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Press Releases

NCAPA Congratulates Vanita Gupta on Being Selected to Head the Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights

3/28/2017

 
The National Council of Asian Pacific Americans (NCAPA) congratulates civil rights leader Vanita Gupta on her selection as the next president and CEO of the Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights (LCCHR). Gupta most recently served as head of the Civil Rights Division at the U.S. Department of Justice in the Obama administration and will be the first woman, first Asian American, and first child of immigrants to lead the coalition of more than 200 diverse civil rights and social justice organizations. She will begin her role on June 1.

NCAPA and 10 of our members are also members of LCCHR. NCAPA leaders issued the following congratulatory messages:

Suman Raghunathan, executive director of South Asian Americans Leading Together (SAALT), a co-chair of the NCAPA civil rights committee: "Our work as civil rights advocates has never been more important, and now more than ever, we must come together to unite even stronger to combat hate. For the South Asian American community, this work is deeply personal as hate violence and xenophobic rhetoric have become increasingly too common. That's why the announcement of Vanita Gupta to head the Leadership Conference, a large and diverse coalition, comes at such a critical time. We commend Vanita Gupta for improving efforts to report hate crimes and data collection, and we are committed to collaborating with her and the Leadership Conference to build on this work."

John C. Yang,  president and executive director of the Asian Americans Advancing Justice | AAJC, a co-chair of the NCAPA civil rights committee: “Vanita Gupta is an outstanding trailblazer in the civil rights community. In such a turbulent time for immigration and civil and human rights, the selection of Vanita Gupta is a momentous occasion and a recognition of the important role of the Asian American community in civil rights. We are thrilled to see a child of immigrants in this important leadership position in human and civil rights advocacy.”

Quyen Dinh, NCAPA chair and executive director of the Southeast Asia Resource Action Center (SEARAC): “Vanita Gupta is an exemplary choice to lead the Leadership Conference, not just because of her impressive professional background, but also because she knows firsthand the challenges that immigrants and people of color face each day. At this critical moment in history, it is vital that the experiences of the underserved are heard, and I have full confidence that she will work tirelessly to advocate for issues affecting the daily lives of our communities.”

Gregory Cendana, NCAPA executive committee member and executive director of the Asian Pacific American Labor Alliance, AFL-CIO (APALA): “I am thrilled for the Leadership Conference for having selected Vanita Gupta to head the organization. Her experience overseeing federal investigations of the Ferguson, Baltimore, and Chicago police departments to advance criminal justice reform and public safety will be instrumental in these challenging times where black and brown communities are under constant attack. As the struggles for broader racial, economic, and social justice move forward, it is vital that a large civil rights coalition like the Leadership Conference is led by someone who has fought for civil and human rights throughout her entire career. APALA has been a proud member and looks forward to this next chapter of our coalition and movement.”

Christopher Kang, NCAPA national director: “Vanita Gupta, who was the first South Asian American to lead the Department of Justice’s Civil Rights division, continues to make history in her leadership of LCCHR. This is a critical time for the civil and human rights movement and for the racial justice movement, and Vanita will bring her voice, her passion, and her experience to bear in moving our nation forward. We also thank Wade Henderson for his two decades at the helm of LCCHR. I have worked with Wade for many years, and his legacy in advancing the civil rights of all Americans and his tremendous impact will continue to be recognized and remembered for years to come.”
​

NCAPA members of the Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights are Asian Americans Advancing Justice | AAJC, Asian Pacific American Labor Alliance, AFL-CIO (APALA), Japanese American Citizens League (JACL), National Coalition for Asian Pacific American Community Development (National CAPACD), National Federation of Filipino American Associations (NaFFAA), National Korean American Service and Education Consortium (NAKASEC), OCA-Asian Pacific American Advocates (OCA), Sikh American Legal Defense and Education Fund (SALDEF), South Asian Americans Leading Together (SAALT), Southeast Asia Resource Action Center (SEARAC).
###
​
Based in Washington, D.C., the National Council of Asian Pacific Americans is a coalition of 34 national Asian Pacific American organizations that serves to represent the interests of Asian American, Native Hawaiian, and Pacific Islander (AANHPI) communities and to provide a national voice for our communities’ concerns. Our communities are the fastest growing racial/ethnic group in the United States, currently making up approximately six percent of the population.
See this on the NCAPA website. 
ncapa_congratulates_vanita_gupta.pdf
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NEA and SEIU API Caucuses along with the California API Legislative Caucus Join 200+ AAPI Organizations Committed to Resisting Trump

