One of the key intellectual assets of KAPA is our Advisory Board, which is comprised of well-known experts in the fields of politics, law, business, academia, and community relations. We look to them for strategic guidance based on their many years of experience, vast network of contacts and belief in our mission.
Mr. Kurt Bardella is currently an LA Times & USA Today Contributor who appears regularly on MSNBC programs such as Morning Joe, Deadline WH with Nicolle Wallace, and The ReidOut. He previously worked as the spokesperson and senior advisor for Republicans on the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee under the leadership of Rep. Darrell Issa (R-CA). During his time at the committee, Kurt choreographed the media strategy for investigations related to the 2008 financial crisis, the bailouts of financial institutions like Merrill Lynch and Bank of America, probes into corporate conglomerates such as Toyota, BP, and Johnson & Johnson. Kurt first came to Washington D.C. in 2006 to serve as the Communications Director & spokesperson for Rep. Brian Bilbray (R-CA) and later Senator Olympia Snowe (R-ME). In his early days, Kurt was based in California where he worked for members of the California State Legislature, for the San Diego City Council, and for a local CBS affiliate as a producer and on-air reporter. Kurt is also the Creator and Publisher of the influential country music media platform the “Morning Hangover.” You can follow him on Twitter @KurtBardella
John Chiang serves as a member of the Board of Directors of Apollo Medical Holdings and Aegis. In addition, he serves on the advisory boards of Pasadena Private Finance, Calyx Peak, Faraday Future and Adept. From 2015-2019, John Chiang served as California’s 33re State Treasurer. As the State’s banker, he oversaw trillions of dollars in annual transactions, managed a $75 billion investment portfolio, and was the nation’s largest issuer of municipal bonds.
Prior to being elected Treasurer, Chiang served as State Controller from 2007-2014. During the Great Recession, he took steps to preserve cash to meet obligations to education and bond holders. His cash management decisions- which included delaying payments and issuing IOUs – were instrumental in keeping the State’s credit rating from plunging into junk status, and his actions saved taxpayers millions of dollars. Additionally, Chiang aggressively used his audit programs to identify more than $9.5 billion of fraud, waste and abuse in government programs, the most by any Controller in California’s history. In 1988, he was elected to California’s Board of Equalization and served two terms, including three years as chair.
John Chiang served as an Aspen Institute Rodel Fellow, Hunt-Kean Leadership Fellow and University of Southern California Center for the Political Future Fellow. Chiang graduated with honors from the University of South Florida with a degree in finance and received his law degree from the Georgetown University Law Center.
Mr. Tong Soo Chung started practicing law in Los Angeles, California in 1984 after graduating from the UCLA School of Law in the same year. He worked for the L.A. office of Whitman & Ransom for two years, and then started his own firm in 1986 under the name of Chung & Lim, which is now known as Limexus in L.A. In early 1994 he was appointed as a senior official at the International Trade Administration, U.S. Department of Commerce, in Washington, D.C. by President Clinton, and worked there for 7 years, promoting the interest of U.S. companies in trade and investment overseas. He joined Yulchon first in 2004, and then became the Head of Invest KOREA at Kotra, the agency in charge of promotion of foreign direct investment, between 2006 and 2010. He re-joined Yulchon in 2010, and has been a foreign attorney and senior advisor, primarily doing corporate and finance-related work, and cross border trade and investment-related advisory work and dispute resolution. He has been working closely with healthcare and defense sector, and in the area of government procurement and international sanctions.
Former State Assemblyman Mike Eng currently serves as a full time Board Member of the California Unemployment Insurance Appeals Board, which consists of 5 attorneys appointed by the Governor and the State Legislature to decide thousands of legal appeals a year regarding unemployment insurance, disability insurance, and tax issues related to the workplace.
Mike previously served as Vice Chair, Los Angeles Community College Board of Trustees; Mayor of the city of Monterey Park; Vice Chair of the California Acupuncture Board; and was an immigration lawyer for 40 years. Mike started the region’s first city commission on the Environment composed of high school students and residents.
Mike served six years as a California Assemblyman during which time he chaired the influential California Assembly Committee on Banking and Finance. Mike currently is on the Faculty of California State University, Los Angeles where he teaches in the College of Business and Economics. Mike earned his Law Degree at UCLA School of Law and his Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees at the University of Hawaii.
Serving in Congress from 2001 to 2017, Honda won the 2000 Democratic nomination for the 15th District, which had once been represented by Norman Mineta. Due to redistricting after the 2010 US Census, Honda began representing the California’s 17th congressional district at the beginning of the 113th Congress on January 3, 2013. The district incorporates Silicon Valley, which is the only Asian American-majority district in the continental United States. He won again in 2014. He lost the election for California’s 17th congressional district election in 2016 to Ro Khanna.
Initially involved in education in California, he first became active in politics in 1971, when San Jose mayor Norman Mineta appointed Honda to the city’s Planning Commission. After holding other positions, Honda was elected to the Santa Clara County Board of Supervisors in 1990, and to the California State Assembly in 1996, where he served until 2001.
On the issue of comfort women, in 2007 Honda proposed US H.Res. 121, which stated that Japan should formally acknowledge, apologize, and accept historical responsibility in a clear and unequivocal manner, refute any claims that the issue of comfort women never occurred, and educate current and future generations “about this horrible crime while following the recommendations of the international community with respect to the ‘comfort women’.”
Jocelyn Hong is a recognized leader in getting her clients the results they seek at the federal level. With over 20 years of experience as a bi-partisan lobbyist. She has successfully pushed through many pieces of stand-alone legislation for her clients and fought against surprise amendments brought up during the debate of complex bills. She is the chair of the H Street Group, an informal organization of over 100 Asian American lobbyists. Jocelyn is a founding board member of the Asian American Action Fund, which is dedicated to supporting Asian Americans for elected office. Jocelyn started her career in Washington as staff for U.S. Senator John Glenn and a U.S. Congressman who served on the powerful Energy and Commerce Committee. She is a graduate of the University of Colorado Boulder.
