And my teacher knew I couldn’t speak English. And I remember going to high school, I had to take all these classes in English. So I said ‘Thank you.’ That live in my memory vividly. So I learned, ‘How are you?’ and ‘My name is Mabel.’ I was greeted with ‘Ching chong Chinaman, never eat your vitamin.’ I didn't know what it meant. And I remember the first day in school, I was so prepared to make friends. My high school in my memory was mostly white, even though it was it wasn't all white.īut I was made to feel like an alien because I looked like an immigrant and I couldn't speak English. We immigrated here and I went to live with my older sister in Ann Arbor, Michigan. I came with my mom and my sister, the three of us. So I came from Hong Kong in 1970, or ‘71. Tell me your earliest memory of discrimination. So the 80s was my kind of awakening that maybe I can be part of changing that reality.

It's been a journey of discrimination and exploitation and being treated as a second-class citizen. Mabel Teng: I think where I was in the 1980s, I was becoming an activist.

Joe Fitzgerald Rodriguez: Where were you in your perception of activism and social justice before the Rainbow Coalition? This conversation has been edited for length and clarity. In this wide-ranging interview with KQED's Joe Fitzgerald Rodriguez, Teng describes her own social justice awakening, lessons learned from the coalitions built in the wake of Chin's death, and how those lessons could heal divisions between the Asian American and Black communities today. (Photo by David Paul Morris/Getty Images) San Francisco Country Court Recorder Mabel Teng (C) and California Assemblyman Mark Leno (R) attend a rally Augin San Francisco, California. She now serves as the interim executive director of the Chinatown Media & Arts Collaborative. Later, as San Francisco assessor-recorder, her office processed the first marriages of same-sex couples in City Hall. Teng since had a storied San Francisco career, serving on the City College of San Francisco Board of Trustees in 1990, then later becoming the first Asian woman elected to the San Francisco Board of Supervisors in 1994. In the 1980s, Teng served as co-chair of the Chinese Progressive Association, one of a bevy of Asian American organizations that rose up in the wake of the Civil Rights movement and played a pivotal advocacy role following Chin's death.Īlso in the 80s, Teng joined Jackson's National Rainbow Coalition, which pushed nationally for more rights for ethnic groups who felt they were ignored by the policies of then-President Ronald Reagan. Mabel Teng has been there through it all - pushing for recognition for Asian American communities in the wake of Chin's death, to the present day, where she recently called for solidarity between the Black and Asian communities in the Chinese-language Sing Tao Daily newspaper. That rising hate has also awakened Asian American voters in San Francisco, who cited increasing violence against their communities in the recall of District Attorney Chesa Boudin this month. 31, 2021, according to the coalition Stop AAPI Hate. At least 10,905 hate incidents against Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders were recorded from March 19, 2020, through Dec. (Photo by Bettmann Archive/Getty Images)Īnti-Asian hate rose during the pandemic amid hateful rhetoric, including from former President Donald Trump, who stoked racist coronavirus fears of Asian Americans. Chin along with the American Citizens for Justice asked Judge Charles Kaufman, who heard the case and passed sentence, to resentence the two involved in the slayings. Lily Chin, mother of Vincent chin who was clubbed to death by two white men in a scuffle in June 1982, breaks down as a relative (L), helps her walk while leaving Detroit's City County Building. Jesse Jackson, who came to San Francisco in the 1980s to join hands with coalitions advocating for Chin's family. The light sentencing galvanized not only Asian American communities, but solidarity from the Black community as well, particularly from Rev. His killers were fined $3,000 and sentenced to three years of probation. He was attacked on June 19, 1982, and died four days later from his injuries. He was beaten to death by two white men who worked in the auto industry and, according to witnesses, were angry over what they perceived as the loss of American jobs to Japanese imports. This week marks the 40th anniversary of the death of Vincent Chin, a 27-year-old Detroit man who was killed in an act of hate, but whose killing sparked Asian American communities to rise up for justice.

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