2/7/2017

 
​Washington, DC – Over two hundred organizations, ranging from national organizations to university student groups with a variety of focus areas from economic justice to health advocacy groups, have signed onto a statement of principles detailing their commitment to resist the Trump administration. Among the most recent signers are the National Education Association (NEA) Asian and Pacific Islander (API) Caucus, the Service Employees International Union (SEIU) API Caucus, and the California API Legislative Caucus, signaling broad support from labor and government affinity groups.
 
“With the union representing the most AAPI members throughout the country, we’re not backing down,” declared SEIU API Caucus Chair Maria Castaneda. “The threat that Trump poses is a danger to us all, and we need to send a message loud and clear to the administration and to all who support such backwards policies and who remain complicit in extending hate, that our collective organizing makes us strong.”
 
“For us working in unions, let this be a reminder that our labor movement is not a monolith just as AAPIs are not a model minority,” Charmaine Banther, Chair of the NEA API Caucus. “AAPI workers and our broader community are voicing grave concerns that we as leaders in our local unions cannot overlook, and it’s time that the rest of labor took a stand for all working people, which includes people of color.”
 
APALA National President and Assistant Executive Director of the United Domestic Workers, AFSCME Local 3930 Johanna Puno Hester commented: “Allies within local governments and local labor unions will be key players in blocking hateful policies and protecting our communities. We look forward to collaborating and co-conspiring with these caucuses to defend our friends, families, and communities from the xenophobic, racist, misogynistic, and hateful attacks coming from the Trump administration and its cronies.” 
  
California API Legislative Caucus Chair and Assemblymember Rob Bonta (D-Oakland) concluded: “California is home to millions of Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders. As Chair of the API Legislative Caucus, I will vigorously stand up and defend those who are most vulnerable in our communities. We know an attack on one of us is an attack on all of us.  We will draw upon our strength, resolve and unity to fight and prevail against this dangerous administration.”
 
To see the full resistance statement and list of signatories, please visit: bit.ly/AAPIsResistTrump. To have your organization sign on, please fill out the form: bit.ly/AAPIStatementOfPrinciples. 
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nea_and_seiu_api_caucuses_along_with_the_california_api_legislative_caucus.pdf
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Over 100 AAPI Organizations Commit to Resistance Following Inauguration and Weekend of Protests

1/24/2017

 
​Washington, DC – Following last Friday’s inauguration of Donald Trump as President of the United States and one of the largest weekends of protests, including the Women’s March on Washington and sister marches around the world, over a hundred Asian American and Pacific Islander (AAPI) organizations have committed to resist Mr. Trump and his Administration. The signatories feature a variety of national organizations, local groups, and student organizations that focus on a range of issues from worker rights and economic justice to health and racial justice advocacy.
 
The joint statement rejects making racism, hate, xenophobia, and sexism normal, and details principles by which organizations will advocate, mobilize, and organize their respective constituencies together in our collective resistance and solidarity efforts. 
 
Johanna Puno Hester, National President of the Asian Pacific American Labor Alliance, AFL-CIO and Assistant Executive Director of United Domestic Workers of American/AFSCME Local 3930, said: “It is so dangerous for Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders – and any other communities of color and marginalized communities – to engage with the Trump administration. With an administration full of right-wingers and white supremacists whose statements and track records already have proven to be toxic for the new American majority and the planet as a whole, we need to lean on each other, collaborate, and co-conspire in the dark times ahead. Millions marched this weekend, including APALA members across the country, and we are ready to continue resisting.”
 
