Kevin Kim, who won the Democratic Primary for New York City Council
On September 15, as the promise of autumn hung lightly in the air, New Yorkers headed into booths to cast their votes in the City Council primaries. What they saw on the ballot–among the Gleasons, Gregorys and Massons–the last names Kim, Choe and Jung.
Contesting for the seat of Councilman were P. J. Kim (District 1, Lower Manhattan), Kevin Kim (District 19, Bayside, Queens), and John Choe and S. J. Jung (both from District 20, Flushing, Queens). A historic 4 Korean American candidates competed in New York’s City Council primaries. And when the results came in on the 16th, Kevin Kim emerged as the winner of the Democratic nomination for City Council from District 19.
Kim’s surprise victory saw him raking him 30 percent of the vote and defeating presumed front-runner Jerry Iannece and four other Democratic opponents. It also brought him one step closer to being the first Korean American to be elected to New York’s lawmaking body.
Kim’s victory marks the political maturation of the Korean American community, a moment that Chung-Wha Hong, executive director of the New York Immigration Coalition, termed as “decisive.” Sam Yoon, who had an unsuccessful bid running for Mayor of Boston, described the primaries as a “watershed moment in New York politics.”
But after the warm glow of victory, it’s time for some cold hard truths.
Despite these Koreans making an impressive play for New York City Council, there still remains a huge gap in Korean American leadership.
Though Koreans, at 1.5 million, represent the 5th largest immigrant group in the United States, there are less than a handful of prominent Korean political leaders in the country. New York alone has 132,000 Korean Americans, according to the latest census figures, yet none have been elected to the New York City Council, the State Legislature or any statewide office.
“We still haven’t found a sense of urgency to get involved in politics,” said Kevin Kim, referring to the Korean-Americans in the Tri-State area. “If they are citizens, they don’t register (to vote), and if they’re registered, they don’t vote in the primaries – robbing themselves of the chance to pick a candidate they truly believe in”
In Flushing, a neighborhood in Queens, a man sits by a fruit cart, piled high with plums, apples and bananas. Asked if he had voted in the primaries, he shakes his head. “No politics, no politics,” he said in broken English, impatient with the questions and eager to direct his attention to a customer.
Businessman first, citizen next–the fruit seller may well embody one of the biggest challenges facing the Korean community in America.
One of the explanations for the community’s reticence to participate in the political process, says Esther Jung, a community organizer involved with P. J. Kim’s city campaign, is cultural. “For Koreans, it’s hard to be civic-minded,” says Jung. “Volunteerism is not even a concept back home.” Jung also observes that new émigrés struggle to assimilate. “Koreans have to learn that they are not in Korea anymore. They have to learn to be part of the American community.”
Nowhere was this chasm between mainstream America and the immigrant community more evident than during the Los Angeles race riots in 1992. “We learned the hard way,” said Sukhee Kang, the mayor of Irvine, California. “Over 700 business owners lost their livelihood overnight. We didn’t have any protection from local authorities, law enforcement and local politicians. We had to protect our own stores; that was a big lesson for our community.”
Brad Lee adds, “Korean American history has gone on for 100 years now. But we still don’t have any network systems in place.”
To put those networks in place, community leaders are urging young Koreans to start looking beyond professions such as medicine and accounting, and to consider other options like politics. “A lot of [Korean Americans] are fixed on success,” says Jung, adding that many second generation Korean Americans also get pigeonholed into going to the Ivys in order to fulfill their immigrant parents’ dreams. But, “we are not robots, we all have different gears.”
Two of the Korean American candidates in the City Council primaries, despite their Ivy-laced degrees, chose to look beyond the boardroom. Kevin Kim hails from Stanford and Columbia, and P. J. Kim wields degrees from Princeton and Harvard.
“I could have been one of the 500 associates at McKinsey and no one would care,” says P. J. “Or, I could do something for the community and make a difference.”
Even if Korean Americans don’t have the stomach to step into the political ring, leaders remind the community that they need to be more aggressive in voicing their concerns–and voting. And with the census just around the corner, Korean Americans have to also stand up and be counted. Kevin Kim also suggests a year-long program designed to get more Korean-Americans register as voters. “Churches have been doing a great job registering voters,” said Kim.” Now, we need to get civic organizations, charity organizations to start registering Korean-Americans,” adding the drive would be non-partisan and be the first step towards greater political participation.
Additionally, for any Korean American leader to succeed, it has also become imperative to cobble together broad support across various ethnic groups. Case in point is Sam Yoon’s election as Boston City councilor at-large in 2005, the first non-white ever elected to serve that post. Yoon could make it happen only with the support of the Chinese community. The 39-year-old naturalized citizen, a graduate of Harvard and Yale, came in third place in the Boston Mayoral Primaries.
“Boston is a world class, 21st century city, rich in academic resources, health care innovation, but Boston politics and the government is still in the Dark Ages,” said Yoon. “To have a Korean American candidate represent new ideas and fresh energy, captures the city’s imagination.”
As the leaves turn across the Northeast and political wheels grind forward, there is an unmistakable air of change. As Kevin Kim prepares to face off with his Republican opponent in the November 3rd City Council election and Sam Yoon charts out a future course of action, their contests should remind Koreans that in a country where the highest office is occupied by the son of an immigrant, anything is possible.
