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Oakland Mayor Sheng Thao, a young pioneering Asian American politico, must be wondering how a convicted felon with 34 guilty verdicts can be riding high, while an uncharged Thao fights for her political life.

That’s how strange politics is in America today.

On the national stage, President Joe Biden is making an historic ask of Americans this week. It’s summer, and everyone is a “low information” voter now. But for the sake of the countryand the future of democracy, this is the time to pay attention and get nerdy now.

Biden is essentially tied with Trump, the newly-convicted felon, which tells you how cockeyed political values are in America.

Instead of policy, Trump is all bluster talking about a pre-debate drug test because he’s sure Biden is going to be “jacked up” on some kind of performance-enhancing drug.

That kind of thing gets attention–not whether you’re going to do a damn thing to improve people’s lives.

It means we’re bound to see a debate light on policy. Trump will be jeering and baiting with half-truths, making faces when his mic gets cut off.

Biden will be so focused on being perfect that any flaw in his demeanor will be amplified.Biden backers are praying he simply stays upright.

Even a slight drool from Joe will be a point for the fool.

But rest assured, if Donald Trump is elected for a second time, the blueprint is already out. The Republicans had a diversity playbook back in 2016 that was a pitch for inclusion and outreach to minorities. It was put aside when Trump stormed in. Now it’s shredded for good. The Heritage Foundation’s plan calls for a “Department of Life.” And we will all have to follow its theocratic-based world view where abortion is illegal and minorities of all stripes are disempowered.

A vote for Trump represents a radical reformatting of democracy.

Pay attention.

POLITICS IN OAKLAND, CA

In the meantime, local Oakland politics is slightly different, but no less confounding.

Sheng Thao, 18 months into her tenure as the first Hmong American mayor of a major U.S. city, is recovering from the worst week in her life.

First, a group of Oakland citizens qualified enough signatures to hold a recall election of Thao. Then on Wednesday, 15 people were shot at an unauthorized Juneteenth celebration in the city’s Lake Merritt area. The topper came Thursday, when the FBI executed a pre-dawn raid of a number of houses, including Thao’s. The homes were all connected to a case reportedly involving improper campaign donations from Andy Duong, a Vietnamese American businessman whose company, CalWaste, won the contract to run the city’s recycling program. No arrests were made, just boxes and computers hauled from the various homes. Not a good look.

But it does make one wonder how Thao is beleaguered in Oakland while Trump, a/k/a CFDT34 (my shorthand for “Convicted Felon Donald Trump, 34 guilty verdicts”), is leading in some national presidential polls.

THAO: “I AM INNOCENT”

For five days, Thao was silent, but on Monday, she came out firing her best shot.

“I have done nothing wrong,” Thao said at a news conference. “I can tell you with confidence that this investigation is not about me. I have not been charged with a crime, and I am confident that I will not be charged with [a] crime because I am innocent.”

Thao said she was seeking answers from the U.S. Attorney as to why she wasn’t “offered the opportunity to cooperate voluntarily.”

Good question. Unless they thought she was hiding something.

Thao addressed the shooting last Wednesday first with sympathy, then pivoted to how she wasn’t going to be distracted from the real issues of Oakland–such as safety or the selling of the Oakland Coliseum to a Black-owned group.

But she went back to questioning the timing of last week’s events.

“I want to know more about the handful of billionaires from San Francisco and Piedmont who are hell bent on running me out of office,” she said, questioning how the recall announcement and the raid seemed orchestrated with the media, especially the right-wing media, “to fan the flames and bend the facts to shape a narrative.”

Thao didn’t elaborate or provide any evidence, but she said it wouldn’t have happened the way it did “if I was rich, if I had gone to elite public schools, or if I had come from money.”

Then she charged again, without evidence. “Former elected officials are sitting safely in their houses in the hills right now with campaign finance violations piling up,” Thao said, suggesting a double standard. “They will never face this indignity.”

Thao segued into how she knows this from growing up poor in America, where one feels “injustice in every bone in your body. Knowing if you cry out and demand for answers you will do nothing but cement the judgment they have for you deep in their minds.”

It was an attempt to rebuild empathy with her fellow constituents. “I see you,” she said. “I really see you.”

It’s a great story. Thao has used it before to bond with Oaklanders who can relate to her, the woman who ran away from an abusive relationship while still pregnant at 16; who worked her way as a single mom through junior college, then UC Berkeley.

The fact is while the political moment is tough, Thao has faced worse in her less than model minority early life.

“When my parents came to this country fleeing genocide, they never could have imagined that their daughter would one day be mayor of Oakland,” she said in closing. “I am my ancestors’ wildest dreams. And I am your mayor, Mayor Sheng Thao.”

But for how much longer? The story is good. But is her story enough?

Trump, the convicted felon, has "friends" who see him as a winner and shower him with millions of dollars and loyal support. Thao was voted in through RCV, ranked-choice voting. It exposes a fallacy of the cost-saving voting method. Thao was most people’s No. 2 and won. She was never seen as a pure No. 1.

Maybe that’s why few allies are standing up behind her now. The Oakland NAACP and even one Asian group are calling for her to resign.

But Thao, a fighter, remains true to her story and hopes that will help the first Hmong American mayor of a major city overcome the politics of the day.

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NOTE: I will talk about this column and other matters on “Emil Amok’s Takeout,” my AAPI micro-talk show. Live @2p Pacific. Livestream on Facebook; my YouTube channel; and Twitter. Catch the recordings on www.amok.com.