Fahd Ahmed, Executive Director of DRUM: Desis Rising Up and Moving, stated: “The communities – organizers, family, and friends – that are impacted the most by national and state policies ground this larger movement and vision for a just society that’s free from repression, bigotry and hate. Our collective activism and organizing are necessary not only to disrupt unjust systems, but also to build power from the ground up. Otherwise, we shortchange our communities if we don’t stand our ground now.”  
 
Sung Yeon Choimorrow, Interim Executive Director of the National Asian Pacific American Women’s Forum, added: “All of us who have felt Trump’s attacks personally and communally know there is so much at stake. We need to come out in full force and resist this new administration, which has already promised to dismantle the rights of AAPI women and our communities. Now more than ever, we need to reaffirm our solidarity with all who are fighting for justice, whether that’s across the street or across the nation.” 
 
Sarath Suong, Executive Director of Providence Youth Student Movement and a member of the Southeast Asian Freedom Network, commented: “This is more than just ‘getting through’ the next four years: this is about survival. As Southeast Asians, we know the full cost of survival when fascism rises to power. We have already seen increased attacks on our communities and organizations even before the inauguration, and we can expect nothing less during the upcoming years. We will not participate in silencing the trauma and struggles we’re facing. We must defend each other and build our collective resilience.”
 
Below please find the statement in full and the complete list of signatories. We continue to welcome new co-conspirators to our collective resistance. To sign on, please visit: bit.ly/AAPIStatementOfPrinciples.
As Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders, We Will Resist
 
We stand at a critical juncture in world history. The election of Donald Trump as president of the United States represents a direct threat to millions of people’s safety and to the health of the planet. As Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders (AAPIs) committed to equality, inclusion, and justice, we pledge to resist any efforts by President-Elect Trump’s administration to target and exploit communities, to strip people of their fundamental rights and access to essential services, and to use rhetoric and policies that divide the American people and endanger the world.
 
Mr. Trump’s campaign used explicit racial appeals to win the support of disaffected white voters, promising to restore their economic and social standing by deporting millions of immigrants, building a wall, creating a Muslim registry, banning Muslim immigration, and punishing Black dissent. He also engaged in deeply misogynistic language and behavior throughout his campaign. He insulted all people of color; people with disabilities; and women – all of whom amount to the majority of America. In the global arena, he has signaled at a new nuclear arms race, promised to expand the use of torture, and disparaged the United Nations.
 
Since his election, Mr. Trump has chosen known white nationalists, corporate moguls, religious zealots, climate deniers, hawkish ex-generals, anti-Islam spokespersons, and anti-government crusaders to serve in his Administration. Right-wing extremists now dominate his party, which will control all three branches of the federal government and the majority of state legislatures, and are positioned to jeopardize the future of the Supreme Court for the next generation and beyond. Together this new realignment of forces seeks to turn back the clock on civil rights and environmental protections, to maximize corporate profits by privatizing the public sector, and to create a racially and culturally exclusive America.
 
This is not business as usual, and we will not engage in business-as-usual tactics and strategies.
 
As AAPIs, our lives are rooted in the long arc of U.S. history, which was born out of racial violence and has been shaped by the struggles for freedom of oppressed peoples domestically and internationally. Some of our ancestors first arrived in what is now the United States as subjects of European empire over 400 years ago. Some of us are indigenous to this country as our ancestors' lands were occupied and colonized by the United States as they sought to expand their global military and economic power. In the centuries since, AAPIs have faced indentured servitude, exclusionary immigration laws, bars to citizenship and land ownership, mass deportation, mass incarceration, war, sexual and gender-based violence, forced displacement, vigilante violence, surveillance, and racial and religious profiling.
 
Today our movements include Southeast Asian refugees organizing to end criminalization and deportation; Muslims, Arabs, Sikhs and South Asians fighting surveillance, profiling, war, and hate violence; women reclaiming their bodies against trafficking, domestic violence, exploitation, and criminalization; low-wage workers standing up against wage theft, poor working conditions, and abusive employers; Native Hawaiians and Pacific Islanders building a generation to fight against generational poverty caused by loss of sovereignty, militarization of lands and people, forced displacement, and criminalization; and trans, gender-non-conforming, and queer people putting their bodies on the line to demand a different, more humane world. We have always fought injustice, and we are resolute to continue doing so.
 
