? Good morning, and welcome to The Yappie’s AAPI politics briefing — your guide to the policy news and activism affecting Asian Americans + Pacific Islanders. Send tips and feedback to [email protected] and support our work by making a donation.
— Edited by Shawna Chen and Mary Yang
City Spotlight
? Our round-up of headlines from metro areas across the U.S.
LOS ANGELES — Asian American leaders in Los Angeles are warning political candidates against using their communities to score points, LAist’s Josie Huang reports.
- In their words: “Too often, it has been the AAPI community that's been that racial buffer, or that racial scapegoat to inflame and agitate the masses and to get more votes,” John Kim, who leads racial justice advocacy group Catalyst California, told LAist.
SAN FRANCISCO — A hospital in San Francisco's Chinatown received $5 million to address bed shortages, according to The San Francisco Standard's Han Li. It's the first time the Chinese Hospital, which primarily serves elderly, low-income, and immigrant patients, has received state funding.
NEW YORK CITY — Starting next year, Diwali will be a public school holiday in New York City, CNN’s Zoe Sottile writes. Diwali, a celebration known as the Festival of Lights, is observed by Hindus, Sikhs, Jains, and Buddhists and starts on Oct. 24 this year. The move was made possible through legislation by state Assemblymember Jenifer Rajkumar (D). NYC Mayor Eric Adams called the decision “long overdue.”
ATLANTA — A new PBS documentary follows the aftermath of the Atlanta spa shootings, which sparked protests against Asian hate across the U.S., Shawna Chen reports for Axios. The film, “Rising Against Asian Hate,” tells the story of how the Asian American community in Atlanta weathered the tragedy and also highlights two epicenters of anti-Asian hate crimes, New York City and San Francisco.
AAPI Nation
? NUMBER OF THE WEEK — 89.4: That’s the percentage of Native Hawaiian and Pacific Islander college students who have student debt, according to the nonprofit Student Borrower Protection Center. Last week, the Biden administration formally launched its federal student loan forgiveness application, though an appeals court temporarily halted the broader debt relief plan on Friday.
? Here's what else is happening across America…
A Sikh family from central California was found dead in a rural area of Merced County after they were kidnapped at gunpoint, the Associated Press’ Olga R. Rodriguez and Stefanie Dazio report. Friends and relatives say the American Dream and promise of security in the U.S. were driving forces behind the family’s emigration from India in 2004, writes NBC News’ Sakshi Venkatraman.
- Worth noting: Sikh Americans report some of the highest numbers of hate crimes per capita among minority groups in the U.S.
Experts are criticizing the lack of on-screen Polynesian representation in the new Amazon Prime series “Rings of Power,” even though the show was filmed in New Zealand—Aotearoa for the Māori community,NBC News’Kimmy Yam reports. Representation is absent, “obscured by make-up” and minimal speaking roles, said Tiara Na’puti, an assistant professor at the University of California, Irvine.
Asian Americans are Texas’ fastest-growing demographic, but 80% of AAPI Texans feel their interests are inadequately represented by the government, Texas Tribune’s Alex Nguyen reports. Asian American Texans say the issues they care about are too often overlooked by Texas lawmakers and political candidates.
Native Hawaiian students and professors at Yale worked to send iwi kūpuna—the human remains of their ancestors—back to Hawai‘i after finding them in the school’s Peabody museum, KITV’s 'A'ali'i Dukelow writes.
Making headlines: Actress Anna May Wong, known as the first Chinese American film star in Hollywood, has become the first Asian American featured on U.S. currency.
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