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New York Times: Asian Americans Grapple With Tide of Attacks: ‘We Need Our Safety Back’
Younger Asian American leaders want to rely less on traditional policing solutions, while more traditional cultural and business groups favor them.
By Jeffery C. Mays, Dana Rubinstein and Grace Ashford/New York Times
She was attacked as she swept up in front of her Queens home in November, beaten in the head with a rock so viciously that she was in a coma for weeks.
As GuiYing Ma battled for her life, other attacks on Asian women followed. A mentally ill man pushed Michelle Alyssa Go to her death at Times Square subway station in January. The next month, Christina Yuna Lee was followed to her apartment in Chinatown and fatally stabbed more than 40 times.
After each instance, Asian American groups and elected officials from across the political spectrum came out in force, demanding that more be done to address violence against members of their community.
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The fault lines over crime were visible in last year’s city election. An exit poll of nearly 1,400 Asian American voters conducted by the Asian American Legal Defense and Education Fund after the June mayoral primary found that anti-Asian violence polled just one percentage point below the top issue, which was jobs and the economy.