| Analysis: Bush Presidency Good, Mostly Bad for Asian Americans |
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| Written by Connie Zheng | |
| Saturday, 21 February 2009 | |
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Photo: Telfair H. Brown/US Coast Guard Former President George W. Bush leaves behind a checkered legacy for Asian Americans. He appointed more Asian Americans to his administration than any other president; community health centers received record federal financing; and many scholars lauded his foreign policy initiatives toward Asia. However, these achievements were weighed down by the detrimental impact of his policies on civil rights, immigration and education. Poor Leadership and Policies Following 9/11, hate crimes, racial profiling and constitutional violations ballooned against South Asians, often mistaken to be of Middle Eastern or Muslim origin. The Bush administration's poor leadership and policies further exacerbated the problem. "People might say the increase is because of 9/11, and not because of Bush, but the leadership of the country plays a big role in the example it sets to the rest of the country," says Bill O. Hing, law professor at the University of California, Davis. "When the US lashed out on Muslims after 9/11, it set a bad example to the country on how to react and treat people of different countries." Another example of poor leadership was the administration's failure to reform federal hate crime legislation, says Priya Murthy, policy director at South Asian Americans Leading Together (SAALT), a national civil and immigrant rights organization for South Asians. While federal policies aimed at combating hate crimes exist, they are often neither fully enforced nor adequately comprehensive. With current federal law, protection for hate crime victims is limited only to incidents where the victim attempts to engage in a federally protected activity, such as voting, attending school or working. In addition, since the 9/11 terror attacks, a series of policies have directly targeted South Asians. Airport security, immigration enforcement agencies, and state and local law enforcement have singled out South Asians for additional scrutiny and investigation. Profiling based on ethnicity, national origin and religion has risen and South Asians have reported higher incidents of profiling. "A lot of racial profiling has been disproportionately done with an eye toward the Muslim and South Asian communities," Murthy says. "Looking back at the past eight years, a slew of different policies implemented by the Bush administration have taken the lead in seeing the South Asian community as enemy." Immigration Reform After 9/11, the FBI began to indefinitely detain individuals suspected of ties to terrorism, unfairly targeting South Asians as a result. South Asian immigrants have also been increasingly subjected to harassment by immigration officials while in immigration detention, with Sikh detainees reportedly unable to practice their faiths or wear religious attire during detention, according to SAALT. In 2002, the Department of Justice established a special registration program, formally known as the National Security Entry-Exit Registration System, which required male noncitizens on nonimmigrant visas from Muslim countries, including Bangladesh and Pakistan, to register with immigration authorities. Consequently, many South Asian immigrants were deported for failing to register or if they were discovered to be out of status. The Asian American Justice Center found that South Asian Americans who filed for permanent resident status or naturalization after 9/11 experienced longer delays with their applications because they were characterized to be Islamic fanatics supporting terrorism. These unfair policies "come down from government protocol," Murthy says. "They're explicitly mentioned in the laws to treat people from different countries specifically. South Asians, Muslims and Arabs must be treated differently under the law." Asian American Students Left Behind The No Child Left Behind Act, Bush's prized education law, has assigned insufficient funding to bilingual language programs, causing poorer test performances and higher numbers of dropouts for Asian American students. Asian Americans constitute 12 percent of all English language learners in the nation. In 2007, the Democratic Policy Committee criticized Bush's budget for not assigning enough funds for English language development programs, widening the achievement gap between English language learners and other students. With a dearth of Asian-language bilingual programs and language development programs available, English language learners are forced into English-only classrooms. Although their lessons focus on English language acquisition, on English standardized tests they are tested on English language arts that measure literacy development. They perform poorly on standardized tests as a result of being tested on content they have not yet learned in a language they have not yet mastered, according to the Asian American Legal Defense and Education Fund (AALDEF). AALDEF has also found that some schools allow Asian American students who are English language learners to drop out or even intentionally push them out for fear they will score poorly on mandated standardized tests and lower the amount of federal funding the school receives. These students have either been forced into GED programs, allowed to drop out with little or no intervention, or have been expelled under questionable circumstances. In one instance, Asian Americans in Lowell, MA, made up nearly 43 percent of the high school students who were removed, pushed out or dropped out due to truancy-related issues that the schools failed to address between 2005 and 2006. Frustrated by the lack of support in mainstream classrooms, many English language learners fail to attend class, perform poorly or drop out. Record APA Appointments However, Bush did leave some positive marks on the Asian American community. He appointed more than 400 Asian Americans to positions in his administration, the most ever, including two cabinet secretaries and more than 150 positions that required Senate confirmation. More than 20 Asian Americans, a record number, served in the White House under Bush. In a first, Bush appointed two Asian Americans to a presidential cabinet: Secretary of Labor Elaine Chao and Secretary of Transportation Norman Mineta. Chao, the first Chinese American and first Asian American woman to be appointed to the cabinet, was the only cabinet member to serve the entire Bush presidency. Chao appointed more Asian Americans than ever to positions in the Labor Department. Mineta, who resigned in 2006 after five years as secretary, became the longest-serving transportation secretary and was the only Democratic cabinet member in the Bush administration. Benefiting Community Health Centers During his 2000 presidential campaign, Bush pledged to expand and create more community health centers as a centerpiece to his "compassionate conservatism" platform. The President's Health Center Initiative in 2002 benefited many underserved Asian American communities, though in general, health care costs and the number of uninsured Americans were rising. Analysis of funding for five prominent Asian American community health centers found that federal financing increased from 2000 through 2008.
