Justice for Akai Gurley and All Victims of Police Brutality

Chinese Americans must raise their voices both for racial justice and against state violence. We recognize Chinese and Asians in the U.S. continue to face diverse forms of discrimination. At the same time, from history we know that toppling this lies in solidarity with Black and Brown struggles.

We must recognize and oppose this country’s ongoing anti-Black racism, and the unjust ways we, too, are called on to participate in institutions that disproportionately victimize Black people. We must oppose this as a matter of justice, and because it inevitably affects and concerns us, too. More Chinese Americans have rallied for NYPD cop Peter Liang than any other cause in recent history but by choosing to lend this one cause prominence, we must ask, whose struggles do we participate in forgetting? And in the end, who does that serve?

No More 'Peter Liang's!

• We call for no more ‘Peter Liang’s’ we don’t want any more cops, Chinese American or not, to be placed a position where a brutal ‘accident’ is only a matter of time.
• Police, from vertical patrols to stop-and-frisk, must stop acting like an occupying army, especially in Black communities, terrorizing residents and taking lives.
• We call for accountability for all police and perpetrators of state violence, and justice for all victims.
• We call for a reinvestment in marginalized people of color and low-income communities’ needs, rather than overblown public spending on policing and incarceration, which cannot address the roots of social ills.

Chinese in the U.S. suffer police, ICE, and other state violence. We must stand with the most marginalized in our communities.

• Right here in Los Angeles, the San Gabriel Valley, and beyond, police have needlessly taken the lives of, or abused, Asian Americans who were not threats:
  • In 2012, Jazmyne Ha Eng was killed by police while seeking mental health services in Rosemead.
  • In 2012, Khoa Anh Le was killed by police in El Monte, when they were called to help him.
  • In 2013, Kim Nguyen was kidnapped and sexually assaulted by LAPD officers in Koreatown. They let her fall out of their speeding patrol car, causing her grave injuries and possible brain trauma. One of the officers involved was Asian American.
• There are over 1.3 million undocumented API immigrants in the U.S., the largest percentage of whom are Chinese. Undocumented immigrants suffer tremendous exploitation, constant harassment by authorities, and violence from ICE agents under increasingly punitive immigration law.
• When we speak about empowering the Chinese community, true empowerment means seeking justice for the most marginalized among us, not impunity for those who perpetuate state violence.

Anti-Black racism is foundational to U.S. society. And Black people suffer much higher rates of police violence.

• Since Black people were forcefully brought to the U.S. as slaves, anti-Black racism has been foundational to U.S. society and its institutions.
• Since the 1980s, the ‘War on Crime’ and ‘War on Drugs,’ which vastly expanded the U.S. prison system, have effectively waged war against poor people of color. Black communities were targeted for mass incarceration, through increased policing and mandatory minimum sentences for minor offenses. Under California’s draconian ‘three strikes’ law, persons have received 25 years to life in prison for petty theft, such as stealing diapers and in one case, four cookies.
• Every 28 hours, a Black person or child is killed by police, security guards, or vigilantes. How would we feel if our men, women, elderly, sick, and young children were being killed, with no redress?
• Instead of blaming Black people and believing racist stereotypes that they are lazy or criminals because of ‘poor family values,’ we must understand how depressed conditions were created by a racist, anti-Black society.

The state’s focus on criminalization hurts us all.

• California claims it has a fiscal crisis when it comes to public services (a fiscal crisis deliberately created by Prop 13’s gutting of property tax after 1978). But it has money to increase spending on police and new prisons:
  • Los Angeles County spends over $1.3 billion per year on the LAPD; its budget for law enforcement is greater than that for housing, workforce development, general services, and other public works combined.
  • California spends more on prisons, and building new ones, than on higher education. Of all U.S. states, California is #1 in prison spending, but #46 in education spending per student.
• Within the ‘tough-on-crime’ national climate, immigration policy has also grown more punitive and deportations have increased. (Obama has deported 2.5 million immigrants since 2009 – more people than any other president.)

Police must be held accountable, regardless of color, because they are in a position of authority. We must reject anti-Black biases, recognize the disproportionate state violence against Black communities, and oppose abuse of authority.

• In today’s cases of police abuse, many officers are not white — they are Black, Latino, Asian. When Black police officers have killed Black people such as Mario Woods and Freddie Gray, the Black community did not ask for the Black officers to be let off. They still demanded accountability.
• Peter Liang is not the only non-white officer to face consequences. Black officers peripherally involved in the murder of Freddie Gray were charged with counts of murder or manslaughter involving sentences of 10-30 years; a Black woman officer who failed to respond properly during the murder of Eric Garner was stripped of her gun and badge.

Our communities have benefited from Black struggles for freedom.

• The Civil Rights Movement, brought forth and led by Black communities, gave us equal voting rights as well as protections against job, education, and housing discrimination.
• It was partly responsible for the 1965 immigration reforms that loosened restrictions on immigration, opening the doors for many of our families to come here or join us.
• Many of the rights we enjoy today, including our children’s access to education, can be traced to the Black freedom struggle in this country.
• When police have killed Asian people, Black organizations were the first to offer solidarity.

The ‘model minority’ stereotype pits Asians against other non-white communities, while ignoring the exploitation faced by working-class Chinese people and the real policies harming our communities.

• Politicians use the ‘model minority’ stereotype of Asians to set up a false comparison between us and Black communities. If Asians could make it, the argument goes, Blacks fail because of their ‘bad culture.’ But this ignores the systemic discrimination and extreme violence Black people continue to face. It also ignores the marginalization many Asian Americans suffer.
• The ‘model minority’ stereotype pits us against other non-white groups and leaves Chinese who are marginalized voiceless.
• Furthermore, it ignores the real policies responsible for harming our communities.
• Some Chinese Americans with education and class privilege have themselves promoted ‘model minority’ explanations for social inequality, to advance their own self-interest, as political candidates, landlords, or business leaders who exploit working-class people. In fact, Republican candidates, the same responsible for policies eroding housing and workers rights, have poured money into leading the mobilizations to defend Peter Liang.

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Our communities are under attack by gentrification, state disinvestment, and punitive policies. Only by standing together can we truly fight back!

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In Los Angeles, we face a housing crisis, with skyrocketing rents and more homeless on the streets everyday. Gentrification threatens to squeeze us out of Chinatown. We must unite to demand a reorientation of the state’s priorities away from overblown spending on police violence and mass incarceration, and towards addressing our communities’ needs through quality education, affordable housing, living-wage jobs, and more. That is the kind of safety and future we want for our families, and especially our children.

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We demand a reinvestment in our communities! No to state violence!

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We stand with the Gurley family’s and Black communities’ demands for justice:

• Peter Liang and all killer cops must be held fully accountable and nothing less.
• The NYPD should permanently end all vertical patrols.
• NYC and LA must invest critical resources into real affordable housing for the working-class, community centers, and education.
• We support Black Lives Matter Los Angeles in demanding justice for Redel Jones, Ezell Ford, Charly “Africa” Keunang, and the many others killed by LAPD officers. We demand justice for Kisha Michael and Marquintan Sandlin, two parents murdered by Inglewood Police.
• We support the fight against L.A. City Ordinance 56.11 revisions which criminalize homelessness and allow the LAPD to confiscate what little property home-deprived residents of Los Angeles have.