From 2003 to 2013 Almost all Asian Am. "civil rights" type orgs. supported race-preference" college admissions in courts
March, 2012 80-20 took a SURVEY taken by 47,108 Asian Ams. The FOR/ AGAINST ratio for a "race neutral" admissions was 52.4 to 1.
May 29, 2012 80-20 became the FIRST AsAm national organization to take legal action AGAINST "race-preference" college admission.
June, 2013 The Supreme Court decision on "Fisher v. Univ. of Texas" came.
Dec. 3, 2013 Calif. Senate passed SCA-5.
Mar. 17, 2014 A great victory! SCA-5 was defeated.
Mar. 21, 2014 80-20 PAC announced to DEFEAT 2 Calif. AsAm politicians.
Mar. 28, 2014 Days of Reckoning I: Sen. Leland Yee lost his senate position.
Nov. 2, 2014 Days of Reckoning II: Paul Fong was defeated.
Timeline II -- Recent Actions on the College Admissions Front
Nov. 17, 2014 Projects on Fair Representation filed lawsuits challenging admissions policies at Harvard and Univ. of N. Carolina - Chapel Hill in District Courts. The cases are expected to work their ways to the Supreme Court eventually. It is a high quality project led by Mr. Ed glum. 80-20 has assisted Blum to find highly qualified AsAm students, who were rejected by Harvard, as plaintiffs.
May 15, 2015 A coalition of 64 Asian American organizations filed a complaint
against Harvard President and Fellows of the Harvard College for discrimination against Asian-American applicants in the College admissions process. The complaint was submitted to Office of Civil Rights, Dept. of Education and Civil Rights Division, U.S. Dept. of Justice. 80-20's Washington D.C. chapter is 1 of the 64 orgs. This complaint received a large amount of media attention, including articles from NY Times, USA Today, Washington Post, China Daily, Wall Street Journal, Bloomberg Business, Boston Globe, Christian Science Monitor, Fox, NBCNEWS , CNN. The 64 orgs. calls itself The Coalition of Asian American Associations.
Unlike the pro or con amicus briefs filed by Asian American 501c-3 organizations of the past, which played supportive roles to lawsuits started by mainstream individuals and orgs, this complaint was filed by an pan-Asian group - a historic first. It showed that Asian Ams' political activism had grown further. A sign that the movement needs further nurturing is that the complaint is mostly based on the data from the lawsuit of the Project on Fair Representation, filed last November. The data is so powerful that a number of the mainstream media articles publicize the ENTIRE complaint, a very rare practice.
May 19, 2015 An "open letter" from 135 AAPI organizations, led by the earlier “civil rights" type organizations like AAJC, OCA & JACL that had always supported "race-preference" college admissions, was issued to down the complaint filed by the "64 AsAm orgs.". The open letter made two points:
(1) Affirmative action in college admissions does not constitute quotas. However, it did NOT submit any data to prove that point. Had it submitted data, it would have proved just the opposite.
(2) It implicitly accused the "64 orgs" of using "divisive wedge politics."
Most AsAms might be befuddled by this accusation and ask, "how does politics come in?" Let me explain. The "open letter" group anticipated that the Depts of Education and Justice in the Obama Administration will NOT deal with the complaint seriously. It is because the presidential election is near, and Democrats need the bloc vote from the black community, 9 to 1 in favor of a Democratic presidential candidate. The Asian Am community will, as a result of the non-action of the Democratic administration, be upset with the Democrats, causing them to vote against the Democrats in 2016. A distinct possibility!
The action taken by the "open letter" group owing to its anticipated non-action by the Democratic administration is MOST disappointing. It revealed where its heart lied -with the Democratic Party instead of the Asian Am. community. It should have urged the Democratic administration NOT to trifled with the "complaint." Instead, it blamed the "64 org. group" for filing the complaint.
How outrageous! These 135 orgs. had abandoned their own community. Shouldn't "Days of Reckoning" be upon them as well, fellow AsAms? But that is not an 80-20 PAC job.
Shouldn't you as citizens demanding accountability?
As expected, the shallow contents of the "open letter" didn't receive any attention from any of the major papers in the nation, in stark contrast to the huge media attention paid to the complaint from the 64 orgs. group.
S. B. Woo, a volunteer for the past 16 years
President, 80-20 PAC, Inc.
PS: I'll be a keynoter at USDA in D.C. at 10 a.m. on May 27. It's open to the public.
80-20's Top 10 Accomplishment, published 3 years ago.