The Institute of Medicine has noted the vital role health centers play in addressing racial and ethnic health disparities. Community health centers primarily serve low-income individuals (over 90 percent of patients) and minorities (two-thirds of patients). The Association of Asian Pacific Community Health Organizations has credited the Bush administration's initiatives in dramatically expanding community health center care, enabling them to provide culturally appropriate and comprehensive care that fit their patients' individual language and cultural needs. Foreign Policy Victor Cha, Georgetown professor and director of Asian studies, disputes the conventional wisdom that the Bush administration's policies in Asia have failed. "Relations with Asian allies have deepened under eight years of Bush," Cha says. By achieving a cooperative and pragmatic relationship with China and by expanding and strengthening the alliance with Japan at the same time Japan and China were improving their bilateral relations, a US-China-Japan partnership has emerged that strengthens regional stability. The United States has strengthened its defense relationship with South Korea. On North Korea, the United States successfully facilitated the shutdown of North Korea's nuclear program in 2007. Bush came into office viewing China as a strategic competitor. Over the course of his presidency, Bush shifted in his approach, instead going for a more results-driven and practical approach that strengthened the prospects of peace and stability. US-China relations have been at their best since the two countries normalized relations, says L. Ling-chi Wang, professor emeritus in Asian American studies at the University of California, Berkeley. Fareed Zakaria, noted foreign policy scholar, journalist and author, has credited Bush to have sided with China on the issue of Taiwan in a more direct manner than any previous president, enabling better US-China relations. In fact, Wang regards Bush's stance on Taiwan as one of his presidency's few accomplishments. "Bush has succeeded in doing what all previous presidents were unable to do - removing Taiwan as a thorn in the flesh," Wang says. "It was the only thing he did that did not go down the drain." During his presidency, Bush indicated strongly to Taiwan that the United States would not support Taiwan should then-President Chen Shui-bian try to push for independence. "Bush realized Chen Shui-bian was trying to provoke a conflict, potentially a war, between the US and mainland China and Bush put an end to that," Wang says. By siding with the Chinese, Bush, in effect, removed one of the biggest thorns between the two countries' relations. At the same time, the removal has strengthened the unity of the Chinese American community at home and significantly reduced the tension between the China and Taiwan, Wang says. "Tension between China and Taiwan directly impacts the Chinese American community because the community cannot be united on any issue as a result of this conflict," Wang says. "In the past, the tension has been there because US containment policies encouraged Taiwan to provoke China, leading to erupting tensions." Going Out on Low Note Bush came into office in 2000 pledging reforms in social security, health care and immigration, but he left the White House failing to deliver on many of his promises. "Clearly he's leaving office as one of the least popular presidents," Cha says. "There may be a different history written about George Bush in terms of what he did for the country after 9/11, but in terms of Asian Americans, there's been no other president before Bush who appointed two Asian Americans at the secretary level for two consecutive terms." Time will tell on how Bush is remembered. "If you look at approval ratings for past presidents, the real history of how American presidents is not how they are remembered two weeks before they leave office, but how they are remembered 30 years from now," Cha says. Connie Zheng is a writer living in San Francisco. She is also a committee member of the San Francisco Asian Heritage Street Celebration. If you would like to comment on this story, go to a discussion board on our blog. |
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