest, y'all.   The post APEX Express – 4.16.26 – Rethinking Immigration Detention appeared first on KPFA.

A weekly magazine-style radio show featuring the voices and stories of Asians and Pacific Islanders from all corners of our community. The show is produced by a collective of media makers, deejays, and activists. Tonight on APEX Express, join the Powerleegirls Host Miko Lee speaks with children's book authors Lorraine Nam, Uma Krishnaswami and Maggie Tokuda-Hall about Library Joy in honor of National School Library Month! To Learn More Lorrraine Nam, illustrator and  author Michael Threet's book: I'm So Happy You're Here: A Celebration of Library Joy    Uma Krishnaswami Her books: Book Uncle Triology   Maggie Tokuda-Hall Her book: Love in the Library  Every Library Authors Against Book Bans   Show Transcript [00:00:00] Opening: Apex Express Asian Pacific expression. Community and cultural coverage, music and calendar, new visions and voices, coming to you with an Asian Pacific Islander point of view. It's time to get on board the Apex Express.   [00:00:35] Ayame Keane-Lee: Welcome to tonight's episode of Apex Express Celebrating Library Joy. I'm Ayame Keane-Lee the editor of tonight's show, and part of the PowerLeeGirls bringing you the introduction to tonight's show. Did you know that April is National School Library Month and in just 10 days from April 19th to 25th is National Library Week? The theme for this year's National Library Week is Find Your Joy with Honorary Chair Mychal Threets. The first of three interviews you'll hear my mom, Miko Lee have tonight is with Lorraine Nam the illustrator for the newly released children's book written by that very Mychal Threets called, “I'm So Happy You're Here”. You will then hear Miko speak with Uma Krishnaswami about her children's book “Book Uncle and Me,” and lastly with Maggie Tokuda-Hall about her children's book, “Love in the Library,” and the important work of Authors Against Book Bans. As a library kid and current library worker, I have experienced firsthand the transformative power of library access and the importance of inclusive and diverse storytelling. In and out of schools, libraries are vital to nurturing and uplifting the autonomy and sovereignty of children, which always has and continues to be a liberatory practice. We hope tonight's show will inspire you right into your local library to check out some of the great books mentioned here or to put them on hold. Let's listen in.    [00:02:06] Miko Lee: Welcome, Lorraine Nam, illustrator of amazing  children's books. Welcome to Apex Express.    [00:02:13] Lorraine Nam: I'm excited to be here.    [00:02:16] Miko Lee: I wanna start with a question I ask all of my guests, which is, who are your people and what legacy do you carry with you?    [00:02:24] Lorraine Nam: Who are my people? I would say creative people. People who are interested in having an open mind, and looking at the bright side of things, the beautiful things, people who are curious. The type of legacy that I bring I think is just my parents who are creative and then bringing that, to this new generation.    [00:02:57] Miko Lee: Thank you for sharing. I am, I'm looking at your beautiful face, and behind you is this, find your joy and, and it's in lots of colors on this pink banner and in at the top we see opening up of a library door with Mychal Threets, who's the author of this book, “I'm So Happy You're Here: A Celebration of Library Joy.” I'm wondering if you can talk about your collaborative process with Mychal Threets.    [00:03:25] Lorraine Nam: The first impression that you have of writer and illustrator for a picture book is that they work really closely together, and that's actually not the case. We work pretty separately, but I was very excited. Mychal wrote the words to this book and they were looking for an illustrator and my agent called me and she asked me if I was interested. I was very excited about the project. I signed up for it and we worked pretty separately. We connected on Instagram, but he pretty much had no art notes, everything was pretty much whatever I was open to. Then we met for the first time and we got our very first copy of the book and we met in New York.    [00:04:10] Miko Lee: And what was that like?    [00:04:12] Lorraine Nam: Um, amazing. He is exactly who he is in his videos.    [00:04:18] Miko Lee: Can you share for our audience who he is and a little bit more about him, just in case folks don't know.   [00:04:24] Lorraine Nam: The book calls him a librarian ambassador. He describes himself as a reader, a lover of librarians or the number one fan of libraries. This is his first book and he's also the host of Reading Rainbow on PBS. We met at the New York Library, public Library for the first time, and he's just so nice, very kind. Honestly, it felt like we already knew each other just because we had been talking through the publisher about the book.   [00:05:02] Miko Lee: Thank you for sharing. It's so beautifully illustrated and you have a incredibly diverse,, amount of people in the book, both racially but also physically, and I really appreciate how you encapsulated that. I'm just wondering what inspired you to develop this specific imagery for this book?    [00:05:22] Lorraine Nam: Yeah, so one of the only stipulations in the art notes was that he wanted to have a diverse group of people attending the library. People of all ages of all color, all sizes, all disabilities. That seemed like a no brainer to me because I just know the message that he puts into the world. The only difficult part was narrowing down the cast. There's all these different types of people and just trying to figure out who to focus on. I wanted to make sure that you still see the same group of kids over and over. So it felt like you were following the along throughout the day, while still having lots of diversity and lots of different types of people.    [00:06:11] Miko Lee: Had you set what the cover was gonna be at the beginning or did that come after you had already finished the whole book?   [00:06:19] Lorraine Nam: Oh, that came much later. We pretty much had the art for the interior nailed down, and then we were working on concepts for the cover. I knew from Mychal's social media presence that maybe he didn't want to be the poster cover of the book. He wanted to be about the library goers and the people rather than himself. And so I was kind of towing that line of like obviously people wanna see him, it's his first book. They're such huge fans, and so like how much to put Mychal in and how much to showcase him, as well as showcase like all the other people who go to the library.   [00:07:02] Miko Lee: He definitely does have a joyous kind of ebullient vibe to him. I recommend for audience to check out his socials because he has this, you wanna listen to him. He's so inviting and I love the poster behind you because he is saying, like, “welcome, come into the library. This is my world.” And you also made him look so cute. Really looks like a cartoon version of him. So sweet. In your artistic process, I'm wondering what helps you define the style of art you utilize? I'm thinking about the paper cutouts that you did for a tale of two princes. What is it about the work that inspires you to select that type of style?   [00:07:43] Lorraine Nam: I actually had a very winding path to the style that I have today. So the style that I have today is very much layered. It's painted, a lot of it is painted. And then I cut it out and then I glue and collage different elements, and then I scan everything in and enhance certain aspects through Photoshop. But a lot of it started actually in wanting to make a physical book. So it was with book binding and then with book binding, because that's just a technique to produce a product, it was what goes in those pages and that's when I started doing cut paper. So just silhouetted, cut paper. And I was doing that for a long time, just cutting out rice paper to make silhouettes. I wanted to tell more of the story and depict people. So then I started making paper cut [laughs] sets. So I would build —almost like Legos— a whole set of paper buildings and paper people and paper objects that are three dimensional. And then I would photograph them. And then from there, I landed in this more 2D, but playing with still technique and texture and layers.    [00:09:10] Miko Lee: Wow, that's so interesting. Can you share a little bit more about your artistic process? Do you start at a certain time of day? Do you only work at night? Do you have a whole studio set up?   [00:09:20] Lorraine Nam: well, For the book projects because there's such a timeline to 'em and they're very specific. I'll do very loose sketches on Post-it notes. They're readily available and then you can stick two of them next to each other to make a full spread. I use these post-its, and then I would just fold them in half and use that as like very quick pencil drawings. And then if I had something that I liked, I would just go in and pen. But they were still very small. So it was more about looking at silhouettes and composition. And then I would print, it's a very old school technique, but I would print out all the text for the book and cut 'em out. And double sided tape and just stick them on to see where the text should be on the page and where it could fit. I would just do that manually until I had something that I liked a little bit more. Then I would start creating digital, like line drawings.    [00:10:21] Miko Lee: And are you lining this all up on a wall or putting it on the desk?   [00:10:26] Lorraine Nam: Um, so they're in like a notebook.    [00:10:29] Miko Lee: Oh, you put 'em in book format?    [00:10:31] Lorraine Nam: It's all the spread. So it should take about two pages basically. You should be able to look at it and look at it from like an eagle eye perspective of what the entire book will look like and what the flow will be like, and if there's closeups or this is like a far away saying, you get more of the like, setting of the library.   [00:10:52] Miko Lee: And with the font printed out really small so that it's on the bottom of that Post-it note.    [00:10:56] Lorraine Nam: Mm-hmm.    [00:10:57] Miko Lee: Wow, that is so fascinating. And what is it when you're eagle eye-ing, what are you looking for?    [00:11:04] Lorraine Nam: I'm pretending that I'm a kid looking at a book for the first time, with zero context and maybe zero reading level skill and just looking at the pictures and seeing if I can spot the same character and if there is a story that follows along, because this is a library book where it doesn't talk about specific people. I wanted to be able to follow each character in the book and see what their day was like in the library. So when they first came into the library, what they were doing during the day, what friends they made, and then maybe them leaving or, you know, a resolution of some kind, like their parents are checking out symbols at the library.    [00:11:52] Miko Lee: the concept of having the character go throughout the book. Was that in the instruction or was something that you created.   [00:11:59] Lorraine Nam: That was something that I wanted. Because I know looking at picture books, the pictures can also tell a story where, the words, it might not be in the words. So I wanted there to be more of a layered storytelling through image.    [00:12:18] Miko Lee: I appreciate that as a mom. I remember when my girls were little, they would always say, where is that rabbit on the page? Or where is that thing? And so being able to track a character all the way through, is quite delightful. It adds another dimension for the multiple readings. You mentioned before about how you didn't really meet Mychal, the author of the book until the very end, and I guess that's common as an illustrator and you've worked with so many different experts in their fields from, physicist Neil Degrasse Tyson to Skater Nathan Chen. How is their very different fields, how does that impact your art making?    [00:12:57] Lorraine Nam: It's actually the most fun. It's what drew me to illustration in the first place. I love being able to do like a deep dive and a specific subject that I wouldn't necessarily have gravitated towards and do that research. I actually do go to the library. I start the process at the library and I look at all the books about that particular topic, and then see what other people have done. And so working on the book for Neil deGrasse Tyson, it was so much fun looking at different how space is depicted the idea of galaxies and making that tangible and real for kids. And then for Nathan Chen, I was already a fan before I got the project, so it was very easy. But watching the videos, seeing all the different techniques and for his book it was more looking at sports books. Because he's such a unique person in his specific field in figure skating that there weren't very many books on figure skating and most are of a female portrayal. I was looking more at sports and how people show different types of movement, , and show like form. And the more technical aspects that are very, very, very specific and very critical to those things.    [00:14:32] Miko Lee: And how did that manifest into your book?    [00:14:35] Lorraine Nam: Um, a lot of drawings of like, the breakdown of his jumps and trying to figure out can a child do this jump [laughs]? And also doing a lot of research 'cause he's a very private person. His book is not about him, it's not a biography, but it's also loosely based off of him. You know, I have two other siblings. If I had a book based off of me, I want my siblings to be involved and represented in that as well. So I included his family, even though they're not a huge part of the book, his siblings are not like big characters. But they're still represented in there. So he can still be like, oh that's my family. This is based off of my story.   [00:15:32] Miko Lee: So when you're doing these approaches, like including Nathan's family or in the library book, making sure characters go all the way through, is that something you have to check in with the writer about, to see if they're okay? Or is that something that you just do and then you submit and you see if they like it?   [00:15:50] Lorraine Nam: That's something that I do, that I find joy in and see. Usually the first eyes on my sketches are the publisher and the art director. And I actually have no idea what, at what stage they really share the sketches, if it's like at a more finalized stage or if it's an early on one, but I usually just go with my own ideas and see what they think about it.    [00:16:20] Miko Lee: Wow. I didn't know that you could have that much say into it. That's lovely. You talked a little bit about using the library for research. Gosh, I imagine that Neil deGrasse Tyson, there's so much research on it, that must have been a deep dive. I'm wondering what the library meant to you as a child.    [00:16:38] Lorraine Nam: Yeah. I grew up as a big reader. The library for me it was a magical space that I wasn't really sure what it was. My parents, because they grew up in Korea and moved here to the States, there was a big language barrier between us and they're also very not talkative people. They just took us to this place one day and it was our local public library and it was right before closing and we were able to check out as many books as we wanted in whatever type of book that we wanted. I felt like that was magical, that there was no limit to it.    [00:17:19] Miko Lee: My last question is, what are you working on now?    [00:17:22] Lorraine Nam: I'm working on a few books, actually. I'm juggling a few, but they're all very fun and different. I'm doing a book about a boy dreaming of flying, being a pilot. So I think that will be a really fun imaginative book.    [00:17:43] Miko Lee: What is one of your books that you would've liked to read to your younger self?    [00:17:50] Lorraine Nam: Mm, I probably Wei Skates On, the book with Nathan Chen. ‘Cause his story is about overcoming obstacles and being disappointed. And just feeling frustrated and upset. And I feel like that's an important lesson even in adulthood. It's not really resolved through words. It's more of like the, everyone is there for him, his family is there for him, and they all just want him to enjoy what he's doing and to not care about winning or losing.    [00:18:33] Miko Lee: Lorraine Nam, thank you so much for chatting with us about your work and about the library as a magical place, appreciate talking with you.    [00:18:42] Lorraine Nam: Thank you so much. I had so much fun talking with you.   [00:18:45] Miko Lee: Welcome, amazing award-winning children's book author Uma Krishnaswami, I'm so happy to have you here on Apex Express.   [00:18:54] Uma Krishnaswami: Miko, it's my pleasure to be here.    [00:18:57] Miko Lee: I wanted to start with a question I ask all of my guests, which is, who are your people and what legacy do you carry with you?    [00:19:05] Uma Krishnaswami: What a wonderful question. Who are my people? My people are children who are, my ideal readership is the eight to 12-year-old group. I write for children. I'm not particularly thinking about audience when I begin writing. But at some point I want my readership to feel validated, whether they recognize themselves as being in my stories or my stories are offering them a window into a world that they are not immediately familiar with. So I would say those are my people.    [00:19:45] Miko Lee: And what is the legacy that you carry with you?    [00:19:48] Uma Krishnaswami: I grew up in India. The year that I was born India had been independent for all of nine years. So I carry very much that colonial legacy. I also am an immigrant to two countries, early in my adulthood to the United States and about 12 years ago to Canada. So my legacy is one of moving and finding new roots, finding community. Those are the things that I try to carry forward in my stories. When I began writing, I lived in the US and I started writing when my son was born. So there I was with a little brown baby and I went looking for books that would represent him and I didn't find them. And I think that is what made me think in my early thirties that, real life people could write children's books because of course the books I had read as a child were all written by people from England and many of them were dead. I kind of thought you had to be dead and British to be a writer. So yeah, it's complicated, isn't it? All of that works into, what you think of as, as your legacy. Having done this for 30 plus years now.    [00:21:03] Miko Lee: And you've written so many beautiful books. Tell us about a little bit more about that first book.   [00:21:09] Uma Krishnaswami: So the very first book, it was called Stories of the Flood. I realized very quickly that I didn't really know what I was doing. I looked to folk tales and traditional tales as a way to teach me about story. My second book called The Broken Tusk Stories of the Hindu God Ganesha. That is the one that I consider as the book that taught me how to write. I had a wonderful editor [unintelligble] Thorpe at a small press in Connecticut, Linnet Books. She told me to lean into story and to see myself as a storyteller. In a way, every book I've written has taught me how to write.   [00:21:47] Miko Lee: Can you tell us about your favorite book as a kid?    [00:21:52] Uma Krishnaswami: My favorite book as a kid, it would have to be Winnie The Pooh.    [00:21:58] Miko Lee: And what was it about Winnie the Pooh that enamored you?    [00:22:01] Uma Krishnaswami: I came to it very early and aunt had traveled to England and she brought me my copy of winnie the Pooh in the House of Poo Corner. And I read them, sitting in very Indian gardens, sometimes up in trees. I spent lots of time up in trees and I took my own geography and placed it over the geography of the book. , So that for me, the a hundred acre wood had lime trees and banyan trees and possibly mango trees. It didn't occur to me, until much later when I read an Enid Blyton reader. I had my moment of disillusionment with Enid Blyton and that's when it really occurred to me that there was an us and a them in, in some of the storytelling I was consuming.   [00:22:49] Miko Lee: What age was that where you recognized that?    [00:22:51] Uma Krishnaswami: My post-colonial moment?    [00:22:53] Miko Lee: Yes.    [00:22:54] Uma Krishnaswami: I might have been a 11.    [00:22:56] Miko Lee: Oh, wow. And were you still living in India at that time?    [00:22:59] Uma Krishnaswami: Yeah, yeah. 11 was a very formative year for me. My grandfather passed away, so it sort of brought mortality , into the framework for me. Also that was my year of disillusionment with Blyton. 'cause I read The , river of Adventure. And the villain in it had my name. He was called. Uma, Raya or Raya Uma or something like that. And yeah, I was just shocked. Just totally shocked. It was pure coincidence, I'm sure. She probably just, pulled the name out of the air and plunked it in. But. I began to notice that he was described as dark skinned and he was described as cunning. All this language that had slid right past me before began to be apparent. So, yeah,    [00:23:47] Miko Lee: I love that. That is so amazing. This name, like what? That's my name as the villain.    [00:23:53] Uma Krishnaswami: I'm the Bad Guy. No, I'm not.    [00:23:56] Miko Lee: And all of your books are such a wonderful clap back to that because you have a multitude of characters and so many different worlds. Initially reached out to you because I started reading book Uncle this trilogy of books that are so lovely. Can you first share a little bit about what the Book Uncle's Trilogy is about.    [00:24:16] Uma Krishnaswami: Okay, so it didn't start out as a trilogy. It didn't even start out as a book. It started out as a short story and then it didn't quite fit. It wasn't a picture book. It seemed to have more layers than that, so it kind of grew. But what started Book Uncle and Me was I was visiting my parents in India. At the time, and I was on this very busy urban street and there was this kid sitting on this on the, on the sidewalk. Um, it was kind of a broken brick sidewalk, and she was sitting cross-legged right in the middle and she was reading book and she was just oblivious to the crowd going around her and the. Buses on the road and there were, you know, random goats and dogs running around and she just was ignoring everything and she was absorbed in her book. And I remembered that I had been that kind of reader as a child. There was an election going on at the time as well, and I thought, I wonder what would happen if I put those two things together. And that is how Book Uncle came to be.    [00:25:14] Miko Lee: And then there was just, you wanted to live in those characters more, so you ended up writing additional books?    [00:25:20] Uma Krishnaswami: Hmm and that's a very good question. And actually no, I didn't, I thought I was done. I wrote Book Uncle and Me back in, I'm say 2009, 2010, something like that. I probably started it in 2010. Um, it got published originally in India in 2012, I believe. And then it was picked up by Ground Wood in Canada and published in Canada and the US so North American edition in 2016. And I thought, you know, I'm done. I'm writing other things. And then come the pandemic and we're all in lockdown. And like a lot of writers, I was doing, um, many, many, virtual. Presentations and programs. Um, and I did something through the North Vancouver Public Library and, there were kids zooming in from, you know, some from home, some from their bubbles, some from classrooms, whatever. And we were talking about book uncle and one of the kids, I think in third grade maybe, she said, Are you gonna write a sequel? And I am just joshing, right? I am. I said, yeah, should I? And they're all going, yeah, you should. And you should write three because you've got three characters you should give them each a [story]. And I'm like, all right guys i'll think about it. I absolutely will but not really taking it seriously. And then as often happens. the session ended and, you know, there we were all in lockdown going nowhere. And I thought maybe, maybe there's something there. Maybe I could return to that. And in a way I was kind of intrigued because I hadn't, had never thought about a trilogy and I was interested in how that would play out. Um, and it was kind of a writing challenge to myself, but honestly, once I started writing Birds on the Brain, which was book two it just kind of, I hesitate to say wrote itself 'cause I, that just seems, you know, so kind of woo woo. But, um, it did, it did. Uh, the, the kid came in and she took over and then a bird flew onto the rooftop and there I was on my way. So that's the story of, of how that that happened. In retrospect, I'm really sorry I didn't ask that child's name because I would've absolutely loved to have acknowledged her in the book. But thank you child from North Vancouver, whoever you are.    [00:27:40] Miko Lee: That is so amazing. That's by request, by audience request. You fulfilled this goal of a trilogy and and I I love that they even said, not just a sequel, but a trilogy.    [00:27:52] Uma Krishnaswami: Oh, they were. Yeah. They had it. I mean, they had, then they, they figured it out, which was really lovely.    [00:27:58] Miko Lee: And those, that trilogy is really geared, as you were saying to the second and third grade audience and I So many of your books are written around kids that can make a difference. What is it about that age that appeals to you and that motivation to show them how they can change the world?    [00:28:16] Uma Krishnaswami: I think they have this really, strong sense of what's fair. It's the age at which, you know, you start pushing back against what you see as small unfairnesses in your life. Parental restrictions quite often, or older siblings. You're pushing back. You're doing a little bit of finding who you are. And I think that uh, you begin to get a sense of awareness of the big world outside your small circle. And I think also one of the things that drives me, with writing to this age is that, I feel that it is so unfair that grownups, the adult world, has created so much injustice. And we just kind of expect the next generation to step up and step into it and, and do the best they can. and it just, it doesn't seem right not to at least give them the wherewithal to think about that. And they do, they have children have voices and their voices matter. As we found out with, the climate strikes. I mean it really was young people who brought those messages out into the world and forced us to think about them and talk about them. So, I think that we owe children that.    [00:29:34] Miko Lee: So which of your books would you want to read to the second or third grade Uma?   [00:29:43] Uma Krishnaswami: [Laughs] Maybe Book Uncle and Me. Because I think there's a lot of second and third grade Uma in that book. I was a compulsive reader like Yasmin. I would've absolutely read a book every day for the rest of my life if I'd had that many books available to me. I didn't. So I read the ones I had over and over again. I lived in an imaginary world, quite a bit of the time.   [00:30:06] Miko Lee: Speaking of having access to lots of books, I'm wondering what your relationship was like to libraries, both as a child and then now.    [00:30:15] Uma Krishnaswami: I'm a proud and inveterate library goer. I put holds on things. I go browse on shelves. I download eBooks and audio books. I always have a pending list. I'm very, very grateful for libraries and also for librarians whom many of whom I have come to know over my life and am immensely grateful for. I did not have access to libraries much as a child. We didn't have a public library system that was free and available and open to everybody. There were the kind of unofficial lending library types that I feature in Book Uncle and Me. There are sadly fewer of them now, but you still find them on street corners in India. I remember taking a book and giving one and then getting one back in return. That was, that was part of my life in some of the places we lived.   [00:31:07] Miko Lee: Did you know an actual book uncle?   [00:31:10] Uma Krishnaswami: I didn't actually pay much attention, to the people who handed those books out. I was much more, focused on the books I was getting. There are characters who I've seen who have run these things. I once had somebody email me and say, I'm a book uncle. This is what I do. So that was really nice.    [00:31:31] Miko Lee: That's sweet. I wanna roll back and talk a little bit more about your artistic process. I'm wondering if you, as a writer, as illustrator, you can sometimes be in your own world, and I'm wondering what your process is.   [00:31:43] Uma Krishnaswami: My place is right here. This is my office room, and I'm standing at a treadmill desk, and usually what I will do, is when I'm writing, I will turn that on very, very slowly. I usually start out at the idea stage with a notebook and a pen. I have fountain pens with very varied colors of ink, and I use those always to write my initial notes and questions about a new story idea. I don't go to the computer and the keyboard until the idea has started showing up quite a few times. In, perhaps in a few iterations, almost as if I'm actually pushing it away at first, you know, saying, don't scratch up my window until you are developed a little bit more. I'm not going to, indulge, the initial shallowness that usually the first idea is often not what it's gonna end up being. I question that, and sometimes this is gonna sound really crazy, but, if I write those questions many times over in different colored inks, the answers begin to break out in clumps. Once I've begun to think, okay, well maybe I, I know what I could do with this. That's when I open up a file.    [00:32:56] Miko Lee: Ooh share a little bit more about the different colored inks. How does that work?    [00:33:00] Uma Krishnaswami: Um, right over there, there's a whole row of inks, and right over here is a fountain pen, and I have several of them. I change the ink colors, and when I get stuck with something, it really does help to write those questions to myself, in a journal notebook. I have a terrible handwriting, so I used to really worry about when people gave me nice notebooks. Little empty notebooks with beautiful glossy pages. I used to think, God, my writing is so awful. I feel like I'm desecrating this beautiful book. I've gotten over that and it's actually really helpful to physically write that thought for me is very, very useful.   [00:33:39] Miko Lee: And when you see the different colors, is it like words that stand out to you, that you piece together? Yeah.    [00:33:44] Uma Krishnaswami: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Or sometimes I'll write something, in a paragraph, and then I'll break it up and write it in a lineated way, maybe in a different color. You just start seeing things differently when you try different ways of thinking about the same thing. It's all a trick to get the kind of managerial editorial mind out of the way. You need her later, but I don't need her when I'm trying to shape something.    [00:34:13] Miko Lee: The, for the creative process. Mm-hmm. The multiple colors just helps    [00:34:16] Uma Krishnaswami: Right.    [00:34:16] Miko Lee: Pull you into that.    [00:34:17] Uma Krishnaswami: Yeah. It just loosens, it loosens my mind up so I don't feel so focused on the objective. I often tell myself, I think Linda Sue Park used to say this. You don't have to write a whole novel. You just write a scene. And so that's what I tell myself, I'm a sceneist. I'm not a novelist. I'm just a sceneist. I write one scene. And that's all I need to write. Then I will write another one and so forth.    [00:34:38] Miko Lee: And do you use sticky notes or something to keep those scenes separately or    [00:34:42] Uma Krishnaswami: just all kinds of things? I use sticky notes. I use little boards on which I draw plot lines, and then I write, notes to myself. I use the journal notebooks. I've started using Scrivener and I actually have found that helpful but not until I've got something, in enough shape to plug things in.   [00:35:01] Miko Lee: Oh, I love hearing about artistic process. That's so fascinating. I appreciate you and you're showing your beautiful pen and everything. It's so great.    [00:35:08] Uma Krishnaswami: It's messy, right? One of the things I've learned is to lean into the messiness and not try to organize things too fast, too early.    [00:35:16] Miko Lee: Mm-hmm. Giving yourself the time for the creative juices to flow.    [00:35:20] Uma Krishnaswami: Yeah. Yeah.    [00:35:21] Miko Lee: So my last question is, what are you working on now?    [00:35:25] Uma Krishnaswami: I've actually just got done with edits on a picture book, which is going to be called Mango Sun. And then I'm working on another picture book. That's just gone to my agent. It's got to do with wildlife rescue and conservation in the Himalayas. It's an Indian setting, but a very different setting from Mango Sun.   [00:35:44] Miko Lee: And most of the ideas from your books are just coming from your imagination or something you read or where are you pulling from to get your inspiration?    [00:35:52] Uma Krishnaswami: Everywhere. Absolutely everywhere. I have a picture book that came out of a trip that we took to Galapagos and will it ever take form? I don't know, it's about the rewilding of an island , and how when you bring one species back, the other one follows. Some of it's from my childhood. I have two picture books that came out of a memory of planting a mango seed and watching it grow.   [00:36:21] Miko Lee: Sounds lovely. Two of my favorite things, mango and Sun [laughs], appreciate you joining us and sharing about your artistic process and your amazing book. And I'll put a link to your website in our show notes. And thank you so much for joining us and talking to us about Book Uncle and your work.    [00:36:37] Uma Krishnaswami: Miko, thank you so much. It's really a delight.    [00:36:41] Miko Lee: Welcome, Maggie Tokuda Hall to Apex Express.   [00:36:45] Maggie Tokuda-Hall: Thank you so much for having me.   [00:36:47] Miko Lee: I'm so happy to have you talking about, your wonderful book, love in the Library. But first I wanna, ask you a question I ask my guest, which is, who are your people and what legacy do you carry with you?   [00:37:01] Maggie Tokuda-Hall: Oh man. I feel like I have so many tribes that I identify with in different ways. , Gosh, who are my people? I mean, generally speaking, angry queer teenage girls very much my people. Tired Jewish aunties also my people. Exhausted Asian mothers also my people, [laughs] librarians and book people are my people. I, I, I don't know. I feel like I have so many people that I feel an affinity toward and an affection for, and kinship with.    [00:37:38] Miko Lee: I like you naming all of those because we're multifaceted people and there's many different things that make up who we are. Yeah. And what is the legacy that you carry with you from all these tribes you're a part of?   [00:37:50] Maggie Tokuda-Hall: From my mother, I carry a legacy of honoring the truth, like really believing that children are owed the truth and that part of being an adult is being courageous enough to tell it. but I also come from like a vibrant family of Jewish storytellers and I feel like I have that, that I carry with me as well.   [00:38:17] Miko Lee: Thank you. So you've written the book Love in the Library about Tamma, a woman who works at a library in the Minidoka concentration camp during World War ii.    [00:38:28] Maggie Tokuda-Hall: Mm-hmm.    [00:38:28] Miko Lee: And she meets George and falls in love. Can you tell me about how you very first heard this true love story of your grandparents?   [00:38:40] Maggie Tokuda-Hall: I can't actually, I don't remember the first time I heard this story. It is a story that I've just always known. like for me it's very much a fabric of how I came to understand the world and my place in it. Like sky is blue, grandma and grandpa met in a prison camp, you know, normal stuff. And so, um,    [00:39:00] Miko Lee: so it's just part of the family lore?   [00:39:03] Maggie Tokuda-Hall: Yeah. Like, it's not something my mother was ever shy about telling us. And I truly do not remember the first time she talked to me about it because I remember being very small and already feeling like I knew that story.    [00:39:15] Miko Lee: Okay. Then how did you decide to turn it into a children's book?    [00:39:19] Maggie Tokuda-Hall: Yeah, so, in 2017 when President Trump took office for the first time, in his very first executive order was to sign the travel or Muslim ban where he was banning people from Muslim majority countries from coming to the United States. It was clear immediately that he was gonna be using his time and power to enact a white supremacist agenda. I knew I needed to do all the things that we're supposed to do. Like I called my representatives and I wrote my postcards and I marched and I did all those things. But I really did try to audit what I had to offer, particularly children in that moment. That was unique to me. And I realized I had this beautiful story in my own family, not just about the cruelty of those sorts of policies, but also the resilience and power of the people who they target.    [00:40:05] Miko Lee: Ooh. Fired up the, that truth teller part of you just became ready to go.    [00:40:11] Maggie Tokuda-Hall: Yeah.    [00:40:11] Miko Lee: Um, speaking of the impact of politics and what's going on and how that relates to books, I know that in April, 2023, Scholastic wanted to include love in the library in a collection around AANHPI folks, but they wanted to edit your amazingly fierce author's note. Can you share with our audience what happened?   [00:40:34] Maggie Tokuda-Hall: I mean, first of all, thank you for calling it amazingly fierce. In my author's note, I talk about how what happened to my grandparents wasn't an isolated moment in American history and that it was racist, which I think is a, a reflection of a very basic understanding of that history. It, it's not, a creative extrapolation and. Scholastic offered to license the book, but my licensing offer came with a caveat, which was that I had to remove that entire paragraph. Um, and I had to remove the word racism from the text altogether. And so I decided to say no and say no publicly. And for about three months, my full-time job was talking about Scholastic, but also about our obligation to tell children, American history, honestly.   [00:41:19] Miko Lee: And they wanted you to get word of the word racist. Did they say why?    [00:41:24] Maggie Tokuda-Hall: Yes, they basically said, the language is too strong and we fear that some teachers won't bring it in for fear of this political climate, which is the nice way of saying like, we have to sell into places where book bans are happening and we think that this language is too incendiary for people who would ban books, which to me was always really, Unsatisfactory logic, because books about Japanese American incarceration are banned all the time and they don't use as strident of language as I use in that author's note. baseball saved us, gets banned. They called us, the enemy gets banned. This story is already considered dangerous by the people who would ban books, so they were trying to hold a center that just doesn't exist.   [00:42:04] Miko Lee: And so what did you end up doing?    [00:42:07] Maggie Tokuda-Hall: I said no and said no publicly, just with like, sort of the hope of, sparking some intra community conversation among kid lit creators about what sort of edits are appropriate to offer people. I would, I still posit, that that's a completely inappropriate edit and that's about sanding down people of color's, history and perspective to cater to a white audience. And I was unwilling to do it. and Scholastic initially released like a very, incomplete apology. And then when they received a lot of pushback about that, they offered a much more full apology. They offered to meet with me and my publisher, the CEO of Scholastic and the head of their education divisions, which is the division that made me this offer. And then they also had me work with a restorative justice consultant, for like a year to try to figure out what they could do better. But what I said to them at the end of that time that I told them, I was extremely transparent that I would be talking about this publicly. So I don't feel bad saying exactly what I said to them here is, I think the exact same thing would've happened. It just would've happened more politely.    [00:43:17] Miko Lee: Wow.    [00:43:18] Maggie Tokuda-Hall: I don't think that they actually reexamined what their role is as a publisher of Books for Children under Unconsolidated authoritarianism. They just figured out how to ask people to make racist edits more, more, uh, gently.    [00:43:33] Miko Lee: And you worked with them for one year with an RJ consultant.   [00:43:36] Maggie Tokuda-Hall: I mean, like, not every day, but we had, you know, meetings over the months. And she was a smart lady. Like I don't think that she, you know, did nothing. I think she was trying her best, but I think that, you know, big institutions are very slow to institute cultural change and that that on the one hand has to happen from the top down, but also can't happen from the top down.   [00:43:56] Miko Lee: Mm-hmm.    [00:43:56] Maggie Tokuda-Hall: And so I genuinely believe that there CEO was trying his hardest to, to make a meaningful change, but without them really stopping and examining and questioning what their own role in this moment is in a critical way. I don't think that they are going to be able to have answered what I would've required for them to, for me to then accept their licensing offer. ‘Cause they made it again.    [00:44:25] Miko Lee: So at the end of the one year long, they made the licensing offer to you again?    [00:44:29] Maggie Tokuda-Hall: Yeah. I think just to be kind, just as like a gesture of like, listen, we know we messed up. We'd love to license your book and I still said no because I don't think that they made meaningful enough change.   [00:44:40] Miko Lee: Hmm. Wow. I love this. What did you learn from this experience?    [00:44:47] Maggie Tokuda-Hall: That it is very unusual for people to blow the whistle within publishing, even when the examples are egregious.    [00:44:54] Miko Lee: Tell me about your connection with Authors Against Book Bans. Did that come out of this experience with Scholastic, or were you involved actively involved in this prior to that?    [00:45:05] Maggie Tokuda-Hall: No, it absolutely came as a result of my experience with Scholastic. Authors against Book Bans is an organization that I'm currently the president of. We're over 5,000 book creators across the country who are united under a single point of view, which is that the government shouldn't be allowed to tell us what to read. That's what we believe and that's what we fight for. And I got involved in founding the group along with specifically David Levithan, who's a really wonderful young adult and middle grade author, who had put together most of this group before I even came on board. Cause we realized that authors needed a central place to fight. There was no one organizing specifically us. And so Authors Against Book Bans was born out of necessity and, the dearth of a place that existed for us. Everyone would call on us to come speak, but it was extremely ad hoc. We weren't making any kind of unified movement, even though we all so passionately agree that, you know, book bans are anti-American and in violation of our First Amendment rights. And, you know, the freedom to read is a necessary freedom for a free and democratic society. and the reason I'd reached out to David initially was because I was hoping to put together something like Authors Against Book Bans, but just by myself, which is, maybe a testament more to my own personality [laughs] problems than anything else, but I was like, I'll just figure it out. And he was like, you know, I'm actually assembling a group that's trying to do this. Would you like to be a part of it? And that's how I came aboard. But I had gotten interested in it because as a result of the Scholastic fiasco, I was invited to give the keynote speech at the Idaho Library Association in 2023. I gave my little speech that I'd been giving a lot then, um, about how we have an obligation to tell American history honestly. And, people were like, the reaction was so emotional to it and so profound and like, I thought it was a good speech. I'm proud of the speech, but like it, something else was going on and I could feel it. And I started talking to the people who were there and when these librarians started telling me what they had gone through, just for making books like mine available to children, stalking, harassment, death threats. One of them had been followed home, like really frightening, scary things happening to them on like, in some cases a daily basis. I realized like I was gonna be a part of this fight. That was that. I wasn't gonna let them fight alone. And so, you know, in, in my advocacy work now, Idaho still holds like a very precious place in my heart because I think that it's a very forgotten state. When we think about places that need help, when we think about places that have been gerrymandered, when we think about places where there are so many good people who are disenfranchised and unable to affect meaningful change in their state level, governments. That have just been absolutely run roughshod over by Christian nationalists. We should be thinking about Idaho. They have, I think, like the highest neo-Nazi population in the United States. so it's a very direct line between my grandparents being incarcerated to the activism that I do now. And it wouldn't have happened without Scholastic's offensive offer.   [00:48:22] Miko Lee: I did not realize that librarians were personally being assaulted or attacked or followed. For books.    [00:48:29] Maggie Tokuda-Hall: You should watch, the librarian's documentary that's now streaming on PBS. Okay. Um, it's common across the country. Amanda Jones, who's an Authors Against Book Bans member no big deal, is a librarian in Louisiana that can't go grocery shopping in her own hometown anymore for fear for her own safety because she has taken a stand to like refuse to remove lgbtq plus books from her school library shelves. It's really dire. And I think people understand objectively that book bans are a problem in our country. I do not think that they understand how violent that this fight is. It's a really dark and hard time to be a librarian. So if you're a person who supports libraries, you should be thanking your librarians and letting them know one-on-one and in person face-to-face that you appreciate the work that they do, because there are people who are making their lives really difficult.    [00:49:25] Miko Lee: Can you talk about what the library meant to you as a child?   [00:49:30] Maggie Tokuda-Hall: I mean, honestly it was like a part-time babysitter. You're a kid, there's a library. Entertain yourself, you figure it out. I think the first time I really felt like a sense of belonging in the library was in middle school. We moved from LA to Northern California and I had to start a new school in seventh grade. I didn't really know anyone and it was embarrassing to not have people to eat lunch with and things like that. So I would eat lunch in the library. And the librarian was really kind about it. Like she never called attention to it. She never embarrassed me about it. She would let me sneakily eat in there, even though there was a very specific rule that you weren't allowed to eat in the library. she put, the Enchanted Forest Chronicles on an end cap once, and that's how I found them and ended up reading the entire series and that was really when I became a fantasy reader and you know, my debut novel was a fantasy novel. I still feel very much like a fantasy reader kind of at heart, and that started there. I mean, we never know when libraries are going to save a kid's life.    [00:50:39] Miko Lee: Can we go back to how you ended up writing this book about your grandparents' experience? Sure. And what was the first spark for you to say, I wanna turn this into something. It's a family lore, but I want more people to know about it.   [00:50:54] Maggie Tokuda-Hall: I mean, the Trump administration thing,    [00:50:56] Miko Lee: it was truly that. You said it was    [00:50:57] Maggie Tokuda-Hall: Yeah. Trump was it    [00:50:58] Miko Lee: Trump got elected. People should know this happened.    [00:51:00] Maggie Tokuda-Hall: Yes. What do you have to tell children in this moment If they're Muslim, they're scared, and if they're not, they need a way to understand what it means to feel afraid. Both of those things need to happen at the same time of like, you have to offer comfort to the children of the marginalized. You have to offer perspective to the children who have the privilege not to feel that fear. And so I have this story and what I love about this story is. I know that children are capable of holding the complexity of this story is both very romantic and very sweet, and also the circumstances it happened under were completely unfair. That's the kind of logic children are able to hold, and they should be given the opportunity to hold that kind of complexity because it'll serve them for the rest of their life because most of most situations we confront are complex.   [00:51:57] Miko Lee: And how were you able to eke out more details of that story? Did you do family interviews or was it more from your imagination?    [00:52:05] Maggie Tokuda-Hall: My mother is a journalist and she kept my grandmother's journals from the time she was in Minidoka. So some of it comes from my grandmother's journals. Some of it comes from working with my mother to make sure that it felt accurate, tonally and factually. ‘Cause she was not gonna let me publish a book that was nonsense. I always say it's Truman Capote true. ‘Cause the situation, the sensory details, all that stuff real, but the dialogue is made up. The dialogue is art. The dialogue is a way for children to understand how they might've been feeling. They never had succinct, quick conversations like this about their humanity and how they felt about each other. It was a long courting process, and so, you know. That part is made up for children,    [00:52:49] Miko Lee: but you, but you did include actual quotes from her journal too, right?    [00:52:53] Maggie Tokuda-Hall: Yes. The book closes with her words, not mine.    [00:52:57] Miko Lee: Can you give us those final words?    [00:53:00] Maggie Tokuda-Hall: The miracle is in us as long as we believe in beauty, in change, in hope. Which are words she wrote while she was imprisoned in Minidoka.    [00:53:11] Miko Lee: And how does that resonate with you in the time of now?    [00:53:15] Maggie Tokuda-Hall: They are words that I desperately cling to in the hope that I can see them become manifest.    [00:53:23] Miko Lee: And what are you working on now?   [00:53:26] Maggie Tokuda-Hall: Making Authors Against Book Bans as operational as possible.    [00:53:31] Miko Lee: And what does that look like?    [00:53:32] Maggie Tokuda-Hall: In late 2025, we became a nonprofit corporation. We have fiscal sponsorship under EveryLibrary, which is a really wonderful advocacy group that's a combination [501](c)3-(c)4, which means you can make tax deductible donations to them, but also they do overtly political work. And so now we can receive tax deductible, donations and continue to do the overtly political work that we do. We are an unapologetically political organization. We are more than happy to help get people elected who fight for the freedom to read, and we are delighted to show the door to people who would stand in our way of that freedom.   [00:54:09] Miko Lee: And how can people get more involved in your work?    [00:54:13] Maggie Tokuda-Hall: They could absolutely go to authorsagainstbookbans.com and make a donation. We need it [laughs]. We are one of the only organizations that receives donations that exists for the sole purpose of fighting book bans. Most every other group in our space have an angle that book bans affect them, and so they fight against them, but that's not their only purview. It is our only purview. So if it is something that you were interested in fighting, then you could make a donation to us. I would suggest signing up to be on the email list from EveryLibrary because they mobilize everybody, not just authors and book creators. And if you are a book creator, self-published, traditionally published, we don't care. Then you should sign up to be a member of Authors Against Book Bans and you'll get calls to action every Friday.   [00:55:07] Miko Lee: Thank you so much for sharing with us about your book and educating us about the work you're doing and appreciate hearing from you. Thank you for joining us.    [00:55:16] Maggie Tokuda-Hall: Thank you for having me.   [00:55:28] Miko Lee: Please check out our website, kpfa.org/program/apexexpress to find out more about our show and our guests tonight. We thank all of you listeners out there. Keep resisting, keep organizing, keep creating, and sharing your visions with the world because your voices are important. Apex Express is produced by Ayame Keane-Lee, Anuj Vaidya, Cheryl Truong, Isabel Li, Jalena Keane-Lee, Miko Lee, Miata Tan, Preti Mangala-Shekar and Swati Rayasam. Tonight's show was produced by me Miko Lee, and edited by Ayame Keane-Lee. Have a great night..    The post APEX Express – 4.9.26 – Library Joy appeared first on KPFA.