The majority of AAPI voters rejected Mr. Trump’s candidacy. Indeed, while Mr. Trump won the Electoral College – a problematic system with its own deep history rooted in slavery and racial inequities – he lost the popular vote.  And with only 58% of eligible voters casting ballots in this election, the vast majority of American voters did not vote to elect Mr. Trump. He and his Administration have no mandate to govern.
 
For all of these reasons, we commit to the following principles and ask all AAPIs to join us:
  • We will center and stand up for Asian American and Pacific Islander (AAPI) community members who are likely to face increased levels of hate violence, targeting, and policing. We will center and uplift the experiences and calls to action of undocumented immigrants, Muslims and those perceived to be Muslim, refugees, women, and Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Queer and Intersex (LGBTQI) community members. We will also support the organizing and resistance strategies of AAPI groups and our allies closest to the ground in local communities.
  • We will defend all targets of bigotry, repression, and hate made by Mr. Trump’s Administration, or caused by the Trump Effect, with a broad principle of solidarity: “An attack on one is an attack on all.”
  • We will refuse to legitimate or normalize Mr. Trump’s Administration, which has already violated the core principles of American democracy by using explicit appeals to racial and religious bigotry, xenophobia, Islamophobia, and misogyny to gain political power. We will reject ideas, statements, and policies that strengthen the incoming Administration’s legitimacy, including divide-and-conquer tactics or strategies that position AAPIs as a racial wedge against other communities of color.
  • We will reject any attempts by the Trump Administration to use AAPIs to make a case for their legitimacy and diversity, and will not compromise our values and agency to gain a “seat at the table” in pursuit of narrow benefits. Nor will we conflate marginal visibility for genuine power and influence for our communities.
  • We agree to be transparent about our engagement with the Trump Administration, and to be held accountable for our organizational strategies and decisions.
  • We will raise awareness about how AAPI communities are affected by discriminatory and divisive rhetoric and policies, and will stand firm in opposing them.
  • We will support those who assume personal and organizational risk to defend democratic institutions and practices including human, civil, and constitutional rights, against unjust laws and actions by the government, any group, or individual.
  • We will seek unity in pursuit of shared goals, knowing that defending democracy will require various kinds of movements and tactics to weather the coming period of increased repression, and to build a more humane and sustainable world.
  • We will work tirelessly toward an inclusive and democratic vision that ensures the safety, self-determination, and wellbeing of all people, and we will model this in our resistance and solidarity efforts.
 
Signatories (as of January 25, 2017):
 

