Asian Americans Advancing Justice Los Angeles

Survivor and Family Empower (SAFE)
AJSOCAL has provided services and support to domestic violence survivors since the organization’s inception, assisting low-income and limited English-speaking survivors of domestic violence, and other victims of crime with a range of family matters, including obtaining restraining orders, child custody, support orders, divorce, parentage actions, and to achieve legal status without the help of the abuser through laws like the Violence Against Women Act (VAWA) or the U-Visa, designed to help victims of crime. In 2022, SAFE worked on 824 new cases, of which attorneys assisted with 199 domestic violence restraining orders.
Citizenship and Immigration
AJSOCAL has provided free legal assistance with naturalization and immigration relief such as adjustment of status, representation in immigration court, family-based petitions, VAWA, T and U visas, asylum, deportation defense, and Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) to its client base of low-income, non- and limited-English speaking AAPIs residing in Los Angeles and Orange Counties. In 2022, of the 1,430 clients seeking naturalization assistance, our OC and LA offices completed 822 N-400 applications. Last year, our citizenship team saved our eligible clients $386,895 by filing fee waivers, as the application process costs a minimum of $725.
AJSOCAL remains one of the only organizations nationwide that is a resource to AAPI immigrants at this scale because of its wide-ranging Asian-language capacity. Due to economic and linguistic barriers, most clients have little to no access to alternative immigration and citizenship services. Support will help continue the agency’s ongoing immigrant integration efforts through the provision of programs and services to AAPI communities and ensure these communities have continued access to a variety of immigration support. Last year, the team worked on 1,257 immigration cases comprised of over 100 DACA renewals, 15 removal defense representation cases, over 25 victim of crime cases for survivors of domestic violence, over 40 humanitarian relief cases, and over 60 family reunification cases.
Housing Protection
AAPIs facing intersecting challenges of housing security and race-based discrimination are receiving much-needed legal services focused on housing protection and eviction defense, especially those who are limited English proficient and/or low-income tenants. Throughout 2022, AJSOCAL’s housing protection team hosted monthly virtual housing clinics, during which attendees received one-on-one legal advice from AJSOCAL staff attorneys and pro bono Asian Pacific American Bar Association attorneys.
The AJSOCAL team disseminated flyers in several Asian languages that featured information about tenant rights via both digital and in-person outreach at community events. The team also provided YouTube TV educational interviews to the communities on housing and evictions. Clients receive consultations and direct legal services, such as drafting letters, legal pleadings, and representation in court for eviction cases. Through this effort, over 424 cases were filed with 166 resulting in court representation.

AAPIs continue to face serious challenges accessing healthcare including linguistic and cultural barriers, mixed-immigration and undocumented status, and low health literacy rates. AJSOCAL partners with a variety of CBOs to lead health insurance enrollment and healthcare navigation within CA, and leads the Health Justice Network, a statewide collaborative of over 50 community-based organizations and healthcare providers, to educate and enroll difficult-to-reach community members, including limited-English proficient persons, immigrants, and the remaining uninsured into Medi-Cal, Covered CA, and safety net programs. In the past two years, AJSOCAL and its partners helped 2,916 individuals enroll and renew into Covered CA and 6,936 individuals into Medi-Cal.

Additionally, AJSOCAL is one of 11 organizations that sit on the Health4All Steering Committee, leading the Health4All campaign. In 2022, AJSOCAL, along with 179 other organizations in the larger Health4All campaign, successfully advocated for Health4All, which will expand Medi-Cal coverage to include all Californians, regardless of immigration status and regardless of age, by 2024. 

Policy

In the past year, AJSOCAL has been able to continue advancing education equity and immigrant rights for the Asian American and Pacific Islander (AAPI) community through policy advocacy. Two key accomplishments include the successful advocacy of expanded dual immersion programs and IDs for all. AJSOCAL’s policy team won $5 million in the California State Budget for Asian-language bilingual teacher education programs in California to address the dramatic shortage of accredited dual immersion language teachers that limits the education options for Asian language speaking students.

The team also successfully advocated for expanding ID access for all, regardless of immigration status, benefiting the elderly, people with disabilities, as well as the undocumented population. Without access to government-issued identification, these groups are often unable to secure rental agreements, employment or health benefits, so are forced to live in very unstable circumstances. Additionally, for incarcerated individuals who do not earn income while imprisoned, lack of identification is one of the largest barriers to successful reentry into the community as IDs are essential to securing housing, social services, and other benefits. Through support letters, traditional and social media outreach/education campaigns aimed at elected officials and the public, and community outreach, AJSOCAL was able to make real California IDs for all.

AJSOCAL's Demographic Research Project (DRP) spearheads a deeper understanding of AAPI communities through research, analysis, technical assistance, and creation of demographic profiles using the most recent Census and other community data. DRP has produced groundbreaking demographic research reports, meant to increase knowledge and foster dialogue about AAPI communities.
The COVID-19 pandemic has had tremendous economic and social impacts on AAPI communities. We have seen how the dramatic rise in anti-Asian hate incidents spurred by rhetoric seeking to blame the pandemic on China and Chinese people has impacted thousands of AAPIs across the country who have been subject to verbal harassment and physical assaults. Because of cultural stigmas, language barriers, fear of deportation, and shame – countless individuals are not seeking the help they need and do not know how to navigate the legal and social services available to them.
In order to address these challenges, AJSOCAL is building a website with a national map of anti-Asian discrimination incidents and resources. This website aims to raise awareness of hate incidents and the spread and pattern of where they are occurring, as well as connect survivors and/or their advocates with resources to address their needs, searchable by zip code, language and type of service needed.
Throughout 2022, DRP has engaged with community-based partners to inform them of this project and to collect their information for the resource directory. Many expressed the need and excitement for a searchable, national resource directory to connect community members when they need assistance that extends beyond their usual referral sources. As such, the website domain, AsianResourceHub.org, which went live at the end of October 2022, is currently active with a short list of Asian Americans Advancing Justice grantees (over 50 community-based organizations) that provide direct services or policy advocacy and civic engagement. These services include, but are not limited to, behavioral health and counseling, healthcare, legal, and youth programing.
Additionally, the directory allows for filtering by type of service, language(s) supported, and location. At this time, we are sharing the site to the listed partners and by word of mouth to save for a bigger announcement when the whole project is ready to launch. This will give us the opportunity to gather feedback on the resource directory, its utility, and how to improve it for user friendliness. Participating pilot organizations are also being asked to help build the resource directory further by referring other organizations to be listed. This year we plan to add data visualizations and data narratives, as well as a Take Action page.