This week on Hashtag History, we will be discussing the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882. The Chinese Exclusion Act was the very first major US law restricting immigration to the United States of a specific national group. This act made it so that Chinese people could not immigrate to the United States for, initially, ten years. But then, it was renewed, made permanent, and then not officially repealed until…you ready for this? 1943. So, essentially, the Chinese Exclusion Act was in effect for more than six decades! Even when the Chinese Exclusion Repeal Act passed, it still only allowed 105 Chinese immigrants to come to the US each year. So even though the Exclusion Act was repealed in 1943, racist immigration laws were not officially dropped until the 50s and 60s.Not only did the Act make it so that Chinese people could not immigrate to the United States—it also made it so that Chinese residents already in the United States could not become citizens. We'll get into a specific case of this later in this episode but, even Chinese American citizens, when they traveled in and out of the country, were often denied re-entry into the country because they were told that they were not American citizens…even though they were.And again, we'll of course get into more detail about this in this episode, but…do you have any guesses why the US would finally, officially repeal this Act in 1943? The US was in the midst of World War II during 1943 and, well, we needed China as allies against Japan. As we were actively detaining Japanese Americans in detainment centers here on American soil, we dropped part of our racist laws against the Chinese so that we could get them on our side and help us work against our other enemies.Follow Hashtag History on Instagram @hashtaghistory_podcast for all of the pictures mentioned in this episode.Citations for all sources can be located on our website at www.HashtagHistory-Pod.com. You can also check out our website for super cute merch!You can now sponsor a cocktail and get a shout-out on air! Just head to www.buymeacoffee.com/hashtaghistory or head to the Support tab on our website!You can locate us on www.Patreon.com/hashtaghistory where you can donate $1 a month to our Books and Booze Supply. All of your support goes a long ways and we are endlessly grateful! To show our gratitude, all Patreon Supporters receive an automatic 15% OFF all merchandise in our merchandise store, a shoutout on social media, and stickers!THANKS FOR LISTENING!- Rachel and LeahEditor: Alex PerezCopyright: The Hashtag History Podcast

In this episode of The Growing Readers Podcast, host Bianca Schulze welcomes author and teacher librarian Jolene Gutiérrez and John Tonai, son of Minoru "Min" Tonai, to discuss the powerful picture book Unbreakable: A Japanese American Family in an American Incarceration Camp.Jolene shares how a childhood lesson from her grandparents about Amache — a Japanese American incarceration camp in southeastern Colorado — planted a seed that grew into a decades-long mission to bring Min's story to young readers. From their first phone call in 2017 to a signed contract in 2023, Jolene and Min built a collaboration rooted in trust and a shared belief that this history must never be forgotten. John reflects on his father's quiet, behind-the-scenes advocacy, the emotional weight of signing books in his absence, and what it meant to finally stand at the door of his father's barrack at Amache and realize that every repeated story had been living inside him all along.Whether you're a teacher looking for a picture book that opens honest conversations about civil rights and injustice, a parent wanting to share difficult history with care, or a reader who believes the best books are both feeling books and discussion books, this episode is a moving celebration of one unbreakable family — and the storytellers who made sure their truth reached the children who need it most.Read the transcript on ⁠The Children's Book Review⁠ (coming soon).Highlights:A Seed Planted at Twelve: How Jolene first learned about Amache from her grandparents — not her history class — and why that gap became the driving force behind this bookSix Years in the Making: Why Jolene shifted from a broad nonfiction project to one person's intimate story — and what that journey to publication looked likeWalking Through His Front Door: John's experience photographing Amache and realizing his father's endlessly repeated stories had been living inside him all alongThe Fire in Min: What Jolene saw in Min that told her this wasn't just a story about the past — it was a warning and a promise about the futureThe Words Are Fixed, the Interpretations Are Infinite: On what it means for a story to leave its author's hands and become the reader's ownNotable Quote:"He was telling this story so that it never happens again." —Jolene GutiérrezBooks Mentioned:Unbreakable: A Japanese American Family in an American Incarceration Camp by Minoru Tonai and Jolene Gutiérrez, illustrated by Chris Sasaki: ⁠Amazon⁠ or ⁠Bookshop.org⁠About Jolene Gutiérrez:Jolene Gutiérrez is an author and teacher librarian whose work is rooted in bringing underrepresented histories to young readers. Unbreakable is her debut picture book. Visit: https://www.jolenegutierrez.com/About John Tonai:John Tonai is the son of Minoru "Min" Tonai, whose lived experience as a Japanese American child incarcerated at Amache is the heart of Unbreakable. Following his father's passing in 2023, John and his sisters have carried the book forward with care. Visit: https://www.unbreakablemintonai.com/Densho — Min Tonai's oral history interviewsInterview I: https://ddr.densho.org/interviews/ddr-densho-1000-354-1/ Interview II: https://ddr.densho.org/interviews/ddr-densho-1000-302-1/ Densho main oral history collection: https://densho.org/collections/oral-history/Amache National Historic SiteNPS official page: https://www.nps.gov/amch Chris SasakiPersonal website: http://www.csasaki.comInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/christopher_sasaki/Credits:Host: Bianca SchulzeGuests: Jolene Gutiérrez and John TonaiAudio Editor: Kelly RinkProducer: Bianca Schulze

Show Notes Mike Freiling was born in San Francisco. His interest in poetry was first kindled in the mid-‘60's, when he attended high school near the Haight Ashbury district, and attended readings by American Beat poets Gary Snyder, Allen Ginsberg, and Lenore Kandel. Freiling attended University of San Francisco and MIT and helped co-found MIT's literary magazine Rune. He studied poetry under David Ferry at Wellesley. After receiving his PhD, he was named a Luce Scholar with an appointment to Kyoto University, In 2014, Freiling returned to Kyoto where he and his wife Satsuki Takikawa co-translated They Never Asked, an anthology of senryu poetry written by Japanese Americans incarcerated during World War II. Today we're going to talk about his translation of the 100 Poems From Old Japan published by Tuttle in 2025, some 46 years after Freiling's first draft.   The Books on Asia Podcast is co-produced with Plum Rain Press. Podcast host Amy Chavez is author of The Widow, the Priest, and the Octopus Hunter: Discovering a Lost Way of Life on a Secluded Japanese Island. and Amy's Guide to Best Behavior in Japan.The Books on Asia website posts book reviews, podcast episodes and episode Show Notes. Subscribe to the BOA podcast from your favorite podcast service. Subscribe to the Books on Asia newsletter to receive news of the latest new book releases, reviews and podcast episodes.

Derek Ikeda is a third-generation Japanese American carrying forward a family legacy rooted in farming, resilience, and great food. He operates Ikeda's Bakery alongside his father Glen, uncle Steve, and brother Brendyn—continuing a business first started by his grandparents, Sam and Sally Ikeda.What began as a small orchard has grown into a Northern California staple: part bakery, part restaurant, part roadside market. Built on a true farm-to-fork foundation, Ikeda's has become known for its fresh fruit, homemade goods, and especially its iconic pies—made from the same land and traditions that started it all.Today, Derek helps lead the evolution of the business while staying rooted in its origins—serving high-quality, honest food to generations of loyal customers and new travelers passing through the I-80 corridor.https://www.ikedas.com/Send us Fan MailFirecracker Farm Small-batch Spicy Salt Family farm with a secret blend of Carolina Reaper, Ghost, and Trinidad Scorpion peppers.Disclaimer: This post contains affiliate links. If you make a purchase, I may receive a commission at no extra cost to you.Support the show