18MillionRising.org
AAPI Feminism Workshop
Alliance of Rhode Island Southeast Asians for Education
Alliance of South Asian American Labor (ASAAL)
Alliance of South Asians Taking Action
Anakbayan-USA
API Equality - LA
API Equality - Northern California (APIENC)
Asian American Leadership Forum for Youth
Asian American Legal Defense and Education Fund (AALDEF)
Asian American Millennials Unite
Asian American Organizing Project
Asian American Psychological Association
Asian American Resource Workshop
Asian American Student Union at UMCP
Asian American Student Union at University of Maryland
Asian American Student Union (University of Minnesota, Twin Cities)
Asian American Studies, UC Davis
Asian Americans Advancing Justice | Asian Law Caucus
Asian Americans Advancing Justice | Chicago
Asian Americans Advancing Justice | Los Angeles
Asian Americans United
Asian-American Women’s Political Initiative
Asian Counseling and Referral Service
Asian Pacific American Heritage Week, University of Pennsylvania 
Asian Pacific American Labor Alliance, AFL-CIO (APALA)
Asian Pacific American Labor Alliance - Alameda Chapter
Asian Pacific American Labor Alliance - Los Angeles Chapter
Asian Pacific American Labor Alliance - New Jersey Chapter
Asian Pacific American Labor Alliance - New York Chapter
Asian Pacific American Labor Alliance - Sacramento Chapter
Asian Pacific American Labor Alliance - San Diego Chapter
Asian Pacific American Labor Alliance - San Francisco Chapter
Asian Pacific American Labor Alliance - San Jose/San Mateo/Santa Clara Chapter
Asian Pacific American Labor Alliance - Seattle Chapter
Asian Pacific American Labor Alliance - Texas Chapter
Asian Pacific American Labor Alliance - Washington, DC Chapter
Asian Pacific American Network of Oregon (APANO)
Asian Pacific Environmental Network (APEN)
Asian Pacific Policy & Planning Council (A3PCON)
Asian Prisoner Support Committee
Asians for Black Lives (A4BL) -- San Diego
CAAAV Organizing Asian Communities
Cambodian Mutual Assistance Association of Greater Lowell
Chinese for Affirmative Action
Chinese Progressive Association - San Francisco
CHOW Project
Critical Filipinx Scholars Collective
DC Asian American and Pacific Islander Democratic Caucus
Densho
Department of Asian American Studies, UC Davis
DRUM - Desis Risng Up & Moving
East Coast Asian American Student Union (ECAASU)
Empowering Pacific Islander Communities
Equality Labs
FIGHT (Formerly Incarcerated Group Healing Together)
Filipino Advocates for Justice
Filipino American Democratic Club of New York
Filipino Migrant Center
Freedom at Emory University
Freedom Inc.
Freedom Trainers
GABRIELA USA
Gay Asian Pacific Islander Men of New York (GAPIMNY)
Guam Communications Network
Hep Free Hawaii
Hepatitis Education Project
Hmong Innovating Politics
Hmong National Development
Institute for Asian Pacific American Leadership & Advancement
Intercollegiate Taiwanese American Student Association
Jahajee Sisters Empowering Indo-Caribbean Women
Japanese American Citizens League (JACL)
Japanese American Citizens League - New York
KAYA: Filipino Americans for Progress
Khmer Health Advocates
Korean American Resource and Cultural Center
Korean Resource Center
Kuya Ate Mentorship Program
Lionswrite Communications
Many Languages One Voice
MekongNYC
Midwest Asian American Students Union
National Alliance for Filipino Concerns
National Asian Pacific American Women's Forum (NAPAWF)
National Asian Pacific American Women's Forum - Philadelphia 
National Coalition for Asian Pacific American Community Development
National Korean American Service & Education Consortium (NAKASEC)
National Queer Asian Pacific Islander Alliance (NQAPIA)
National Organization for Women's (NOW) Inaugural Virtual Chapter: Young Feminists and Allies
New Directions Consulting
OneAmerica
Paradox
Penn Taiwanese Society, University of Pennsylvania
Philadelphia South Asian Collective
Philippine Student Association - UIUC
Pilipino American Unity for Progress, Inc. (UniPro)
Progressive Asian Network for Action (PANA)
Providence Youth Student Movement (PrYSM)
Rad Azns
REACH! Asian Pacific Islander Recruitment and Retention Center
Reappropriate
Services, Immigrant Rights, and Education Network (SIREN)
SHK Global Health
Sikh American Legal Defense and Education Fund
Spice Collective, University of Pennsylvania
South Asian Americans Leading Together (SAALT)
South Asian Fund For Education, Scholarship and Training (SAFEST)
South Asian Network (SAN)
Southeast Asia Resource Action Center (SEARAC)
Southeast Asian Coalition
Southeast Asian Freedom Network (SEAFN)
Stanford Asian American Activism Committee
TIGRA - Transnational Institute for Grassroots Research & Action
UPenn Asian Pacific Student Coalition
UPLIFT
UXO Clearance Laos
VietLead
VietUnity - Bay Area
VietUnity - Los Angeles
Visual Communications
Wakefield Asian Club, Arlington, Virginia
Yale Asian American Studies Task Force
Yellow Rage

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