Outgoing Cabinet Secretary Christopher P. Lu talks about leaving the Administration —
Outgoing Cabinet Secretary Christopher P. Lu talks about leaving the Administration — and explains why he thinks Obama is still the “first Asian American President.”
Five years ago, when a one-term Senator from Illinois was in the process of stunning fellow Senator and presumptive nominee Hillary Rodham Clinton by seizing presidential front-runner status away from the former First Lady, I interviewed Christopher P. Lu, Senator Obama’s legislative director and Harvard Law School classmate, on an unusual topic:
In 1988, author Toni Morrison had dubbed Bill Clinton America’s “first black president,” detailing the ways in which his personal narrative dovetailed with that of African Americans. Having read Obama’s memoir, “Dreams from My Father,” it struck me that his life experiences and worldview bore an uncanny resemblance to my own, and those of many of my friends. So — if Obama were elected — could the first actual black president, born and raised in Honolulu with a long stint in Jakarta, be the first figurative Asian American president?
At the time, Lu was measured in his response, calling the Senator a kind of “human Rorschach test” whose diverse background and personal charisma invited others to project themselves upon him. And yet, he acknowledged that many aspects of Obama’s story would resonate particularly with Asian Americans: “He talks about feeling like somewhat of an outsider; about coming to terms with his self-identity; about figuring out how to reconcile the values from his unique heritage with those of larger U.S. society. These are tensions and conflicts that play out in the lives of all of us children of immigrants.”