A weekly magazine-style radio show featuring the voices and stories of Asians and Pacific Islanders from all corners of our community. The show is produced by a collective of media makers, deejays, and activists. Annie Lee moderates a panel with African and Asian Americans about the impacts of Birthright Citizenship and the need for Surviving Through Solidarity. Guests include: Lisa Holder, Ming Hsu Chen, Don Tamaki and Michael Harris.   Link to an APEX Episode on Wong Kim Ark from March 20, 2025 Show Transcript [00:00:00] Opening Music: Apex Express Asian Pacific expression. Community and cultural coverage, music and calendar, new visions and voices, coming to you with an Asian Pacific Islander point of view. It's time to get on board the Apex Express.   [00:00:40] Miko Lee: Welcome to Apex Express. I'm your host, Miko Lee, and tonight we will listen to a recent event, Birthright Citizenship, Surviving Through Solidarity that took place at Chinese for Affirmative Action. Just yesterday, on April 1st, the Supreme Court heard the case around birthright citizenship. This event that you're gonna listen to was highlighting Asian and African American solidarity. As you might know, the cases of dread Scott in 1857 and Wong Kim Ark in 1898 are linked as landmark Supreme Court cases that directly defined and redefined American citizenship specifically about race and birthright. While Dred Scott denied citizenship to people of African descent, Wong Kim Ark's case utilized the subsequent 14th Amendment to solidify birthright citizenship for children born to foreign nationals. I'm just noting that in this conversation, because it was a panel discussion that was live, there was some irregular use of microphones, so sometimes the audio can be a bit spotty. Please bear with us, and if you want to review the transcript, check out our website, kpfa.org, apex Express. And last year we also covered the story of Wong Kim Ark and have included this past show in our show notes. Now let's listen in to moderator Annie Lee, Lawyers Michael Harris and Don Tamaki, Lisa Holder of Equal Justice Society and Ming Chen of UC Law.   [00:02:20] Annie Lee: Everyone. My name is Annie Lee and I am the managing director of policy at Chinese for Affirmative Action. Welcome to CAA's office here in San Francisco, Chinatown. And thank you all for being here today for our discussion: Birthright Citizenship Surviving through Solidarity. CAA and Stop AAPI Hate are proud to co-sponsor this event because it matters to us. CAA has been around since 1969 and we are a community based organization that provides direct services to lingual working class Chinese immigrants. And we also try to improve their lives through policy and advocacy. And in 2020, we co-founded Stop AAPI Hate, which is the national leading aggregator of anti-Asian hate incidents. And we know at Stop AAPI Hate that anti-immigrant policies are anti-Asian hate. So why are we here right now? March marks two anniversaries of two Supreme Court cases. One is Dred Scott and the other is Wong Kim Ark. These are two seminal cases in US history. And next week on April 1st, the Supreme Court will hear oral arguments in the lawsuits challenging Trump's birthright citizenship executive order. So we are here to talk about birthright citizenship because it's an issue that is near and dear to both the Black and Asian communities.   [00:03:46] Without further ado, I am so thrilled to welcome this panel of amazing folks. Let's start with Michael Harris. Michael Harris here on my right is a retired attorney. He, for many, many years led the juvenile justice division at the National Center for Youth Law, an incredible litigator and advocates, and I'm so proud that he's here. He's also on the Equal Justice Society Board. Next to Michael is Don Tamaki. Don is a lawyer at the firm Minami Tamaki, and you might know him because he was part of the legal team that successfully got reparations for Japanese Americans after decades of fighting that injustice. So thank you Don. Don and Lisa, actually, spend time together on the California Reparations Task Force. And so this is Lisa Holder next to Don. Lisa is the president of the Equal Justice Society, which is based in Oakland, an incredible legal organization that has been in many, many fights, including, they filed an amicus brief in support of birthright citizenship, and that brief discusses why this is an issue for the Black community. And last but not least, we have Professor Ming Chen, who is a law professor at UC Law, and she's also the faculty director of the RICE Program, which is Race, Immigration, Citizenship, and Equality. So thank you so much to my panel and let's dive in. So some of you know, but I am a former US history teacher, so I often worry that people don't adequately understand American history and I fear that people don't understand reconstruction and the 14th Amendment. So let's start with the origin of birthright citizenship. What is birthright citizenship and where did it come from and why does its origin matter for understanding what's happening today? So Ming, I'm gonna start with you because you're a law professor and then others chime in. Lisa, Michael, Don. 'cause I think you'll have more to add.   [00:05:45] Ming Chen: Great. Thank you so much Annie, and thank you to CAA for having us all. I'm really excited to be part of this conversation, which I think is going to be really the beginning of a series of conversations over the next few months. So you're starting in the right place, Annie, in asking us what birthright citizenship is, because that is the heart of what the common lawsuit will be about: who gets to be a citizen in the United States. And that's actually why I named my organization RICE. I think the emphasis is on the “C” [citizenship], because I do think it is something that brings together immigrant communities, as well as all of the different communities within the United States that have been expanding, over time. Getting to the, legal text I, I think it's important to remember first that birthright citizenship is bigger than the United States. Worldwide there are at least two ways of becoming a citizen. One is by birthright and the other is by naturalized citizenship. So we're talking about the birthright half. And the United States is not alone. It's among countries mostly in the Western hemisphere that have chosen to focus on the “jus soli” version of birthright citizenship, which is “soli” is soil. So it's birth by touching US soil. And the idea behind that theory was always meant to be an egalitarian one. It's one that is about the idea that anyone can become a citizen, right? In contrast to the older system that Europe and other countries use, “jus sanguinis,” which is to say that citizenship could only be inherited by blood and heritage. Right? So I think right from the very beginning, it tells us what the text and the history of our 14th amendment citizenship clause intended to accomplish, which was to have an egalitarian spirit, a fresh start, and a continual renewal of what it means to be an American.   [00:07:33] Lisa Holder: Just sort of continuing on the path that Ming just opened up for us, birthright citizenship is very much connected to the African American experience. Particularly because the genesis of that right, really was a reversal of the construct and the regime of the enslavement era, right? Everyone's aware that during that era, descendants of Africa were not considered humans, much less citizens. And the legal cases that were brought where people try to have their citizenship, and their humanity acknowledged, the courts universally said, no, you are not citizens and Black people have no rights that white people need to respect. Right. And so that was the case, law of the land until, after the Civil War, when we had the 13th, 14th, and 15th, amendments were lifted up and embedded into our laws. You also had the Civil Rights Act of 1866 where that body of law was overturned and enshrined into our constitution was a new law that said that freed people are citizens and they do have rights that everyone needs to respect and rights to equality. You know, we know that there have been problems executing that [laughs] but at least enshrined in our laws and enshrined in our constitution that is where the birthright citizenship, constitutional law came from. It came out of that experience.    [00:09:21] Michael Harris: I just want to add a couple things to that. I mean, it's very distinguished scholars, they're hitting it really hard. Two things, universality and so I wanna talk about that first. I got one more coming forward. It's universal. Birthright citizenship is universal. And what I mean by that is everybody gets to be a citizen who's born here in the United States. Period. It's universal, applies to everybody. It doesn't matter if you're Black or white or Asian, none of that matters. That's really important. The other thing is it's that this criteria is not something that's subjective, nobody gets to decide. It's automatic. If you're born here, you automatically have citizenship. Those two things being automatic and being universal I think are really important. And this, we'll talk about this more as we go through the conversation, but those two things are what makes birthright citizenship so powerful and why they keep coming to try and take it down because it's universal so everybody gets it and it's automatic. Nobody can take it away. So let's, we'll I'll just leave it there for now, but we'll come back to that.   [00:10:33] Annie Lee: Don, this one's for you. So the 14th Amendment passes in 1868. Like Lisa said, it's to reverse Dred Scott, where the Justice Taney wrote that Black people had no rights, which the white man was bound to respect. And so they had to repudiate that through the 14th amendments, they have universal and automatic birthright citizenship with very, very few exceptions for like diplomats kids. Okay, that's like so, so narrow. So 14th Amendment passes in 1868, but it takes another 30 years for a Chinese American man named Wong Kim Ark to establish that birthright citizenship actually applied to the children of immigrants. So Don, can you tell us Wong Kim Ark's story, who was he, what happened to him and why did the federal rural government make him this test case?   [00:11:22] Don Tamaki: Just a couple words about context. I mean, one of the remarkable things about the case is it occurred during especially California's ultra racist, ultra virulent racist period. It's a contradiction in that regard. So just taking you back to the origins of where this racial pathology comes from, of course we focus, tend to focus on Asian American history, but actually you have to begin with Black history and indigenous history in the country. So in 1619, the first enslaved people were brought to America. And you know, 12 million people were kidnapped off the west coast of Africa. 2 million died during the middle passage. 400,000 were dropped off in America, and the million other millions ended up in the Caribbean, in the Brazil in Haiti, Jamaica, et cetera. And from there, slavery in America continued for 246 years. Two and a half centuries. Civil war happened in 1865. It concluded, and for another 100 years, Jim Crow exclusion infected America. And San Francisco, by the way, was heavily Jim Crow until the 1960s and into the 1970s. The vestiges of that exclusion and discrimination directly are rooted in the Black American experience.   [00:12:52] Michael Harris: And it's still present here today. That's why we have a Chinatown. That's why we have a Japantown in San Francisco because of what Don just did.    [00:13:00] Don Tamaki: Redlining and racial covenants.    [00:13:02] Michael Harris: That's right.    [00:13:03] Don Tamaki: Exclusions, redevelopment, and so on. So people think of California as being like a enlightened state. Well, California did enter the union in 1850 before the Civil War. 1849 enslavers came to California and they brought their human property with them. So there were probably at least 1500 enslaved people in California. 1865 Civil War ended, but Democrats in 1868 rose to power saying they would vote against any law that would have any equality between , Black Californians, indigenous people, and Chinese folks. And beginning toward late 1800s, that's when the bulk of Asian American immigration began. First Chinese American coming during the gold rush, and then Japanese Americans have followed and so on. And so, Jim Crow seeped into all that. Chinese Exclusion Act was passed in 1882. California was known as a strong Klan state by the end of the 1800s with strong Ku Klux Klan chapters in San Francisco, Los Angeles, Oakland, Riverside, San Jose, Anaheim and so on. And so this was a toxic stew that Chinese immigrated into and other groups too. So unsurprisingly, tons of anti-Asian legislation policies, exclusion, follow. So Wong Kim Ark was born in San Francisco in 1873 to Chinese parents who lived and operated a business here. His parents continued to reside and remain in the United States until 1890, and then they departed for China. Probably no doubt because of the inhospitable conditions here. And racial terror was part of that, including the race riots here in Chinatown. And now that I mention it between 1865 to 1935, 352 people were lynched in California. Eight of those were Black Californians, but the rest were indigenous, Chinese, and persons of Mexican descent.   [00:15:18] So that was the environment. Wong Kim Ark continued to live in California into his twenties, reportedly working as a cook in San Francisco. And at the age of 21 he actually made two trips to China. He made a trip to China when he was 17 to visit his parents. Stayed there a year, came back without incident worked, came back here, worked till he was 21, then went back to China to visit his parents at that point. And when he attempted to reenter the United States, he was denied entry and detained with a threat of deportation upon the sole ground that he was not a citizen of the United States. Of course he was born here. So the issue was you know, birthright citizenship was the citizenship clause of the 14th Amendment did it apply to Wong Kim Ark. And the interesting thing is about the case is that the court ruled in his favor. All persons born in the United States and subject to the jurisdiction thereof. And those words are now, today becomes crucial. And people, I think we on the panel will talk about the implications of that language subject to the jurisdiction thereof. And it established this principle that basically was reaffirmed repeatedly throughout our history for this 100 year plus period. To get to your last question, why did the court do this? I think scholars smarter than me can explain this, but I'll give you some clues. The court ruled in Wong Kim Ark's favor despite the virulent context of the era, because that's what the plain and expansive language of the 14th Amendment says.   [00:17:02] All persons didn't say formally enslaved, didn't say Black Americans. It said all persons. That's what the plain expensive language of the Civil Rights Act of 1866 says: all persons and as Lisa referred to. And the congressional record of the 14th Amendment and the Civil Rights Act of 1862, where legislators are debating these issues they clearly understood, and the record shows that if you include this expansive language, it will apply to groups like Chinese and Asians. And so with that understood it was adopted and ratified in 1868, 14th Amendment, and it was reaffirmed in other legislation like the Immigration Act of 1940. They just assumed that if you're born in this country, you're an American citizen. It was applied throughout the turbulent history involving my community, Japanese Americans. As you recall, 1942, 125,000 people were rounded up and put in concentration camps and the first generation were ineligible to become citizens. They were given identity cards marking them as enemy aliens. 2000 people died in those camps, but people were born in those camps. And the government, despite the fact that we were at war with Japan, understood that if you're born in this country. And even if your parents were quote, “enemy aliens,” you're gonna be classified as American citizens. And maybe lastly, the court ruled in favor of Wong Kim Ark because the 14th Amendment was trying to repair the harm done by Dred Scott v. Sandford, which was to provide human beings who've been here for two and a half centuries, the right to become an American citizen with all the benefits that go with that, like voting for instance. And recognizing that if you don't have those rights, you don't have anything, you are you, you're nothing. And for Japanese Americans, for instance, who are born in those camps, can you imagine if they didn't have birthright citizenship? They're not part of Japan. They're not part of America. Where are they? They're stateless. They have no home. They have no rights. And so it would create another underclass of people who have no rights for, and for which the 14th Amendment was trying to remedy which was you know, to provide a pathway. And so I guess you could say that's why, that's the incongruity of why Wong Kim Ark came out that way. In my opinion.   [00:19:59] Ming Chen: Maybe what I could add to the conversation is not just sort of who is included but who is not included. Because I think that's actually a much more small and specific group than the current dialogue would have you believe. So in the very language of the 14th Amendment, this idea of subject to the jurisdiction thereof. It refers to three exceptions and only three exceptions. One is for Native Americans, and that is because as of 1924 there wasn't a need to grant citizenship through the 14th Amendment because there were other provisions to grant citizenship to Native Americans. The second exception is for those who are children of diplomats. And the reason for that is because they have citizenship in their home country and their parents are only on a temporary post to the United States with the understanding that they're here in the United States in service to their home country. And I think that actually points to the limited meaning of the third exception, which is the one that I have to say, I have a really hard time understanding is part of the debate now. Because I think up until now, you know, this debate renews itself a couple times every year. Every time there's a new census, every time there's redistricting on all of the anniversaries, and usually the fight is about subject to the jurisdiction thereof. But the third exception, which has come into the dialogue, is about the language of accepting children of invading armies. And that is one that I have not thought we needed to argue about. It really becomes a touch point as Don mentions this history with internment and the children of a group of enemy aliens. I think that gives it a whole new historical read.   [00:21:48] But one of the reasons that this argument, I guess I should first explain the argument because it may not be obvious to you as it was not obvious to me the first time I heard it, which was about 18 months ago. And so the argument is that the children of invading armies referring mostly to the children of immigrants coming across the US Mexico border should not be considered birthright citizens. So that's kind of what the public debate, what the insinuation is behind some of the current effort to chip away at Wong Kim Ark through the executive order. There have been many efforts to chip away through legislation. I don't know how frequently it's been attempted through constitutional amendment, which is what it would actually require. That's a very, very high bar that's almost never met. I think most people haven't really made a serious, serious effort there. But what I think is kind of stunning to me in the sort of momentum behind the current moment is that Judge Ho who himself is a birthright citizen. Took up this language and this argument about the children of invading armies after previously saying that he agreed with this interpretation that children of undocumented immigrants, children of temporary visas all of these different legal statuses in addition to all of these racial groups, would immediately be citizens. And the argument he tried to make is that it wouldn't include the group at the border because historically it wouldn't have included enemy aliens or invading aliens either. And I think that what is so surprising to me is that a) that there is meant to be this historical analog between what would've been happening at the time of the Civil War and what is happening now at the US Mexico border. We are not having a civil war. We are not in active military conflict at the US Mexico border. I'll set aside other US military conflicts and how we wanna use that terminology. But I think that's really important because I, I feel like it's almost a trick, you know, to turn what is a media frame that's meant to be like clickbait, right? The idea that there is an invasion at the border, right. That we're being flooded with people who don't belong here. And to try to turn that into a legal argument saying this is actually an invading army and that takes this group outside of the 14th Amendment.    [00:24:19] Michael Harris: That's, I was gonna ask you a follow up question because we haven't been invaded that many times by armies I mean, maybe the War for Independence when the British sent ships over and took over Boston for a while. I could see how if they had kids, I mean, that's a stretch, that might apply to this. But I think the rhetorical device, they're touching on where they speak of people who come into the United States without proper documentation as an invading army or an invading whatever. They use that terminology quite often. Is that enough to bootstrap into this exception?    [00:24:59] Ming Chen: I, not to me, [audience and panel laughter] I think not to serious legal scholars and jurists. I mean, and you know, I'm not trying to be inflammatory by saying that. I think there are a lot of people who are pretty far away from me on a legal and political spectrum who would also say that this argument is pretty unprecedented. To try to say that that would be enough to bootstrap it into the actual text of the constitution or the spirit of Wong Kim Ark. So I think it's going really, really far. And I think too far, and I hope that if that becomes a line of discussion during the oral argument, that it would be cut off pretty quickly.   [00:25:38] Annie Lee: Well, let me punt it to Lisa then. If it's pretty clear based on the text, based on the legislative history, based on, just everything in the last 125 years that has said very clearly that birthright citizenship is universal and automatic. Why is Trump doing this? Like, what is being attempted legally, but also politically? And Lisa, you take a stab at this first and then others can chime in.    [00:26:04] Lisa Holder: Yeah. You know, why is Trump doing this? [audience and panel laughter] There's many layers, you know? And it, this is a strategic play and you have to sort of think about this in a layered way. Like there's a long term strategic play. There's a short term strategic play, there's a procedural strategic play, but that sort of bootstraps and brings in a much more moral and narrative rhetorical play. Procedural play. The short term strategic play has a lot to do with the midterm elections. Right, right. And also limiting people of color's ability to pick people who look like them as their representatives. Right. Because all of a sudden you're not only putting into question people's citizenship based on birth and turning this into a lineage thing where you have to bring me proof that your parents or their parents were born here or something like that, or were naturalized. So you're starting to put into question in a practical measure, people's access to the franchise, people's access to the voting booth. Right. And you're also starting to create a chain effect. So people are actually afraid to go to the voting booth. Right. And then you couple that with moving the migration of ICE. Now ICE is in the airports. Guaranteed by November, ICE will be in the voting booth, right? So you create this chilling effect. And then in terms of having representation that looks like you having people of color represent you in the US House of Representatives, your state representative. When you put birthright into question in this way, you're also gonna be able to challenge people who are running for office, people of color, running for office and say, well, you can't really run because you need to prove. And that is a rhetorical issue that we have seen being used already with both Harris and Obama, you know, because they were brown, Black people. Their birthright citizenship was, they were manipulating that rhetoric and that narrative.   [00:28:25] So this is not coming out of the outta left field. It's iterative and it's a it's rhetoric that has been, you know, percolating up for a long time. This is just a culminating moment. The long term strategy is really about white supremacy. We know that, you know, all of the social science shows that in 20 years this, the country will be a majority minority country, right? And people of color will have a huge amount of power in terms of, you know, in terms of the vote, right? Because of that, switch to majority minority and white people will be in the minority. And so, this is about, from a long term perspective, ensuring that certain people maintain their power as an electoral block. Right? So that's sort of like a long term electoral politics play. And then finally, the procedural issues are what's outstanding, okay? As Ming mentioned, if you are going to use procedure to overturn a constitutional amendment that is a, an astronomical feat to accomplish, right? Because you need two thirds of all of the representatives in Congress, and then on top of that, you need 75% of the states to ratify that process. So overturning a constitutional amendment is virtually impossible. But what we have here is trying to do the same thing. One person trying to do the same thing using the powers of the executive office. It is unprecedented. It is absurd. It has no legal viability, but it is a political moment where this man sees an opportunity because of the bias that we see in the judicial branch, in the court system. And that is being leveraged for the executive to to do something that is unprecedented and that is actually procedurally impossible, right? For one person by just signing a document all of a sudden disenfranchising 13 million people. That is not the democratic process. It's quite the opposite.   [00:30:38] Michael Harris: I just wanted to add to that. The Senate and the House of Representatives are both very narrowly controlled by the Republicans, and so it's really important to Trump to maintain that control. He'll only be able to continue doing these outrageous things by virtue of getting a rubber stamp from Congress. And so either house going the other way would put a stop sign in front of him and make it much more difficult for him to do all those things. All this money he's spending he would not be able to do that if Congress was actually active in doing it's job. Cause under the Constitution, spending is supposed to be controlled by the Congress, not by the Executive. So everything's upside down, but that's only working because Congress is allowing him to do that and not trying to stop him. If the Democrats are able to take over the Senate or the House where there's only a three or four seat margin right now that would make it much, much, much harder for him to pull these things off. And so anything he can do to get an advantage in that way I think is also part of what they're trying to do and trying to pull off.   [00:31:48] Ming Chen: One other thought, and you know, I'm trying very hard to not be professorly in the sense of using jargon or highfalutin terms, but I'm just curious, has anyone in this room heard the term perpetual foreigner before? A few of you have, I mean, I think it's really pertinent here. The first time I heard of this idea was when I started to learn from other Asian American law professors when I was still in college. I think that idea was that for certain groups of people, including Asian Americans, it doesn't matter whether you are actually a citizen by law or how many generations you've lived in the United States, right? So I'm a birthright citizen like Wong Kim Ark, but I think the first time I heard about it was, you know, this idea of Asian Americans not being able to be Americans socially in terms of belonging regardless of whether they are themselves, the child of citizens or immigrants and if they're the sixth generation children, right. I remember taking a Chinatown tour with David and is that where we are about six generations out for a lot of the descendants. So even if you were in the sixth generation that if you look Asian, that you will still be seen as being foreign. And so I think that idea has animated a lot of the work that I do. Like why it is that a lot of the work I do on race centers Asian Americans and then a lot of the work I do on immigrants centers, the naturalization process.   [00:33:16] But I think it's also important to recognize the breadth of that idea. Again, this idea of trying to blur the line between actuality, like what is real and what sounds like a fancy argument. Right. And I think what Lisa said, you know, her brief reference to the challenges against Barack Obama and Kamala Harris when they were running for a highest offices. You know, I think again, there's not, it's not a coincidence. I mean, to me that's the perpetual foreigner at work again. Because it's the idea that not only that Black people cannot possibly be the leader of this country, right? Sort of the, the figurehead of this country, but that for Barack Obama, the child of one international student on a lawful, probably f visa at the time, or that for Kamala Harris, the child of two lawful immigrants, that they cannot be birthright citizens that would be eligible for president. So there's a lot of commonality in that argument. And I think, you know, people forget, I think people assume that if you're talking about groups who are not Asian right, or who are not Latinx, that we're not talking about foreignness, we're only talking about race. And certainly we are talking about race, but we're not talking about it exclusively.   [00:34:33] Michael Harris: And then in addition to all of that is just the straight up racism of it. And that's supported by this notion of white supremacy. And what I mean when I say that, Lisa has touched on this already, is that there is a hierarchy of racial groups. And we're not all created equal. There's a hierarchy and the top group is, you already know, I don't have to say it, is the whites [laughter], and then below that are the other people like us who look different. And the reason there's, they're able to put these groups out there and get people to buy into that belief system is because we look different. And so this is why the perpetual thing is perpetual it's because we still look different. And that is a key part of the white supremacy. They still want to buy into this notion that white people are superior. And the only way they can make that work is by saying that people who look different are inferior.   [00:35:34] Annie Lee: I love this discussion because it's so real. And what you are saying essentially is you're talking about belonging and you're talking about power. Like who gets to belong in America? And then that is necessarily connected with who has power in America, who deserves to have power in America. But I know that we all belong in America and that we have power. So I wanna shift this conversation now to what can we do? And so beyond the courts everybody tune in next week. But beyond the courts, what is the role of community organizing, state and local policy advocacy? Public education in defending birthright citizenship and fighting against the attack on birthright citizenship is one sliver of everything that he has done. So many executive orders that came out on day one. So how, how do we, as everyday people fight white supremacy? What can we do when they are redistricting and trying to take away our franchise right before the midterm elections? What do we do when they're using courts that they've already packed with their federal society judges? And so what, what can an average regular person do? And Don I'm gonna go to you first.    [00:36:47] Don Tamaki: Let me say something in a very far less intellectual way than my colleagues here. This is a very old playbook. The playbook of demagoguery is very old. He said the old is humanity. And there are three elements to that playbook. One, appeal to prejudice, however, that is, race, skin, color, religion, whatever. Secondly, fear monger and scapegoat. And thirdly trafficking, conspiracy theories, fake news, false information, erasure of history. That's how you control the culture. And it worked in 1619. It worked in 1882. It worked in Germany in 1933. And it works today, you know, 2016, 2020. You know, when Chinese were blamed as spreaders of the Chinese virus. Asian Americans, when Mexicans were characterized as drug dealers and rapists when Jews and immigrants were portrayed as replacing good white people. This dehumanizing [of] people where one more Black man killed during an encounter with law enforcement barely evokes a shrug because it is so normal. It is so normal, folks, and so it works. And so, you have the candidate Trump running for office and say to a national audience that, to the people of Springfield, Ohio, that Haitian immigrants are eating your dogs and cats and getting away with it. Or the images of the Obamas transposed on cartoon apes. And this is really Jim Crow stuff. This is Antebellum stuff. And it's a recycling of the same playbook. And so the first part of organizing is being aware of what's going on. This is not a new thing. Okay, it's just a racial pathology that churns in one form or another, and it has an origin. It predates us. And so I, I think part of that is educating ourselves how everything is interconnected.   [00:38:58] And since we're talking about Black Asian solidarity, I'll just say a couple things. I mean, the civil rights movement had three triumphs that we all should remember. The Civil Rights Act of 1964, the Voting Rights Act of '65 began the dismantling of Jim Crow, which I, as I said, was a hundred year phenomenon following the end of the Civil War and the Immigration of Act of 1965. The third act. It ended as, you know, racist quotas. It prioritized family ties and skills and it greatly increased Asian immigration. As a result, the majority of AAPIs today are post 1965 Americans whose very presence here was made possible by the Black Civil Rights Movement. How many of us know that, you know? I mean, everybody focuses not everybody, but people tend to focus on their own peculiar predicament as if it's unique to our own situation. And in fact, it's all, quite connected. So I think part of this organizing process is realizing, you know, it's Martin Luther King, the oft quoted statement where he says we may have come on different ships, but we're in the same boat now. And especially in connection with what's happening and, and you're seeing it in different parts of the country where sure, immigrants are being targeted in Minneapolis, but then you have thousands of Minneapolitans that, you know, ordinary people, business folks, teachers, laborers, protesting in Sub-Zero weather against what, what happened? And, and yeah. You know what, can we do protest work? I hope everybody's out there on March 28th, you know, this Saturday on the No Kings March.    [00:40:51] Michael Harris: Not just protesting, running them out of town.    [00:40:55] Don Tamaki: Well, [audience and panel laughter] Gregory Bovino, Gregory Bovino, who was the leading charge? Gone. Kristi Noem. Gone.    [00:41:03] Michael Harris: Yes, right.    [00:41:05] Don Tamaki: 2000 ICE agents in Minneapolis reduced to much smaller numbers. That's right. Their plans then launching Ohio trashed. You know, so that's why you, so boycotts, boycotts work. Ask Elon Musk. Ask Target. Local elections, Michael mentioned the midterm elections. It is if we don't, if Democrats don't get back the House, the country's cooked. So, I mean, everybody should be involved one way or the other in that. Raising money, you know, we are part of a, a fundraising group called CAPA21, and there are other groups out there, but those are, those things are crucial to funnel money toward swing elections and critical races. The education part I think is essential. If you consider the velocity change in terms of the civil rights movement, Japanese American redress and reparations was a 20 year movement. And it was full of education of the public. Civil rights movement, same thing. The philosophy of change on marriage equality or LGBTQ rights and all those things happened because they became normal. They were, they started out as ideas that people thought were preposterous. You know, that'll never change.    [00:42:26] Michael Harris: Right.    [00:42:26] Don Tamaki: And Jim Crow will never end. And San Francisco can segregate Asian Americans within Japantown and Chinatown. It, it will never change. But that idea of change, which were thought preposterous happens. But it requires civic engagement. So just examples.   [00:42:46] Michael Harris: I want to amplify two things that Don said. One is there will be a march this Saturday a No Kings March, and it's really, really important for people to show up for that march. ‘Cause the one thing that's devastating to a government is to have its people out there visible on the streets saying what the government is doing is wrong. Because you can spin certain things, you can lie about certain things, but bodies in the streets you can't lie about. It's there and it's real. So that's one thing that's really important, really. But I would encourage all of you if you can, if you are able, please join us and come out on Saturday. The other thing I want to add to the Don's excellent list is there's a few groups in the Bay Area and in San Francisco that does postcards. And their strategy is they identify particular jurisdictions where it's a very close race and it'll be pivotal if a Democrat can win over a Republican, say in a House or maybe even like the Texas Senator race. That one's probably gonna be very close too. And they send postcards to people encouraging them to vote. Don't sit it out. And those extra votes can be the difference between winning and losing. And that might flip the House might flip the Senate. So those are some other additional items.    [00:44:11] Ming Chen: I think at a much more basic level, it's just like telling, telling your story, telling the story of America. Because, you know, when we talk about all these rhetorical tricks, I mean, I think what it means is that that narrative is gaining a lot of power. And so I think you have to reclaim the narrative, right? You have to tell the counter story which happens to be the real story of what's happening. This is something that I actually haven't talked about this publicly, but my daughter she's like on the brink of being 13, not yet a teenager. It made me really sad that she came back from her well-funded, pretty liberal public school about a month ago crying because she said that in her Mandarin Chinese class, there was a child who was saying that Asian people eat dogs. And then writing swastikas on the chalkboard and singing Nazi songs making fun of the women in the room, I guess they're girls in the room saying that they're all lesbian without knowing anything about them. And it just made me really profoundly sad because I'd like to think that a lot of ignorant narrative is because people don't know better, right? I mean, as an educator, I hope that education will simply solve it. And it made me really sad to hear that again. You know, I'm, I'm on the brink of Berkeley. I basically live in Berkeley, right? So one of the most densely populated PhD overeducated people in America. And to be three generations in and to still have this story being told in the classrooms was really distressing to me. And even more distressing that it isn't just the like Chinese people that eat dogs as being a stereotype from those who are not educated, but it's something she might have heard on TV from the highest offices in the land, right? Something she might've heard the vice president say, for example. And so I just think it's so important and doesn't take education, doesn't take a law degree, right? To be able to tell that story. And so I was really, really proud that my daughter you know, did file a complaint with the principal that she came home and told us about it. And you know, her two parents who are civil rights and immigration lawyers, [laughter] but also that she's been like talking to her classmates right, about the fact that that's not true. That's not right. She's been comforting the other kids in the classroom who don't share the same background that she does. And I feel like that kind of work is just as important.    [00:46:45] Michael Harris: I want to add something to that. We have to take note of the fact that a lot of these types of comments really vile, racist things and not just about Asians, it's also some of the things about Black people, young people are saying. Part of it is because it's very easy to say things like that online because you can do it anonymously and not have to, you know, stand up and back up your comments, so to speak. And another part of it is our culture. We gotta be real about this. When I was growing up, I'm sure you were told this too, as the country became more educated and got more exposed to people of color and more people got higher education, all this crazy stereotypical racist stuff would go away because people would know better. That's what they told me the whole time I was growing up and now we know that's not true [audience laughter] because the reverse is happening. It's growing because some people are making money by putting stuff like that online and selling t-shirts and hats and stuff like that. Or starting, you know, whatever they start. There's this guy, Alex Jones, who made millions of dollars doing that kind of stuff. So some people are making money off of it. Other people are just buying into that ideological tip and are using that to gain power and influence and clicks. So we just have to be aware that this is a current going on in our society right now. And it's happening and it's growing and we, we need to be aware of it and start thinking about ways how we can put it to rest. Cause it's, it's happening.    [00:48:30] Annie Lee: Thank you so much. I do wanna give our audience some time to ask any questions that you all might have. So if you have a burning question to ask our illustrious panel now is your opportunity.   [00:48:45] Audience member: I was wondering how does this with, with the rhetoric of, of Washington pushing for IDs for voting how will that impact on people's presence at the voting booths and validating their ability to vote?   [00:49:04] Michael Harris: I think what you're referring to is the Safeguard [SAVE America] Act is now in Congress, and if it's passed and signed by the president, then it'll become law. And what it will require is anyone who wants to vote will have to have a photo ID. And even if you registered, you have to prove you're a citizen. So those two steps are, I think, designed to suppress the vote of people of color. I mean, I think it's very straightforward. This has been what Republicans have been trying to do for ever since the case that Don just mentioned passed and they were able to start doing this stuff. And I agree. It goes back to the notion that in 20 years, America's going to be a majority minority country. There's gonna be more people of color than white people. And I think that I'm just gonna come out and say that freaks them out. It really freaks 'em out. I think a lot of them have lived their whole lifetime where only white people were in charge, running stuff, and they can envision a future not too far off where that might not be the case anymore. And that's scary. It shouldn't be. I mean, we're all the same. It's all gonna be, you know, and there's Black Republicans and Black Democrats and there's Asian Republican. I don't know why they're so freaked out about it, but but they are freaked out about it. And a lot of this is to suppress the vote so that they can continue to stay in power and will not have to give up the power that they would lose otherwise.   [00:50:35] Lisa Holder: Yeah, I mean, it's always been about limiting the franchise, right? And since the time that it expanded beyond white males with property, there's been a battle to keep it as limited as possible. You know? And when you think about what happened after the Civil War, after the 13th, 14th, and particularly the 15th Amendment were passed and African Americans were allowed to vote, you had a 100 year backlash. Where 10,000 African Americans were murdered and lynched. Most of those were people who were trying to mobilize their communities to enter into the franchise and exercise the right to vote. That's the retrenchment that we're seeing being reiterated right now. Right. And we know that during that period, there were all kinds of hoops that, for instance, Black people had to jump through because of those Black Codes where you had to, for instance, prove that you can read this particular statement. Right. Or, you know, just like all kinds of random hoops that you had to jump through. And so when we see these barriers, these gatekeepers, like, oh, you have to have an ID. If this birthright citizenship goes through, no, no, no you can't bring in your birth certificate. You know, we need some proof of your parent, of your lineage. Right. And it's really is combined with that narrative and that rhetorical aspect, that Ming was articulating because although in fact we are America. America looks like us, Americans look like us. The alternative narrative where white predominance is the point is always going to be pushed where no, no, no, we are different. We are not normal and we are not America. And so that's, that's the narrative piece that all of this leads to. And that's why this story of storytelling that Ming talked about is so important. And also it is so important to just constantly push back to resist, to vote. To run for office when you look like an American.   [00:52:45] Audience member: My question is, if the executive order passes, what can we do to resist? Because one of the things is it will also disenfranchise women because it's about proving your identity that matches your birth certificate. Right. And there are really so many people that will not have their names to match their identities. And so what can people do to, to, to counter if that should happen?   [00:53:11] Don Tamaki: The legislative answer? Well, there'll be court challenges, no doubt    [00:53:15] Audience member: but, but before, let's say the midterm election.   [00:53:18] Michael Harris: Call your representative, fax 'em, email 'em, get your friends to do that, because it's pending in Congress right now.   [00:53:25] Don Tamaki: But elections have consequences is the point. And it people who says, well my vote doesn't count, doesn't matter. Everybody, both parties the same. Elections have consequences. I, I guess the only other thing to remember, I keep, you know, repeating this, the solidarity and connectedness bears repeating because the story keeps recycling. It's very recycled story about voter suppression. You know, the Civil War ended in 1865, 12 years of reconstruction. Lincoln is assassinated shortly after during the beginning of reconstruction and thereafter, you know, a deal was struck in the contested election of 1876. Federal troops are withdrawn from the south and then the voter suppression comes in literacy tests, poll taxes.   [00:54:19] Annie Lee: Mm-hmm. Grandfather clauses.   [00:54:21] Don Tamaki: Yeah. I mean in Virginia. During reconstruction 140,000 formerly enslaved people registered to vote after the collapse of reconstruction it was reduced to 21,000. California had you know, poll taxes. Other states had literacy tests and whatever, and it's now repeating because folks don't like the results of an election. The answer is not to, you know, broaden your net and appeal to upfront (?) policy. The answer is to suppress voting, stop people from voting. And so again, it's a matter of awareness I think we have to realize the game plan. And it makes it so important about who is voted into the dials and levers of the controls that run the country. So that's critical.    [00:55:13] Ming Chen: I can jump onto that. go vote. But I think it's also, you know, it's early enough to say, get your documents in order. Right? Go and be ready to vote in a way that won't draw question, right? So you don't have to wait for the lawsuit. And I will say for that, as someone who spends most of my days working with 20 something year olds who move all over the country, a lot of it is about sort of get your ducks in order, right? So if you don't have a driver's license with the current address that matches your name, you can fix that now. So many people who don't have a normal ID because they never learn how to drive, right? So make sure you go get that document. You mentioned marriage, Anna, and I remember I moved to New York at the same time that I got married and trying to get my name on the document when I was it, you know, it's like this endless loop, right? Because you're getting a new ID because of your address. If you don't have that, you can't get your social security card, if you don't have that you can't validate the marriage certificate, right? There's just this endless loop. And you have to get all of that in order, right? So I think maybe there needs to be two parts to our voter mobilization this year, right? It's get yourself ready, sort of like arm up and then vote so that your vote will actually end up counting.    [00:56:33] Miko Lee: Please check out our website, kpfa.org/program/apexexpress to find out more about our show and our guests tonight. We thank all of you listeners out there. Keep resisting, keep organizing, keep creating, and sharing your visions with the world because your voices are important. Apex Express is produced by Ayame Keane-Lee, Anuj Vaidya, Cheryl Truong, Isabel Li, Jalena Keane-Lee, Miko Lee, Miata Tan, Preti Mangala-Shekar and Swati Rayasam. Tonight's show was produced by me Miko Lee, and edited by Ayame Keane-Lee. Have a great night.   The post APEX Express – 4.2.26 – Surviving Through Solidarity. appeared first on KPFA.

