By Kyle Ching, 2025 CLA Intern
Let me tell you about an immensely valuable day that I had thanks to the CAUSE Leadership Academy and their placement of me as an intern with LA City Councilmember Ysabel Jurado.
I started my day at Terasaki Budokan, a community center and public gymnasium in Little Tokyo. Councilmember Jurado had committed to speaking at an event titled “AAPI Leaders in Solidarity Against Terrorizing ICE Raids” later in the day, and I had gone early to help the organizers set up. There, I worked with members of the Terasaki Budokan team and the AAPI Equity Alliance to provide physical support in setting up chairs, the stage, and sound systems.
As people started arriving at the press conference, I got the chance to meet so many inspiring leaders in the API community. For example, one of my fellow CAUSE interns Esther Lian introduced me to Assemblymember Mike Fong, for whom she was interning—he represents AD 49, a majority Asian American state legislative districts in the San Gabriel Valley.
Assemblymember Fong kicked off the speeches at the press conference by talking about the importance of standing with the Latino community to combat hate and violence. He said that, in the wake of the pandemic and anti-Asian hate crimes, Asian Americans understand what it is like to be the victims of violence and prejudice and therefore must stand with the Latino community against the vile actions of ICE. Councilmember Jurado pointed out that Asian Americans, too, have been the victims of ICE raids, and Councilmember Nithya Raman highlighted how undocumented Southeast and South Asian have been deported and torn apart from their families. There were over ten different speeches, but I was impressed by how united this diverse group of AAPI leaders was in their denunciation of the current administration’s actions.
After the press conference, I made my way back to City Hall, where I talked with Councilmember Jurado’s communications director about how small businesses in Downtown LA had seen their sales plummet in the wake of ICE raids. The councilmember’s office had actively spent the past two weeks doing outreach to small businesses across her district, and in this vein, I was assigned to make a reel highlighting Café Dulce, a small business in Little Tokyo.
I spent the next few hours interviewing Café Dulce’s customers and their staff, filming Councilmember Jurado trying Café Dulce’s sweet treats, and putting together a one-minute reel for her Instagram. The experience, however small, was valuable to me because it gave me a chance to engage with Councilmember Jurado’s community one-on-one and see the type of direct outreach she prioritizes in her actions.
This day, to me, highlighted the core values and goals that CAUSE embodies as an organization: API leadership, API solidarity, and direct outreach to API communities that has historically been lacking among our elected officials. Over my first two weeks at CAUSE, I have been inspired as I have seen a reality where API communities stand up for themselves and for others. I cannot wait to see what CAUSE shows me next.
The views and opinions expressed in this publication are those of the author and do not reflect the views or positions of CAUSE or the CAUSE network.
The CAUSE Leadership Academy (CLA) for students is a nine-week, paid, internship program that prepares college undergraduates to lead and advocate for the Asian Pacific Islander community on their campuses and beyond.