Asian American / Asian Research Institute
The City University of New York
Adams was speaking at a press conference announcing a series of initiatives to help small businesses in Chinatown and other parts of the city. He said he would send a formal letter to Biden on Tuesday and that “we will never allow the Oval Office to be used to attack people in our country.”
Adams’ pick to run the Department of Small Business Services is Kevin Kim, the first Korean-American to hold the post. Kim is an attorney specializing in New York State liquor license matters. He previously served as a State Liquor Authority commissioner.
State agencies in New York will now be required to break down data for individual ethnic groups under the Asian American Pacific Islander umbrella.
The “Unity Map” was drawn by three civil rights legal groups—the Asian American Legal Defense Fund, the Center for Law and Social Justice, and Latino Justice—and features districts drawn to preserve a community’s political power, the organizers said, particularly important given the growth of the Asian population in the city according to last year’s census.
“God bless America, right? I was a refugee, now I’m mayor of a major city in Massachusetts,” said Lowell Mayor Sokhary Chau.
Reflections on growing up brown, queer, and Asian American.