On this season of Crimes of the Times, Los Angeles Times journalist Christopher Goffard explores criminal cases that have left a mark on California history. This season's stories include new developments in the Black Dahlia and Zodiac cases, the snitch scandal that rocked Orange County, the plight of the Japanese American woman known as Tokyo Rose, and the assassination of Robert F. Kennedy.

Episode Summary: In this week's episode of your favorite Korean Adoptee podcast, the Janchi Boys sit down with KJ's friend Saki and talk about growing up in the Midwest as a Japanese American!Show Notes & Corrections:This isn't episode 180Saki isn't our first non-adoptee guestThe audio is really low quality and all over the place—sorry about that!---// Support the Show!Online at janchishow.com / @janchishowSupport the show at janchishow.com/supportWatch our Youtube VideosWrite us a note: janchishow@gmail.comThe Janchi Show Quick BioThe Janchi Show focuses on exploring intersectional identities and current events through the lens of adoption, race, lived experience and more. Sometimes we have guests, and sometimes it's just the three of us. Either way, it's always a janchi!// Meet the Janchi Boys!Nathan NowackNathan (he/him) is a transracial Korean American adoptee who was born in Seoul in the 1970s. He was adopted at the age of 5 months old and raised in a small town in Oklahoma along with a non-biological Korean adopted sister.  After going to college in Colorado he later moved to Los Angeles to pursue a digital media career and eventually started 2 photography companies.  He loves spending time with his wife and 3 kids, playing golf, and collecting Lego. He is in reunion with his biological family as the youngest of 7 and has been in contact since 2015.  He currently serves on the Advisory Council for KAAN and helps with the planning of their annual adoptee conference.  In 2021, Nathan and his family moved back to Colorado to be closer to family and start a new chapter in their lives.  Connect with Nathan!Website: http://www.coverve.comInstagram: http://instagram.com/nnowackPatrick ArmstrongPatrick Armstrong (he/him) is a transracial Korean American adoptee, podcaster, speaker, and community facilitator. He is one of the hosts of the Janchi Show, a podcast that explores and celebrates the experiences and stories of Korean adoptees everywhere. He also is host of Conversation Piece with Patrick Armstrong, a podcast where he discusses the missing pieces of the conversations we're already having. He is a cofounder of the Asian Adoptees of Indiana, a group dedicated to creating a safe, engaging community for all Asian adoptees who need it. He is currently based in Indianapolis with his wife and cat. Connect with Patrick!Website: http://patrickintheworld.meLinkedIn: http://linkedin/in/patrickintheworldInstagram: http://instagram.com/patrickintheworldK.J. Roelke (@kjroelke)KJ (he/him) was adopted from Daegu and raised in Dallas, Texas with his two biological, older siblings and his younger sister, adopted from Russia. After spending a decade in the Midwest for college and career, he and his wife are back in Dallas and living large! He has been on his journey of discovery since 2015 and spends his days as a web developer for the Choctaw Nation of Oklahoma.Connect with K.J.!Website: https://kjroelke.online/LinkedIn: https://linkedin/in/kjroelkeInstagram: https://instagram.com/kjroelke// Listen to/Watch The Janchi Show on all major platforms:Apple: http://janchishow.com/appleSpotify: http://janchishow.com/spotifyYoutube: http://janchishow.com/youtubeGratitude & CreditsMichelle Nam for our logo and brandingJerry Won for bring us togetherThis show is created and produced by Patrick, Nathan and KJ and is the sole property of the Janchi Show, LLC.

In the wake of Pearl Harbor, more than ten thousand Americans living abroad became trapped in Japanese-controlled territories, and with rumors of ill treatment and torture, the U.S. State Department was desperate to bring home its citizens. Despite the intense acrimony between the warring governments, a tireless State Department official, James Keeley, helped hatch an extraordinary plan through diplomatic back channels: each country would send a ship filled with civilians through war-torn waters to a neutral port city where their passengers could be safely exchanged. Today’s guest is Evelyn Iritani, author of “Safe Passage: The Untold Story of Diplomatic Intrigue, Betrayal, and the Exchange of American and Japanese Civilians by Sea During World War II.” While the U.S. and Japanese governments both assumed their enemy non-combatants--including many in relocation camps and jail cells--would welcome their new "tickets to freedom," the reality proved more complicated. For those who had sunk deep roots in their adopted homelands, the exchanges offered an agonizing choice. And for some patriotic Americans of Japanese descent, there was no choice at all: as the State Department found itself in need of more bodies to trade, they were "repatriated" against their will to a country at war that had never been their home. Some of the stories of repatriates we discuss a Japanese Peruvian barber brought to the U.S. as a negotiating pawn; three American teachers accused of spying in the Japanese island of Hokkaido, and a young Japanese American boy fascinated with The Green Hornet and boy scouts.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

