www.csua.org/u/ixx -> www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2007/06/16/MNG84QGJ8F1.DTL
FBI searches SF supervisor's office (5/18) The media and City Hall leaders want San Francisco Supervisor Ed Jew out of office because he is Chinese American and politically conservative, loyal supporters of the beleaguered supervisor claimed Friday. Separate groups held a rally at City Hall on Friday and met over tea in Chinatown to voice their support for Jew and decry what they see as persecution of a man who has yet to have his day in court. Calvin Louie, president of the Chinese American Democratic Club of which Jew is a board member, helped organize the rally. About 40 people held signs reading "Political Persecution" and "Double Standards." "The press has already prosecuted him, convicted him, and now they want to hang him," said Louie, Jew's friend and accountant. Jew was charged Tuesday with nine felonies related to the allegation he didn't live at a Sunset District address he used as a candidate for office, to vote in city elections and to apply for a driver's license. He also is being investigated by the FBI on suspicion of soliciting or extorting a bribe from businessmen who gave him $40,000 in cash. But one Chinese American leader said Friday that Jew's legal troubles are of his own making and have nothing to do with race or politics. Rose Pak, a powerhouse at the Chinatown Chamber of Commerce, recently called for Jew's resignation and said his supporters are spouting baseless conspiracy theories. "Our community leaders should not bury their head in the sand and try to blame it on somebody else," Pak said. "I wish these people would stop talking so everybody doesn't think we're all morons." It wasn't just Chinese Americans sticking up for Jew at the rally Friday. Joe O'Donoghue, former head of the Residential Builders Association, said Jew should stay in office and fight what he characterized as a media witch hunt. "If you're an immigrant or a minority, you're a second-class citizen in this country." Rita Goldberger, a Sunset resident and a Green Party member, said she just about always disagrees politically with Jew, a former member of the Republican Party. But she thinks it's unfair that several of Jew's more liberal colleagues on the Board of Supervisors are calling for his resignation. She also contended Mayor Gavin Newsom's recent scandal -- over his admission to sleeping with his campaign manager's wife and having an alcohol problem -- disappeared from the pages of local newspapers because he, too, is more liberal than Jew. "Nowhere, because the media and his powerful friends made it go way." Nathan Ballard, the mayor's press secretary, countered, "Anyone who thinks the mayor's scandal didn't get a lot of attention must have been out of the country when it was happening." As the rally played out at City Hall, about 30 of Jew's backers -- most of them from the Chinese Six Companies, a powerful group of business leaders -- met at the New Asia Restaurant in Chinatown. Albert Chin, ex-president of the Chinese Six Companies, of which Jew is also a member, helped organize the meeting and lamented what he views as unfair treatment of Jew because of his race. It's racial -- there's no question in my mind," said Chin. Asian Americans are often called "the sleeping giant" in San Francisco politics because they make up a third of city residents, but don't have much political representation. Jew is the only Asian American on the Board of Supervisors. "This might be the first time we wake up the giant," Chin said. As for most Chinese Americans in San Francisco, they need answers from Jew himself, said David Lee, director of the Chinese American Voter Education Committee and an instructor in political science at San Francisco State University. Charges of racism from Jew's political allies won't sway them into Jew's camp, Lee said. Rather, he said, they need to hear a credible explanation about the circumstances that have led to the investigations from Jew himself. "People want to hear from the supervisor and not just his friends," Lee said.
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