Support for LAist comes from
Audience-funded nonprofit news
Stay Connected
Audience-funded nonprofit news
Listen

Share This

News

California Assembly Apologizes to Japanese Americans for WWII Wrongs

()

Congress has cut federal funding for public media — a $3.4 million loss for LAist. We count on readers like you to protect our nonprofit newsroom. Become a monthly member and sustain local journalism.

The California State Assembly unanimously passed a resolution Thursday morning apologizing for how it treated Japanese Americans in World War II.

That's when more than 110,000 people were incarcerated at camps around the country, including two in California: Manzanar and Tule Lake.

"It's clearly the right thing to do," said House Speaker Anthony Rendon of the resolution.

And a reminder, Rendon said, to do better.

Support for LAist comes from

"We need to make sure that the actions we take on this floor are not acts of racism against our own citizens, or racism against others for that matter," Rendon said.

During the war, the Assembly fed xenophobia by pushing for Japanese American dual citizens to give up their U.S citizenship, and for "disloyal" Japanese American state employees to be dismissed.

Joyce Nakamura Okazaki was at her home in Seal Beach on Thursday when she heard of passage of the resolution sponsored by Democratic Assemblymember Al Muratsuchi of Torrance.

Okazaki was seven years old when her family was sent from their home in Boyle Heights to the Manzanar camp in the Owens Valley. Now 85, she remembers boarding a train with her mother.

"I said, 'Why can’t we go to Union Station?'" Okazaki recalled. "But she never answered me. You know, I was just a kid."

She felt badly for her parents, college graduates whose lives were put on hold.

"They lost their freedom, their place that they lived," Okazaki said. "Their future was kind of limited."

Support for LAist comes from

Okazaki and her mother and sister were famously captured in one of the portraits Ansel Adams took during a trip to Manzanar.

After leaving Manzanar in 1944, her parents never spoke of the experience, Okazaki said. But she thinks they would have appreciated the apology if they were still alive.

"It's long overdue," she said.

Next, a similar resolution from state Sen. Richard Pan, D-Sacramento, will be going before the Senate's judiciary committee.

GO DEEPER:

As Editor-in-Chief of our newsroom, I’m extremely proud of the work our top-notch journalists are doing here at LAist. We’re doing more hard-hitting watchdog journalism than ever before — powerful reporting on the economy, elections, climate and the homelessness crisis that is making a difference in your lives. At the same time, it’s never been more difficult to maintain a paywall-free, independent news source that informs, inspires, and engages everyone.

Simply put, we cannot do this essential work without your help. Federal funding for public media has been clawed back by Congress and that means LAist has lost $3.4 million in federal funding over the next two years. So we’re asking for your help. LAist has been there for you and we’re asking you to be here for us.

We rely on donations from readers like you to stay independent, which keeps our nonprofit newsroom strong and accountable to you.

No matter where you stand on the political spectrum, press freedom is at the core of keeping our nation free and fair. And as the landscape of free press changes, LAist will remain a voice you know and trust, but the amount of reader support we receive will help determine how strong of a newsroom we are going forward to cover the important news from our community.

Please take action today to support your trusted source for local news with a donation that makes sense for your budget.

Thank you for your generous support and believing in independent news.

Chip in now to fund your local journalism
A row of graphics payment types: Visa, MasterCard, Apple Pay and PayPal, and  below a lock with Secure Payment text to the right
(
LAist
)

Trending on LAist