Inclusive Democracy

Our National Security and Civil Rights program challenges profiling, surveillance, and discriminatory immigration policies criminalizing and targeting community members, especially Arab, Middle Eastern, Muslim, and South Asian communities after 9/11. More recently, we have been advocating on discriminatory prosecutions of Chinese scientists. On the local, state, and federal level, we fight national security and counterterrorism policies rooted in white supremacy and racism. In coalition with partners and community organizations state and nationwide, we work with community members to defend their civil rights to free speech, immigration, refuge, privacy, and safety.

Spotlight

Since Trump took office, the Muslim Ban, first instated in January 2017 and expanded in 2020, has upended the lives of our Black and AMEMSA community members. As a result of prolonged separation from loved ones and indefinite delay on their visas, those directly impacted have faced sustained financial hardship and emotional distress. In response to xenophobic and Islamophobic federal policy, we formed the No Muslim Ban Ever (NMBE) coalition, developing long-term partnerships with organizations such as the National Immigrant Law Center and the Council on American-Islamic Relations - San Francisco Bay Area (CAIR-SFBA). After years of federal administrative advocacy, direct representation of impacted individuals and families, community education with translated resource materials, and regular updates to communities and partners, our coalition finally succeeded in pressuring the Biden administration to repeal the ban in January 2021. Since then, we have continued to advocate for full dismantling of post-9/11 national security frameworks and establish a procedure for reparations to communities directly impacted by the Muslim Ban.

Our Voting Rights program fights for full participation in the electoral process on behalf of all eligible voters, especially those from historically disenfranchised and limited-English speaking communities. Given that AAPI and AMEMSA communities comprise the fastest growing racial and ethnic group among eligible voters, we see voting rights as a powerful vehicle for community empowerment and civic engagement within our participatory democracy. By partnering with community groups, affiliate partners, and organizations locally, statewide, and across the nation, we advocate for full language access and representation in voting, redistricting, and Census data collection to ensure everyone in our communities is equally heard.

Spotlight

Throughout 2020 and 2021, our team worked to ensure that Asian American and Pacific Islander (AAPI) and Arab, Middle Eastern, Muslim, and South Asian (AMEMSA) communities throughout California had fair opportunities for representation and a voice in state and local redistricting. First, we worked to support an accurate census count, the building block of our representative democracy. Our efforts paid off: the undercount in California was relatively low considering how many hard-to-count communities live in the state. Then we shifted to redistricting, the redrawing of political lines that can either divide or keep a community whole. We did this by engaging communities in redistricting, advocating for fair mapping processes, and pushing for maps that empower AAPI & AMEMSA Californians while also respecting other communities of color.

For our state advocacy, we built a statewide coalition with Advancing Justice - SoCal that was anchored by nine AAPI & AMEMSA organizations; drafted maps; and collaborated with civil rights organizations representing Black, Latine, and other communities to find compromise and align map proposals. The coalition worked with communities across the state to submit more than 100 pages of testimony to the California Citizens Redistricting Commission. At the local level, we held educational workshops and supported community mapping for redistricting in Bay Area cities and counties. In many parts of the state, through our advocacy, AAPI & AMEMSA communities were kept whole and together in the maps, which means they can have a stronger voice in elections and policy decisions. In a number of regions, we convinced the line-drawers to draw districts in which AAPI communities make up a large percentage of the district and are able to better elect the candidates that will fight for their needs.

Read more about our state coalition’s redistricting successes.