APEX Express is a weekly magazine-style radio show featuring the voices and stories of Asians and Pacific Islanders from all corners of our community. The show is produced by a collective of media makers, deejays, and activists. APEX Express and Lavender Phoenix are both members of Asian Americans for Civil Rights and Equality (AACRE). AACRE focuses on long-term movement building, capacity infrastructure, and leadership support for Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders committed to social justice. Important Links: Lavender Phoenix  Dragon Fruit Project – Podcast Series Transcript: Miata Tan: ​[00:00:00] Hello and welcome. You are tuning into Apex Express, a weekly radio show, uplifting the voices and stories of Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders. I'm your host Miata Tan. Tonight we have two incredible guests. From Lavender Phoenix. They're a Bay area based organization supporting queer and transgender Asian American and Pacific Islander [00:01:00] youth. I really enjoyed my conversations with both of these folks, and I'm sure you will as well. This episode is a rerun from December, 2025 when Lavender Phoenix was at a transitional moment in their leadership.  Tonight, you'll hear from the outgoing executive director as she passes the torch along to the new director stepping into the role, uh, we're bringing this episode back in honor of the transgender day of visibility. That's just around the corner Tuesday, March 31st. It felt like the perfect time to revisit these conversations. A quick note throughout both interviews, you'll hear us refer to the organization as both Lavender Phoenix and its very cute nickname. LavNix. Without further ado, here's my conversation with Yuan Wang, the outgoing executive director of Lavender Phoenix.   Miata Tan: Yuan, thank you so much for joining us today. , Would you be able to share a little bit about yourself with [00:02:00] our listeners to get started?  Yuan Wang: Yeah. I'm so excited to be here. , My name is Huan. My pronouns are she, and they, and I'm actually the outgoing executive director of Lavender Phoenix. You're catching me on my second to last week in this role after about four years as the executive director, and more years on our staff team as an organizer and also as a part of our youth summer organizer program. So this is a really exciting and special time and I'm really excited to reflect about it with you.  Miata Tan: Yay. I'm so excited. I'd love for you to give us an overview of Lavender Phoenix and the work that y'all do, what communities you support,  Yuan Wang: Lavender Phoenix was founded about 21 years ago, and we are based in the Bay Area. We're a grassroots organization that builds the power of transgender non-binary and queer Asian and Pacific Islander communities right here in the Bay. Right now our work focuses on three major [00:03:00] Areas. The first is around fighting for true community safety. There are so, so many ways that queer, trans, and more broadly, uh, working class communities in the San Francisco Bay Area. Are needing ways to keep ourselves and each other safe, that don't rely on things like policing, that don't rely on things like incarceration that are actually taking people out of our communities and making us less safe. The second big pillar of our work is around healing justice. We know that a lot of folks in our community. Struggle with violence, struggle with trauma, struggle with isolation, and that a lot of the systems that exist aren't actually really designed for queer and trans API people, to thrive and feel connected. And so, we've been leading programs and campaigns around healing justice. And the last thing is we're trying to build a really principled, high integrity leaderful movement. So we do a ton of base building work, which just [00:04:00] means that, everyday queer and trans API people in our community can come to Lavender Phoenix, who want to be involved in organizing and political work. And we train folks to become organizers. Miata Tan: And you yourself came into Lavender Phoenix through one of those programs, is that right?  Yuan Wang: Yeah. Um, that is so true. I came into Lavender Phoenix about seven or eight years ago through the Summer organizer program, which is kind of our flagship youth organizing fellowship. And I was super lucky to be a part of that.  Miata Tan: How has that felt coming into Lavender Phoenix? Like as a participant of one of those programs? Yeah. And now, uh, over the past few years, being able to lead the organization?  Yuan Wang: Yeah. It feels like the most incredible gift. I share this a lot, but you know, when I had come into Lavender Phoenix through the summer organizer program, I had already had some experience, doing [00:05:00] organizing work, you know, doing door knocking, working on campaigns. but I really wanted to be in a space where I felt like I could be all of myself, and that included being trans, you know, that included. Being in a really vulnerable part of my gender transition journey and wanting to feel like I was around people all the time who maybe were in a similar journey or could understand that in a really intimate way. I really found that at Lavender Phoenix. It was pretty unbelievable, to be honest. I remember, uh, the first day that I walked in. There were members and volunteers leading a two hour long political education that was just about the histories of trans and non-binary people in different Asian and Pacific Islander communities. So just being in a room full of people who shared my identities and where, where we were prioritizing these histories was really, really exciting. I think for the years it's just been so amazing to see Lavender Phoenix grow. The time when I joined, we had a totally different name. It was [00:06:00] API equality, Northern California, or we called ourselves a pink and we were really focused on projects like the Dragon Fruit Project, which was a, a series of more than a hundred oral histories that we did with elders and other members members of our community. Things like the Trans Justice Initiative, which were our first efforts at really building a community that was trans centered and that was, was building trans leaders. And now those things are so deeply integrated into our work that they've allowed us to be focused on some more, I think what we call like issue based work, and that that is that community safety, healing justice work. That I mentioned earlier. So, it's just been amazing to witness multiple generations of the organization that has shaped me so much as a person.  Miata Tan: That's really nice. Seven, eight years that, that whole  Yuan Wang: Yeah, I joined in 2018 in June, so you can maybe do, I think that's about seven and a half years. Yeah. I'm bad at [00:07:00] math though.  Miata Tan: Me too. So you've been executive director since late 2021 then? This, these few years since then we've seen a lot of shifts and changes in our I guess global political culture and the way conversations around racial solidarity issues mm-hmm. as you've navigated being executive director, what, what has changed in your approach maybe from 2021 till this year? 2025?  Yuan Wang: Wow, that's such an interesting question. You're so right to say that. I think for anyone who's listening, I, I imagine this resonates that the last four years have been. Really a period of extraordinary violence and brutality and grief in our world. And that's definitely true for a lot of folks in Lavender Phoenix. You mentioned that we've been living through, [00:08:00] you know, continued pandemic that our government is providing so little support and recognition for. We've seen multiple uprisings, uh, in the movement for black lives to defend, you know, and, and bring dignity to the lives of people who were killed and are police. And obviously we're still facing this immense genocide in Gaza and Palestine bombings that continue. So I think if there's, if there's anything that I could say to your question about how my approach has changed. I would say that we as a whole, as an organization have had to continue to grow stronger and stronger in balancing our long-term vision. Intensifying urgent needs of right now and balancing doing the work that it takes to defend our people and try to change institutions with the incredible and at times overwhelming grief of living in this moment. Yeah, you know, in this [00:09:00] past year, um. Have been members of our community and, and our larger community who have passed away. Uh, I'm sure there are some listeners who know, Alice Wong, Patty by architects of the disability justice movement that Lavender Phoenix has learned so much from who have passed away. And we've had to balance, you know. Like one week there's threats that the National Guard and that ICE will be deployed and even higher numbers to San Francisco and, and across the Bay Area. And oh my gosh, so many of us are sitting with an incredible personal grief that we're trying to hold too. So, I think that's been one of the biggest challenges of the last few years is, is finding that balance. Yeah. I can say that some of the things that I feel proudest of are, you know, just as an example, in our healing justice work, over the past four years, our members have been architecting a, a trans, API peer counseling program. And, through that program they've been able to provide, [00:10:00] first of all, train up. So many trans API, people as skilled, as attentive, as loving peer counselors who are then able to provide that. Free, uh, accessible peer mental health support to other people who need it. So I think that's just one example. Something that gives me a lot of hope is seeing the way that our members are still finding ways to defend and love and support each other even in a time of really immense grief.  Miata Tan: That's really beautiful and it's important that you are listening to your community members at this time. How do you, this is kind of specific, but how do you all gather together? Yeah, Yuan Wang: yeah. You know, I feel really lucky 'cause I think for the last 10 years we, Lavender Phoenix as a whole, even before I was a part of it, has been building towards a model of really collective governance. Um, and, and I don't wanna make it sound like it. You know, it's perfect. It's very challenging. It's very hard. But I think like our comrades at Movement generation often say, if we're not prepared to govern, then [00:11:00] we're not prepared to win. And we try to take that, that practice really seriously here. So, you know, I think that, that getting together. That making decisions with each other, that making sure that members and staff are both included. That happens at like a really high strategic level. You know, the three pillars of our theory of change that I mentioned earlier, those were all set through a year of strategy retreats between our staff, but also a. 10 to 15 of our most experienced and most involved members who are at that decision making. The same comes for our name, uh, Lavender Phoenix. You know, it was, it was really our core committee, our, our member leaders who helped decide on that name. And then we invited some of our elders to speak about what it meant for them, for us to choose Lavender Phoenix, because it was an homage to the work so many of our elders did in the eighties and nineties. It also looks like the day-to-day, because a lot of our work happens through specific committees, whether it's our community safety committee or healing justice committee. Um, and those are all [00:12:00] committees where there's one staff person, but it's really a room of 5, 10, 15 members who are leading community safety trainings. The peer counseling program, training new members through our rise up onboarding, um, and setting new goals, new strategic targets every single year. So, it's always in progress. We're in fact right now working on some challenges and getting better at it, but we're really trying to practice what governing and self-determination together looks like right in our own organization. Miata Tan: And a lot of these people are volunteers too.  Yuan Wang: yeah, so when I joined the organization there were two staff, two mighty staff people at the time. We've grown to nine full-time staff people, but most of our organization is volunteers. Yeah. And we call those folks members, you know, committed volunteers who are participants in one of our committees or projects. Um, and I believe right now there's about 80 members in Lavender Phoenix.  Miata Tan: Wow. It's wonderful to hear so much growth has happened [00:13:00] in, um, this period that you've been with Lavender Phoenix. The idea of empowering youth, I think is core to a lot of Lavender Phoenix's work. What has that looked like specifically in the last few years, especially this year? Yuan Wang: Yeah, the  Miata Tan: challenges.  Yuan Wang: That's a great question. I think, um, you know, one of those ways is, is really specifically targeted towards young people, right? It's the summer organizer program, which I went through many years ago, and our previous executive director was also an alumnus of the summer organizer program, but that's, you know, an eight to 10 week fellowship. It's paid, it's designed specifically for young trans and queer API people who are working class, who grew up in the Bay to organize with us and, and really. Hopefully be empowered with tools that they'll use for the next decade or for the rest of their life. But I'll also say, you know, you mentioned that Lavender Phoenix has grown so much in the last few years, and that is such a [00:14:00] credit to folks who were here 10 years ago, even 15 years ago, you know, because, the intergenerational parts of our work started years before I was involved. You know, I mentioned earlier the Dragon Fruit Project where we were able to connect so, so many elders in our community with a lot of younger folks in our community who were craving relationships and conversations and like, what happened in the eighties? What happened in the nineties, what did it feel like? Why are you still organizing? Why does this matter to you? And we're actually able to have those conversations with folks in, in our community who. Have lived and fought and organized for decades already. So I think that was like one early way we started to establish that like intergenerational in our work. And a lot of those folks have stayed on as volunteers, as supporters, some as members, and as donors or advisors. So I feel really lucky that we're still benefiting in terms of building the leadership of young people, but [00:15:00] also intergenerational reality overall because of work that folks did 10 years ago. Miata Tan: That's really important. Having those, those ties that go back. Queer history is so rich, especially in the, in the Bay Area. And there's a lot to honor.  With the intersection between queer and immigrant histories here, I wonder if you have anything that comes to mind. Yuan Wang: I think that queer and immigrant histories intersect in the lives of so many of our, our members and, and the people who are inspiration too. You know, I'm not sure that. I think a lot of listeners may not know that Lavender Phoenix is as a name. It's an homage to Lavender, Godzilla, and Phoenix Rising, which were two of the first publications. They were newsletters launched back in the eighties by groups of. Uh, trans and queer API, folks who are now elders [00:16:00] and who were looking around, you know, learning from the Black Power movement, learning from solidarity movements in the Bay Area, and saying we really need to create spaces where. Trans and queer Asian Pacific Islanders can talk about our journeys of migration, our family's journeys as refugees, our experiences with war, and then also about love and joy and finding friendship and putting out advertisements so that people could get together for potlucks. So yeah, I think, um, there's so much about the intersection of immigrant and queer and trans journeys that have been. Just even at the root of how we name ourselves and how we think of ourselves as an or as an organization today.  Miata Tan: I think today, more than ever all of these communities feel a little more than a little under threat,  Yuan Wang: we could say so much about that. I think one thing that we're really paying attention to is, uh, we're seeing in different communities across the country, the ways in which the [00:17:00] right wing is. Uh, kind of wielding the idea of trans people, uh,  the perceived threat that trans people pose. As a wedge issue to try to build more more power, more influence, more connections in immigrant communities and in the process like really invisiblizing or really amplifying the harm that immigrant, trans and queer. People experience every single day. So I think something that we're thinking about on the horizon, you know, whether it's, uh, partnering with organizations in California or in the Bay Area or across the country who are doing that really critical base building work, power building work in immigrant communities is trying to ask, you know. How do we actually proactively as progressives, as people on the left, how do we proactively have conversations with immigrant communities about trans and queer issues, about the, uh, incredibly overlapping needs that trans and queer people in all people who are marginalized [00:18:00] right now have in these political conditions? Um, how can we be proactive about those combinations and making those connections so that, we can kind of inoculate folks against the way that the right wing is targeting trans people, is fear mongering about trans people and trying to make inroads in immigrant communities. Yeah. That's one thing on our radar for the future. Miata Tan: That's so important. Kind of, breaking down those, those stereotypes Yuan Wang: totally breaking down stereotypes, breaking down misinformation. And yeah, it reminds me of a few years ago Lavender Phoenix held a few conversations with a partner organization of ours where there were some younger folks from our organization who are talking to some older immigrant members of that organization and we're just connecting about, the sacred importance of, parenting trans and queer kids right now of, you know, and, and just having conversations that actually humanize all of us rather than buying into narratives and stories [00:19:00] that that dehumanize and, and that flatten us. Yeah. Um, so that we can defend ourselves from the way that the right wing is trying to hurt immigrant communities and trans and queer communities. Miata Tan: the youth that you work directly with each week. Is there anything as you reflect back on your, your time with Laxs that really stand out, things that folks have said or led conversations in?  Yuan Wang: Oh my gosh. Yeah. I mean, I, I could, I could celebrate things that I've witnessed every single year. You know, we the young people in the summer organizer program experience so, so much in, in many ways it's kind of like the faucets, like all the way on, you know, like there's, they're learning so much about skills and values and projects and, you know, just as some examples this last summer, we had a team of summer organizers who helped lead an event that was about COVID safety and disability justice, where people [00:20:00] actually got together to build DIY air filters that could hopefully, you know, make them feel safer in their own homes. And, um, in previous years we've had summer organizers work on the peer counseling program. There's so much that folks have done. I think what I actually hear year after year is oftentimes the thing that sticks out the most, it isn't necessarily just the project, it isn't necessarily like the hard skill training. It's people saying every single week during our team check-ins, someone shared an affirmation with me. I felt more seen. It's people saying, you know, I didn't expect that we were gonna do a three hour training. That was just about why it's so important to ask for help and why that can be so, so difficult for, um, for queer and trans young folks. It's folks saying, you know, even speaking for myself actually. I remember being a summer organizer and one of, uh, [00:21:00] my close friends now one of our elders, Vince spoke on a panel for us and, talked about what it was like to be young during the height of the hiv aids crisis, you know, when the government was neglecting to care for folks and so many members of our community were dying without care, were, were passing away without support. And all of the lessons that Vince took from that time holds now, decades later that still make him feel more hopeful, more committed, more full as a person. Um, that meant so much to me to hear when I was 21 and, still feeling really scared and really lonely, about the future. So I think it's those, I, I wouldn't even call them like softer skills, but the incredible st. Sturdiness and resilience that building long-term relationships creates that seeing people who show you a potential path, if it's been hard to imagine the future. And that building the [00:22:00] skills that make relationships more resilient. I feel like it's those things that always stand out the most to a lot of our young people. And then to me, I see them grow in it and be challenged by those things every single year. I feel really good. 'cause I know that at the end of the summer organizer program, there's a group of young, queer and trans API rising leaders who are gonna bring that level of rigorous kindness, attentive attentiveness to emotions, um, of vulnerability that creates more honesty and interdependence. They're gonna be taking that to an another organization, to another environment, to another year in our movement. That makes me feel really happy and hopeful.  Miata Tan: Yes. Community.  Yuan Wang: Yeah.  Miata Tan: . Looking towards that bright future that you, you shared just now Tina Shelf is coming on as the executive director. What are your hopes for 2026 Yuan Wang: [00:23:00] yeah. You know, I'm, I'm so excited that we're welcoming Tina and we're really lucky because Tina joined us in August of this year. So we've had a good, like five months to overlap with each other and to really, um, for all of us, not just me, but our staff, our members, to really welcome and support Tina in onboarding to the role. I feel incredibly excited for Lavender Phoenix's future. I think that in this next year, on one hand, our Care Knock Cops campaign, which has been a huge focus of the organization where uh, we've been rallying other organizations and people across San Francisco to fight to direct funding from policing to. To protect funding that's being threatened every year for housing, for healthcare, for human services that people really need. I think we're gonna see that campaign grow and there are so many members and staff who are rigorously working on that every single day. And on the other hand, I think that this is a time for Lavender Phoenix to really sturdy [00:24:00] itself. We are in we're approaching, the next stage of an authoritarian era that we've been getting ready for many years and is in other ways as so many folks are saying new and unprecedented. So I think, um, a lot of our work in this next year is actually making sure that our members' relationships to each other are stronger, making sure that, responsibility, is shared in, in, in greater ways that encourage more and more leadership and growth throughout our membership so that we are more resilient and less res reliant on smaller and smaller groups of people. I think you're gonna see our program and campaign work continue to be impactful. And I'm really hopeful that when we talk again, maybe in two years, three years, five years, we're gonna be looking at an organization that's even more resilient and even more connected internally.  Miata Tan: It's really important that y'all are thinking so long term, I guess, and have been preparing for this moment in many ways. On a personal [00:25:00] note, as you are coming to an end as executive director, what's what's next for you? I'd love to know.  Yuan Wang: Yeah, that's such a sweet question. I'm going to, I'm gonna rest for a little bit. Yeah. I haven't taken a sustained break from organizing since I was 18 or so. So it's been a while and I'm really looking forward to some rest and reflection. I think from there. I'm gonna figure out, what makes sense for me in terms of being involved with movement and I'm, I'm certain that one of those things will be staying involved. Lavender Phoenix as a member. Really excited to keep supporting our campaign work. Really excited to keep supporting the organization as a whole just from a role that I've never had as a volunteer member. So, I'm just psyched for that and I can't wait to be a part of Lavender Phoenix's future in this different way.  Miata Tan: Have fun. You'll be like on the other side almost. Yeah,  Yuan Wang: totally. Totally. And, and getting to see and support our incredible staff team just in a different way.  Miata Tan: One final [00:26:00] question As you are sort of moving into this next stage, and this idea of community and base building being so incredibly important to your work and time with Lavender Phoenix, is there anything you'd like to say, I guess for someone who might be considering. Joining in some way or Yeah. Where they could get involved, but they're not, not quite sure. Yuan Wang: Yeah, absolutely. Um, I think that if you are a queer and trans, API person who is looking for community, um, looking to channel what you care about into action, looking to be with other people who care about you Lavender Phoenix is here. And I think that there is no more critical time. Than the one we're in to get activated and to try to organize. ‘Cause our world really needs us right now. The world needs all of us and it also really needs the [00:27:00] wisdom, the experience, and the love of queer and trans people. So, I will be rejoining our membership at some point and I'd really like to meet you and I hope that we get to, to grow in this work and to, um, to fight for our freedom together. Miata Tan: Thank you so much. We, this was a really lovely conversation.  Yuan Wang: Yeah, thank you so much And also welcome Tina. Good luck.   Miata Tan: that was my conversation with Yuan Wang, the outgoing executive director at Lavender Phoenix. You may have heard Yuan mention the Dragon Fruit Project. This is an intergenerational oral storytelling podcast series and online project that explores the stories of queer and trans Asian and Pacific Islanders around love, activism and community. For links to the Dragon Fruit Project and everything else from tonight's show, please head to our show notes at [00:28:00] kpfa.org/program/apex-express. Now here's a little taste of the Dragon Fruit Project.   Amy Sueyoshi: Hi, my name's Amy Swei. I'm the Dean of the College of Ethnic Studies at San Francisco State University. I am a historian by training, um, and my specialties are in Asian American history and history of sexuality. I use she or they pronouns. I usually do turn of the century history, which is 1890s to 1920, and I decided to start, you know, doing some oral histories in the early two thousands. Um, at the time, history wasn't super sexy. Very few nonprofits were engaging in historical projects. Very few artists were also using history as a site of inspiration. So I was really skeptical about whether people would wanna join me, but, you know, people were excited to do it, which I was surprised about. API queer [00:29:00] history is also clearly on the margins in both the history field as well as in Asian American studies. And so, you know, I could scream it from the rooftop, tell lots of people, and most people wouldn't care. They'd be like, yeah. And so there's a way in which I think that what's more important to me is that for the few people that it did matter. It, it really mattered. But generally speaking, I feel like the world doesn't care, which is even more reason why we should care, right? If, if we don't take care of ourselves, then. Other people aren't gonna do it for us. Being a historian, I know that a lot of queer history generally gets lost because queer genders, queer sexualities are stigmatized. And if you're Asian, you probably don't wanna talk about it even more a, because you've probably been socialized to not talk about sexuality. Because of your ethnicity. And then B, if you were assigned female at birth and you know, socialized as a woman, you probably [00:30:00] wouldn't think your life was valuable enough to save anything about it. Right. In terms of historical knowledge. You don't have to be the George Washington of gay people. You can just be a regular person. And so I wanted, um, the older Asian lesbians who are still around to save their stuff, to be able to know how to save it, not throw it in the garbage, so that when they passed or when they were ready to give up their materials, we could deposit. At the Historical society and some younger dyke or young, younger queer pup could come along and do research on them.  ,   Miata Tan: That was a short snippet from the Dragon Fruit Project. You can learn more about this intergenerational storytelling series and lavender Phoenix who produces it at our website. That's kpfa.org/program/apex-express. Now after a short break, we are sitting down with the new executive director of [00:31:00] Lavender Phoenix. Stay with us. ? ​ Miata Tan: [00:32:00] [00:33:00] That was, remember me by Tao. You are tuned into Apex Express on 94.1 KPFA, a weekly radio show uplifting the voices and stories of Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders. I'm your host, Miata Tan, and tonight we are joining the Lavender Phoenix team at a transitional [00:34:00] point in the organization's history. Our next guest is Tina Sho Baha, the incoming director of this local organization supporting queer and trans Asian American and Pacific Islander Youth. As a reminder, throughout this conversation, you'll hear us referring to the org as both Lavender, Phoenix, and Laxs Nicks.   Miata Tan: Tina. Tina Shauf-Bajar: Hi Miata.  Miata Tan: How you going today? Tina Shauf-Bajar: I'm doing well, thank you. How are you? Miata Tan: Yeah, not so bad. Just excited to speak with you. tell me more about yourself what's bringing you into Lavender Phoenix. Tina Shauf-Bajar: Sure, sure. Well I am the incoming executive director of Lavender Phoenix. Prior to this, I was working at the California Domestic Workers Coalition and had also worked at the Filipino Community Center and, um, have done some grassroots organizing, building, working class [00:35:00] power, um, over the last 20 years, of my time in the Bay Area. And I've been alongside Lavender Phoenix as an organization that I've admired for a long time. Um, and now at the beginning of this year, I was I had the opportunity to apply for this executive director position and talked with un, um, had a series of conversations with UN about, um, what this role looks like and I got really excited about being a part of this organization. Miata Tan: That's super cool. So you, you, you weren't quite in the space with Lavender Phoenix, but moving alongside them through your work, like what were what were the organizations that you were part of when you were, were working in tandem, I guess. Tina Shauf-Bajar: Well the organization that I feel like is most, most closely, relates with Lavender. Phoenix is, um, Gabriela, which is a Filipino organization. It's a Filipino organization that's a part of a national democratic movement of the Philippines. [00:36:00] And we advance national democracy in the Philippines. And, liberation for our people and our homeland. Sovereignty for our homeland. And Gabriela here in the US does organizing with other multi-sectoral organizations, including like migrant organizations, like Ante and youth organizations like Naan and we organize in diaspora. And the reason for that is because many of our families actually leave the Philippines due to, um, corrupt government governance, um, also like foreign domination and exploitation and plunder of our resources. And so many of us actually have to leave our countries to, to survive. And so we're still very connected. Gabriela is still very connected to, um, the movement in the Philippines. And yeah, so we're advancing liberation for our people and have been alongside Lavender Phoenix for many [00:37:00] years. And here we are. Miata Tan: That's beautiful. I love hearing about, all of these partnerships and, and colLavoration works that happen in the San Francisco Bay Area and, and beyond as well. it sounds like you're speaking from a personal place when you talk about, um, a lot of these immigrant communities. Could you speak more to your family background and what brings you into this? Tina Shauf-Bajar: The, the fight for immigrant justice? So I was born in the Philippines and um, I spent my childhood and adolescent since the, in the South Bay of LA and then came here to the Bay Area in the year 2000. Flashing back to when my parents immigrated here, my dad's family first came to the US um, by way of the Bay Area in the late sixties and early seventies. My dad actually was a few years after he had arrived, was uh, drafted into the military so that they can send him [00:38:00] to Vietnam, but instead of going to Vietnam, he took the test to go into the Air Force and traveled everywhere in the Air Force and ended up in the Philippines and met my, met my mom there. And so. That became like they got married and they had me, I was born in the Philippines. I have a younger sibling. And, um, and I think, um, growing up in, in a working class immigrant neighborhood black and brown neighborhood, um, it was always important to me to like find solidarity between. Between communities. I actually grew up in a neighborhood that didn't have a lot of Filipinos in it, but I, I felt that solidarity knowing that we were an immigrant family, immigrant, working class family. And when I was in college, when I went to college up in, in Berkeley, um, that was the time when the war on Iraq was waged by the US. I got [00:39:00] really I got really curious and interested in understanding why war happens and during that time I, I feel like I, I studied a lot in like ethnic studies classes, Asian American studies classes and also, got involved in like off campus organizing and um, during that time it was with the Filipinos for Global Justice Not War Coalition. I would mobilize in the streets, in the anti-war movement during that time. Um, and from there I met a lot of the folks in the national democratic movement of the Philippines and eventually joined an organization which is now known as Gabriela. And so. That was my first political home that allowed me to understand my family's experience as immigrants and why it's important to, to advance our rights and defend our, defend our people. And [00:40:00] also with what's happening now with the escalated violence on our communities it. It's our duty to help people understand that immigrants are not criminals and our people work really hard to, to provide for our families and that it's our human right to be able to work and live in dignity, uh, just like anyone else. Miata Tan: You are speaking to something really powerful there. The different communities that you've been involved with, within the Filipino diaspora, but who are some other immigrant folks that you feel like have really helped shape your political awakening and, and coming into this space, and also how that leads into your work with Lav Nix today?  Tina Shauf-Bajar: When I was working at the Filipino community center that gave me a, gave me a chance to learn to work with other organizations that were also advancing, like workers' rights and immigrant [00:41:00] rights. Many centers in San Francisco that, um, work with immigrant workers who. Wouldn't typically like fall into the category of union unionized workers. They were like workers who are work in the domestic work industry who are caregivers, house cleaners and also we worked with organizations that also have organized restaurant workers, hotel workers. In like non-union, in a non-union setting. And so to me I in integrating in community like that, it helped me really understand that there were many workers who were experiencing exploitation at really high levels. And that reregulate like regulation of, um, Lavor laws and things like that, it's like really. Unregulated industries that really set up immigrant workers in, in really poor working conditions. [00:42:00] Sometimes abusive conditions and also experiencing wage theft. And for me, that really moved me and in my work with Gabriela and the community and the Filipino Community Center, we were able to work with, um. Teachers who actually were trafficked from the Philippines. These teachers actually, they did everything right to try to get to the, the US to get teaching jobs. And then they ended up really paying exorbitant amount of, of money to like just get processed and make it to the us. To only find themselves in no teaching jobs and then also working domestic work jobs just to like survive. And so during that time, it really like raised my consciousness to understand that there was something bigger that wa that was happening. The, the export of our people and exploitation of our people was happening, not just at a small scale, but I learned over [00:43:00] time that. Thousands of Filipinos actually leave the Philippines every day just to find work and send money back to their families. And to me that just was like throughout my time being an activist and organizer it was important to me to like continue to, to like advance poor, working class power. And that I see that as a through line between many communities. And I know that like with my work in Lav Nix that the folks who experience it the most and who are most impacted by right-wing attacks and authoritarianism are people who are at the fringes. And born working class trans and queer people. Within our sector. So yeah. Being rooted in this, in this principle of advancing foreign working class power is really core [00:44:00] to my to my values in any work that I do. Miata Tan: What are some other key issue Areas you see that are facing this community and especially queer folks within Asian American communities today? Tina Shauf-Bajar: The administration that we're under right now works really hard to drive wedges between. All of us and, um, sewing division is one of the t tactics to continue to hoard power. And with Lavender Phoenix being a trans and queer API organization that's building power, it's important for us to understand that solidarity is a thing that that's gonna strengthen us. That that trans and queer folks are used as wedges in, in conservative thinking. I'm not saying that like it's just conservatives, but there's conservative thinking in many of our cultures to think that trans and queer folks are not, [00:45:00] are not human, and that we deserve less and we don't deserve to be recognized as. As fully human and deserve to live dignified lives in our full selves. I also know that locally in San Francisco, the API community is used as a wedge to be pitted against other communities. Let's say the black commun the black community. And, um, it's important for us as an organization to recognize that that we, we can position ourselves to like wield more solidarity and be in solidarity with, with communities that are experiencing the impacts of a system that continues to exploit our people and continues to view our people as not fully deserving. Not fully human and that our people [00:46:00] deserve to be detained, abducted, and deported. That our people deserve to not be taken care of and resourced and not have our basic needs like housing and food and healthcare and it impacts all of us. And so, I see our responsibility as Lavender Phoenix, and, and in the other organizing spaces that I'm a part of that it, it is our responsibility to expose that we are not each other's enemies. Hmm. And that we are stronger in fighting for our needs and our dignity together. Miata Tan: Community. Community and strength. I'm thinking about what you said in terms of this, the API solidarity alongside [00:47:00] queer folks, alongside black and brown folks. Do you have a, perhaps like a nice memory of that, that coming together? Tina Shauf-Bajar: So one of the most consistent, things that I would go to, that's, that Lavender Phoenix would, would lead year after year in the last 10 years is Trans March. And my partner and I always make sure that we mobilize out there and be with Laxs. And it's important to us to be out there. in more recent trans marches. Just with a lot of the escalation of violence in Gaza and ongoing genocide and also just the escalated attacks on on immigrants and increased right and increased ice raids. And and also the, we can't forget the police, the Police killings of black people. And I feel like at [00:48:00] Trans March with Lavender Phoenix, it's also a way for us to come together and you know, put those messages out there and show that we are standing with all these different communities that are fighting, repression, And it's always so joyful at Trans March too. We're like chanting and we're holding up our signs. We're also out there with or you know, people, individuals, and organizations that might not be politically aligned with us, but that's also a chance for us to be in community and, and show demonstrate this solidarity between communities. Miata Tan: It's so beautiful to see. It's, it's just like what a colorful event in so many ways. Uh, as you now step into the director role at Lav Nix, Lavender Phoenix, what are you most excited about? What is 2026 gonna look like for you? Tina Shauf-Bajar: I am most [00:49:00] excited about integrating into this organization fully as the executive director and I feel so grateful that this organization is trusting me to lead alongside them. I've had the chance to have conversations with lots of conversations since, since my time onboarding in August through our meetings and also like strategy sessions where I've been able to connect with staff and members and understand what they care about, how they're thinking about. Our our strategy, how we can make our strategy sharper and more coordinated, um, so that we can show up in, in a more unified way, um, not just as an organization, but, but as a part of a larger movement ecosystem that we're a part of and that we're in solidarity with other organizations in. So I am looking forward to like really embodying that.  it takes a lot [00:50:00] of trust for an organization to be like, look, you, you weren't one of our members. You weren't a part of our staff prior to this, but we are trusting you because we've been in community and relationship with you and we have seen you. And so I just feel really grateful for that. Miata Tan: For an organization like Lav Nix, which with such a rich history in, in the Bay Area is there anything from. That history that you are now taking into 2026 with you? Tina Shauf-Bajar: Yeah, I mean, I think in seeing how Lavender Phoenix has transformed over the last 10 years is really not being afraid to transform. Not being afraid to step even more fully into our power. The organization is really well positioned to yeah, well positioned to build power in, in a [00:51:00] larger community. And so I, I feel like I've seen that transformation and I get to also, I get to also continue that legacy after UN and also the previous leaders before that and previous members and staff, um, we stand on the, on their shoulders. I stand on their shoulders. it's so beautiful, like such a nice image. Everyone together, yeah, no, totally. I mean, just in the last few weeks, I, I've connected with the three executive directors before me. And so when I say. I stand on their shoulders and like I'm a part of this lineage I still have access to. And then I've also been able to connect with, you know with a movement elder just last week where I was like, wow, you know, I get to be a part of this because I'm now the executive director of this organization. Like, I also get to inherit. Those connections and [00:52:00] I get to inherit the work that has been done up to this point. And I feel really grateful and fortunate to be inheriting that and now being asked to take care of it so. and I know I'm not alone. I think that's what people keep saying. It's like, you're not, you know, you're not alone. Right. I'm like, yeah. I keep telling myself that. It's true. It's true, it's true. Miata Tan: Latinx has a strong core team and a whole range of volunteers that also aid in, in, in your work, and I'm sure everyone will, everyone will be there to make sure that you don't like the, the, the shoulders are stable that you're standing on. Tina Shauf-Bajar: Totally, totally. I mean, even the conversations that I've been a part of, I'm like, I'm the newest one here. Like, I wanna hear from you, like, what, how are you thinking about this? There is so much desire to see change and be a part of it. And also so [00:53:00] much brilliance like and experience to being a part of this organization. So yeah, absolutely. I'm not alone. Miata Tan: One final question as with youth really being at the center of, of Lav Nix's work. Is there something about that that you're excited just, just to get into next year and, and thinking about those, those young people today that are you know, maybe not quite sure what's going on, the world looks a little scary. Like what, what can, what are you excited about in terms of helping those, those folks? Tina Shauf-Bajar: Well, for a long time I, I worked with youth years ago before I before I found myself in like workers justice and workers' rights building working class power. I also worked with working class youth at one point, and I, I was one of those youth like 20 years ago. And so, I know what my [00:54:00] energy was like during that time. I also know how I also remember how idealistic I was and I remember how bright-eyed it was. And like really just there wasn't openness to learn and understand how I could also be an agent of change and that I didn't have to do that alone. That I could be a part of something bigger than myself. And so so yeah, I think that like wielding the power of the youth in our communities and the different sectors is I think in a lot of ways they're the ones leaving us, they know, they know what issues speak to, to them. This is also the world they're inheriting. they have the energy to be able to like and lived experience to be able to like, see through change in their lifetime. And you know, I'm, I'm older than them. I'm older than a lot of them, but, I also can remember, like I, I can look back to that time and I know, I know that I had the energy to be able [00:55:00] to like, you know, organize and build movement and, and really see myself as, as a, as someone who could be a part of that. My first week here in, in August I actually was able to, to meet the, the, um, summer organizer, the summer organizers from our program. And I was, it just warms my heart because I remember being that young and I remember, remember being that like determined to like figure out like, what is my place in, in organizing spaces. So they were the ones who really like, radically welcomed me at first. You know, like I came into the office and like we were co-working and they were the ones who radically welcomed me and like showed me how they show up in, in, um, Lav Nix Spaces. I learned from them how to fundraise, like how Lavender Phoenix does it, how we fundraise. And [00:56:00] um, one of them fundraised me and I was like, I was like, how can I say no? Like they yeah. That we need that type of energy to keep it fresh. Miata Tan: something about that that, um. It is exciting to think about when thinking about the future. Thank you so much for joining us, Tina. This was such a beautiful conversation. I'm so excited for all of your work. Tina Shauf-Bajar: Thank you so much.  Miata Tan: That was Tina Sho Baha, the new executive director at Lavender Phoenix. You can learn more about the organization and their fantastic work at lavenderphoenix.org. Tonight's show was a rerun and originally aired on December 25th, 2025. Tina is now several months into her new role, and we are super excited for what comes next. If these conversations tonight moved you, please check out our show notes [00:57:00] at kpfa.org/program/apex-express. We've added some links to previous Apex Express episodes featuring the Lavender Phoenix crew, as well as their Dragon Fruit Project, which is an intergenerational podcast series that you don't wanna miss. Make sure to check it out. A huge thank you to all of our listeners out there. And in the words of Keiko Fukuda, a Japanese American judoka and Bay Area legend, “Be Strong, Be Gentle, Be Beautiful.”  A little reminder for these trying times. APEX Express is produced by Ayame Keane-Lee, Anuj Vaidya, Cheryl Truong, Isabel Li, Jalena Keane-Lee, Miko Lee, Miata Tan, Preeti Mangala Shekar and Swati Rayasam. Tonight's show was produced by me, Miata Tan. Get some rest y'all.   The post APEX Express – 3.26.26 – A Conversation with Lavender Phoenix: The Next Chapter appeared first on KPFA.

