Hate-filled assault personal for Yang
An emotional Andrew Yang, the top Asian American in the mayoral race, said one of the latest victims in a string of hate-filled attacks “could easily have been my mother.”
“These incidents are becoming all too commonplace,” said Yang, speaking out Tuesday against the latest round of disturbing assaults on Asian Americans in the city. “They’re heartbreaking. There’s no place for this in New York City.”
Yang, handing out groceries at a food pantry at St. Ann & the Holy Trinity Church in Brooklyn Heights, found himself addressing the issue yet again.
In recent days, the candidate offered emotional speeches in Times Square and at the Rev. Al Sharpton’s headquarters in Harlem. But an attack on a 65-year-old Asian American woman who was beaten and seriously injured Monday near Yang’s Hell’s Kitchen home struck a particular chord.
“Like so many other people, I woke up to a horrifying video of an Asian woman being horribly beaten for no other reason than her race,” said Yang, the son of Taiwanese immigrants, who ran for president last year. “An elderly Asian woman walking the streets of Hell’s Kitchen could easily have been my mother, because that’s where we live. And so when I saw this video, that is who I thought of.”
The personal connection was reminiscent of a poignant reflection from then-President Obama, on the 2012 shooting death of Trayvon Martin, an unarmed Black teenager who was gunned down in Florida by a neighborhood watch coordinator.
“If I had a son, he’d look like Trayvon,” Obama said. “When I think about this boy, I think about my own kids.”
Yang’s latest remarks came on the heels of two caught-on-camera incidents that emerged Monday: the assault in Midtown and a beating of an Asian-American man on a J train in Brooklyn.
It wasn’t immediately clear when the subway attack took place, but the ambush on
W. 43rd St. occurred late Monday morning, according to authorities, and drew immediate outcry.
Cops said the attacker told the woman, “F—- you. You don’t belong here.” An apartment security guard appeared to close a door on the wounded woman rather than assisting her.
“What’s worse?” tweeted State Sen. John Liu (D-Queens) on Monday night. “The attacker who stands by nonchalantly after brutalizing Asian woman, or the men inside who shut the door on her?” He added that “we are human beings!”
Yang said that the response to the beating showed “exactly the opposite of what we need here in New York City.”
“We need to be able to come together, help each other and provide assistance when someone clearly needs it,” Yang said.
The attacks are just snapshots amid a spike in reported hate crimes. In New York City, the tally of anti-Asian hate crimes reported to the cops climbed from three in 2019 to 28 in 2020, according to an analysis from California State University, San Bernardino.
The shootings of women of Asian descent in Georgia this month brought a new focus on the rising violence, a trend that follows President Donald Trump’s xenophobic rhetoric during the pandemic. The former commander-in-chief sometimes called COVID-19 the “kung flu” and the “China virus.”
Yang said Asian Americans in New York should continue to go out into their neighborhoods. “We can’t let fear win,” he said.
But he suggested walking in pairs, and he repeated calls on Mayor Bill de Blasio to ramp up funding for the NYPD’s Asian Hate Crimes Task Force.
He said he wasn’t sure whether an elevated NYPD presence in Asian American communities this month has made an impact. But he noted that a beefed-up police footprint can help provide a sense of security.
“If I’m the next mayor, I will take these hate crimes with the seriousness that they merit,” Yang said. “People should be able to walk the streets of New York without fear — particularly based upon their ethnicity or race.”