Leading API Coalitions Express Severe
Disappointment Over Supreme Court Decision to Uphold
Prop 8 Ruling in CA Asian Week
June 3, 2009
Daily Dose & Announcements
API Equality and
API EqualityLA, two organizations that have worked
single-mindedly to build public support for same-sex
marriage in the Asian and Pacific Islander
communities since 2004, are severely disappointed
that the Supreme Court will uphold a proposition
revoking marriage rights for lesbian, gay, bisexual,
and transgender (LGBT) people.
“We are extremely saddened that the Court saw it
fit to take away rights from a minority group,” said
Khanh Nguyen, a staff attorney at API Legal
Outreach, “Essentially, the court has set forth a
dangerous precedent where a simple majority vote is
enough to exclude a minority group from equal
protection under the state constitution.”
“As Asian and Pacific Islanders, we are no
strangers to the perils of selective justice,”
stated Tawal Panyacosit, Director of API Equality.
“From bans on immigration and interracial marriage,
our community has often been the victim of such
discrimination. We cannot stand silent as the
Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender members of
our communities come under fire from the same sort
of prejudice that has so often hurt our families.”
According to the Williams Institute, an LGBT
think tank based at UCLA, there are approximately
66,000 LGBT Asian and Pacific Islanders living in
California, the largest population in the nation.