Sara. Misasha. Megumi. All three of us are the daughter of one Japanese parent and one White parent each. All three of us had dual citizenship with the United States and Japan at one point. But the trajectories of our citizenship are distinctly different, and only one of us holds a Japanese passport now. Are we all still Japanese?   Today, we speak with Megumi Nishikura, a documentary filmmaker who focuses on stories not often told in our history books, despite their themes impacting so many of us, Japanese or not. We explore belonging, identity, citizenship, and what history teaches us about where we are now - and the stories we want to carry forward with us. If you've ever wondered if you've belonged, or if you've ever been told you're not ____ enough, we hope you listen, and join our conversation.   What to listen for: The small things people - sometimes unintentionally - say that make others feel like they don't belong. What it's like to live in the grey zone between the law and reality when it comes to citizenship and membership in communities. One word: anxiety.  How observed demographic changes don't necessarily mean that lived experiences change too much…yet.  About Our Guest:  Megumi Nishikura is a documentary filmmaker whose work explores identity, belonging, and the cultural intersections between Japan and the world. Her feature documentary film "Hafu - the mixed race experience" screened theatrically throughout Japan and aired on PBS and NipponTV. She produced "Fall Seven Times, Get Up Eight: The Japanese War Brides," which aired globally on BBC World News. In 2019, Megumi directed and produced "Minidoka," a short film about the Japanese American internment experience during WWII, which was published by TIME magazine. She is currently making a film about Japan's Nationality Law and the dual citizenship issue in Japan.  When she's not making her own films, Megumi works as a producer on docuseries for major streaming platforms. A few photos from HAFU and her latest film:  https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1JK8VEHfq9dhog5ZSindMVccurZQXcYDj   Trailer links: Hafu - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6j_wQQZY-OE&t=1s War Brides: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dc0cpMPmMeU Minidoka - https://vimeo.com/384081882?fl=pl&fe=sh  

During World War II, the United States government rounded up over 120,000 Japanese Americans, most of whom were U.S. citizens, and sent them to remote incarceration camps across the western United States for suspected disloyalty. One of those camps was Manzanar, located in the harsh desert of eastern California. When a popular community leader was arrested without explanation, thousands of incarcerated residents gathered in protest, sparking what we now know as the Manzanar Uprising, which left two people dead and changed the course of history. For a full list of our sources, visit npadpodcast.com/episodes For the latest NPAD updates, group travel details, merch and more, follow us on npadpodcast.com and our socials: Instagram: @‌nationalparkafterdarkTikTok: @‌nationalparkafterdark Support the show by becoming an Outsider and receive ad free listening, bonus content and more on Patreon or Apple Podcasts. Want to see our faces? Catch full episodes on our YouTube Page! Thank you to this week's partners! Nutrafol: Get $10 off your first month's subscription and free shipping when you visit Nutrafol dot com and enter promo code NPAD. Coyuchi: Get FIFTEEN PERCENT OFF your first order when you visit Coyuchi dot com slash NPAD. That's Coyuchi dot comslash NPAD to get FIFTEEN PERCENT OFF. C-O-Y-U-C-H-I dot com slash NPAD. IQBAR: Text PARK to 64000 to get 20% off all IQBAR products, plus FREE shipping. Message anddata rates may apply. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

A mural on the campus of Bellevue College depicts two Japanese American children in a U.S. Government incarceration camp during World War II. Soon after, the VP, and In 2020, a Bellevue College VP instructed someone to erase information in the accompanying artist description, that mentioned anti-Japanese agitation by influential Eastside businessman Miller Freeman. The VP and Bellevue College’s President both resigned. Now, Bellevue College is permanently rededicating the mural which was created by Seattle artist Erin Shigaki. She joins us to talk about it. We can only make Seattle Now because listeners support us. Tap here to make a gift and keep Seattle Now in your feed. Got questions about local news or story ideas to share? We want to hear from you! Email us at seattlenow@kuow.org, leave us a voicemail at (206) 616-6746 or leave us feedback online.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Send a text"Irene made all of us believe that museums could be more than things that looked towards yesterday. They could be places that are central to today and tomorrow."To celebrate Women's History Month, we are dedicating this episode to a true titan of the Japanese American community: the late Irene Hirano Inouye. As the longtime CEO of the Japanese American National Museum (JANM) and founder of the U.S.-Japan Council, Irene's vision turned a "mess" of an old temple building into an international landmark and a permanent home for our stories.In this deep dive, we explore Irene's journey from a service-driven childhood in Gardena to leading national foundations like Ford and Kresge. We also get personal, discussing the "mundane" objects that connect us to our history.Subscribe & Leave a Comment: If you were curated in a museum today, what mundane object would represent your heritage? Let us know in the comments!Links & Resources:·        Learn more about JANM:Japanese American National Museum·        The US-Japan Council:Explore Irene's Global LegacyCREDITSThe music was created by Jalen BlankWritten by Koji Steven SakaiHosts: Michelle Malazaki and Koji Steven SakaiEdited by Koji Steven SakaiProduced by Koji Steven Sakai in conjunction with the Japanese American National Museum

Send a textJun Fujita was a pioneering Japanese-born photographer who made his way to Chicago to become widely regarded as the first Japanese American photojournalist. Hear more about Fujita's life in Chicago from Graham Harrison Lee, Fujita's great-nephew and author of the book Jun Fujita: Behind the Camera.Preorder a copy of the second printing of the book from the publisher (and save $10):https://hatandbeard.com/products/jun-fujita-behind-the-camera-by-graham-harrison-lee-002Follow author Graham Lee on Instagram.Want to help support the show? Buy me a coffee! Buy more than one and get a personalized video thank you.https://www.buymeacoffee.com/chicagohistoryLeave me a voice message - just click on the microphone in the lower right corner here: https://www.chicagohistorypod.comUp your cocktail or Sodastream game with Portland craft syrups!https://portlandsyrups.com/collections/all?sca_ref=1270971.MO4APpJH1kAnything purchased through the links below may generate a small commission for this podcast at no cost to you and help offset production costs.Jun Fujita: Tanka and Other Verse by Jun Fujitahttps://amzn.to/4ujXgA4 (Paperback)https://amzn.to/4cyqaWK (Kindle Edition)You can read this book FREE with Kindle Unlimited. Not an Unlimited subscriber? Get a free 30-day trial here:  https://amzn.to/2WsP1GHWant better sleep? Try the most delicious alternative to melatonin and sleeping pills that helps you fall asleep, stay asleep, and wake up feeling refreshed. MoonBrew. Use the code below for 15% off.https://moonbrew.co/TOMMYHENRYNeed music for YOUR projects? Audiio has got you covered. Try a free trial here:https://audiio.com/pricing?oid=1&affid=481Send me an email - Chicago History Podcast (chicagohistorypod AT gmail.com)Chicago History Podcast Art by John K. Schneider (angeleyesartjks AT gmail.com)Support the show

The traveling exhibition “Resilience - A Sansei Sense of Legacy” brings an artistic lens to the forced incarceration of an estimated 120,000 Japanese Americans — about two-thirds of whom were U.S. citizens — following President Roosevelt's Executive Order 9066. Featuring the work of third-generation Japanese American artists, the exhibition explores the effects of that wartime injustice and connects it to the present day. The St. Louis showing of “Resilience” includes pieces by longtime Alton, Illinois resident and SIUE graduate Arthur Towata. To explore local connections to the legacy of WWII Japanese American internment, we speak with Wendy Roll, president of the Japanese American Citizens League - St. Louis; Amy Ozawa, Arthur Towata's niece and executor of his estate; and Kristine Aono, WashU graduate and one of the artists whose work is part of the “Resilience” exhibition's core collection.

Today’s episode is a classic from the archives, a conversation from 2019 with Brandon Shimoda about his book The Grave on the Wall. While the book centers on an exploration of Shimoda's grandfather's internment at Fort Missoula during World War II, it is really an interrogation of America that extends both directions in time from that moment. Forts such as these, that imprisoned Japanese and Japanese-Americans during the war, were also previously used to fight the Indian wars that established white dominance over Native lands, and are now today being used as detention centers/concentration camps for the refugees and immigrants from our southern border. The Grave on the Wall is also an engagement with photography and (mis)representation, memory and memorialization and asks the question of what it means to memorialize something that is ongoing, that has never ended. For the bonus audio archive Brandon Shimoda contributes a reading from Etel Adnan’s long poem “Fog,” a poem she dedicated to him. This joins contributions from everyone from Isabella Hammad to Dionne Brand, Natalie Diaz to Kaveh Akbar and more. To learn how to subscribe to the bonus audio and about all the other potential rewards and benefits of joining the Between the Covers community as a listener-supporter head over to the show’s Patreon page.

My guest today describes herself as a 'city girl at heart' who traded her corporate business suits for Steve Madden platforms and a life of authentic passion. Lori 'Sas' Sase is a graduate of Coach U and the voice behind The Imaginal Podcast. From her Japanese-American heritage to her love of live music and her deep reverence for the loyalty of dogs, Sas brings a refreshing, honest, and messy humanity to the world of self-improvement. We're going to talk about reclamation, healing, and living expansively. www.asanctuaryforthesoul.com  

Rachel Maddow hosts a special conversation with guests from her "Burn Order" podcast, live from the Orpheum Theater in Los Angeles to discuss the fight against the race-based incarceration of Japanese-Americans during World War II and how lessons from that episode in American history apply today. Want more of Rachel? Check out the "Rachel Maddow Presents" feed to listen to all of her chart-topping original podcasts.To listen to all of your favorite MS podcasts without ads, sign up for MS NOW Premium on Apple Podcasts. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.