Dunwoody, October 2, 2026 – Asian American Pacific Islander community members gathered at an invitation-only event at a private residence to meet and network with Senator Tammy Duckworth of Illinois and Mayor Aftab Pureval of Cincinnati. In addition to the two leaders, Georgia’s AAPI legislative leaders, including Rep. Sam Park, Rep. Michelle Au, and Rep. Long Tran, were in attendance.
The event was co-organized by Shekar Narasimhan, Founder and Chairman, Asian American victory Fund and Lani Wong, a longtime Democrat activist.
Both leaders shared their insights and stressed the importance of AAPI community members voting in the upcoming midterm election on Nov. 3.
“Our cultures are our superpower”
Senator Duckworth, an Iraq War veteran and the first Thai American in the U.S. Senate, told the crowd she did not speak English until age 8 and grew up translating for her mother. She urged Asian Americans to embrace, not hide, what makes them different.
“Our cultures are our superpower, and we’ve not recognized that,” she said.
She warned against accepting “respect that is contingent on keeping quiet.” She described holding up President Joe Biden’s nominees to push for an Asian American cabinet secretary. Then she told the crowd that political power comes from turning out.
“When you are the margin of victory in Texas, and in Georgia, and all around the country, you have power,” she said.
Senator Duckworth explained that her PAC, Perimeter PAC, is named for a young crew member who held off enemy fighters after her helicopter was shot down in Iraq. She thanked the volunteers for “standing the perimeter” and urged them to vote in local races too.
“It’s a library board that decides which books are banned,” she said. “It is the PTA that decides what is taught in our schools.”
“We don’t need a miracle”
Rep. Michelle Au introduced Mayor Pureval and said her constituents had been asking since his 2024 visit, “When is the hot mayor coming back to Georgia?”
Pureval, the son of a Punjabi father and a Tibetan refugee mother, is Cincinnati’s first Asian American mayor. He opened with a laugh line.
“I am very, very Asian. I’m 6’3″, but I’m all Ohio, baby,” he said.
He praised metro Atlanta’s AAPI communities, from Buford Highway to Chamblee, and joked, “Look at sweet tea. Neither sugar nor tea is from the South. It’s from Asia, baby.”
Pureval criticized President Donald Trump for scapegoating immigrants and Asian Americans. He called Trump’s push to restrict birthright citizenship personal, because his own parents were not yet citizens when he was born.
“In America, a baby’s future should be bigger than a president’s prejudice,” he said.
He closed with turnout math. Georgia was decided by fewer than 12,000 votes in 2020, and the state has roughly 320,000 eligible Asian American voters.
“To win elections in Georgia, we don’t need a miracle,” he said. “We need one in every 28 of us to bring one more voter to the polls.”
Both speakers urged the crowd to reelect Sen. Jon Ossoff, and Pureval also backed Keisha Lance Bottoms for governor.
“In one generation, my family went from being refugees to now the mayor of Cincinnati,” Pureval said. “We’ve got 32 days to preserve that dream for the next generation.”