Soo Hong is a partner at Blevins & Hong, PC and Hong & Sessions Law, LLC with multiple offices in Georgia. Soo’s main practice areas include Bankruptcy, Personal Injury, and Criminal Defense. She is the recipient of the 2015 Ross Adams Younger Lawyer Award and 2017 Attorneys to Watch in Atlanta Attorney at Law Magazine. Soo was born in Seoul, South Korea, and grew up in Georgia. Soo is a graduate of Georgia Institute of Technology and Mercer University. Soo is a 2018 graduate of the Republican Leadership for Georgia and was a candidate for Georgia State House of Representative in 2020. She is the President-Elect of the Cobb County Bar Association, serves on the board of the Gwinnett County Public Library Foundation, and a former instructor at Chattahoochee Technical College.
Ms. Hyepin Im is a former U.S. Presidential Appointee on the Board of the Corporation for National and Community Service and serves as President and Founder of Faith and Community Empowerment (formerly KCCD), a national nonprofit involved in empowering churches and nonprofits to leverage their resources by building capacity, leadership, and partnerships in economic development and serving as a bridge between the Asian American community and the greater community at large.
She serves on the Los Angeles Mayor’s Interfaith Collective, Community Advisory Board of MUFG Union Bank and Torrey Pines Bank, U.S. Army Advisory Board, the Pacific Council on International Policy, the Western Partner for the Council on Foreign Relations, and L.A. County Supervisor’s Empowerment Congress and Board of FTE (Forum for Theological Exploration) and Advisory Board for Pittsburgh Theological Seminary Urban Institute.
Her previous positions include venture capitalist for Renaissance Capital Partners, Sponsorship Manager for California Science Center, and Senior Auditor at Ernst & Young. She has a B.S. from U.C. Berkeley, M.B.A. from University of Southern California, and M.Div., summa cum laude, from Wesley Theological Seminary.
Jerry Kang is Distinguished Professor of Law, Distinguished Professor of Asian American Studies, and was the inaugural Korea Times – Hankook Ilbo Endowed Chair in Law and Korean American Studies (2010-20). He graduated magna cum laude from both Harvard College (physics) and Harvard Law School, where he was a supervising editor of the Harvard Law Review. After clerking for the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, he started his professorship at UCLA in 1995. A leading scholar on implicit bias and critical race studies, Professor Kang collaborates broadly across disciplines and industries on various scholarly, educational, and advocacy projects. An inspiring teacher, he has received UCLA’s highest recognition: the Eby Art of Teaching Distinguished Teaching Award. He recently stepped down as UCLA’s Founding Vice Chancellor for Equity, Diversity and Inclusion (2015-20) after completing a five year mission to “build equity for all.”
Alexander J. Kim is a shareholder in the Minneapolis office of global law firm Greenberg Traurig, LLP. He protects companies’ inventions by acquiring patents and the associated monopoly rights for the companies. Alex has wide-ranging experience in prosecuting patent applications in front of the United States Patent and Trademark Office. Alex knows how to strategize domestic and international intellectual property rights so that the companies can be positioned to reach their business goals. Alex has a background in physics, chemistry, biophysics, computational biology, and physiology. He has deep knowledge across a broad range of technologies and industries, including space vehicles, robots, optics and lenses, blockchain, construction, automotive, heavy industrial machines, chemicals, biomedical devices, diagnostic methods, displays, e-commerce, HVAC systems and controls, network systems, communication systems, energy storages, and alternative energies.
Mr. Kim currently serves as the President of the International Association of Korean Lawyers (IAKL), and is the founder of the Korean American Bar Association of Minnesota (KABAMN). Mr. Kim has served as the President of the Minnesota Asian Pacific American Bar Association (MNAPABA), and as the Co-Chair of the 1st Annual National Asian Pacific American Bar Association (NAPABA) Central Region Convention.
Duyeon Kim is an Adjunct Senior Fellow with the Indo-Pacific Security Program at the Center for a New American Security (CNAS). Her expertise includes the two Koreas, nuclear nonproliferation, arms control, East Asian relations and geopolitics, U.S. nuclear policy, and security. She is also a Columnist for the The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists. Kim was previously Senior Advisor for Northeast Asia and Nuclear Policy at the International Crisis Group; an Associate in the Nuclear Policy and Asia programs at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, and a Senior Fellow and Deputy Director of Non-Proliferation at the Center for Arms Control and Non-Proliferation in Washington, DC.
Kim is a member of the Council for Security Cooperation in the Asia Pacific (CSCAP) U.S. Committee, the International Nuclear Security Forum, the National Committee on North Korea, and the Council of Korean Americans, while serving on the Board of Directors of the bilateral Korea-America Association.
Kim holds an M.S. in Foreign Service from the Georgetown University School of Foreign Service, and a B.A. in English/Literature from Syracuse University.
Joanne Kim is the President and Chief Executive Officer and a member of the Board of Directors for Commonwealth Business Bank, as known as CBB Bank, one of the fastest growing banks in the United States. Ms. Kim has led CBB Bank since April of 2011.
A graduate of Korea University, Ms. Kim has since built her banking career in the United States. Previously, Ms. Kim served as President and Chief Executive Officer and as a Member of the Board of Directors for Wilshire Bank and its holding company.
Under her leadership, CBB Bank achieved a milestone of $1 billion in total assets in 2017.
Joon I. Kim is a partner at New Paradigm Strategy Group and has over 16 years of experience in Democratic politics. Joon works with clients to integrate grassroots campaign strategy with digital media strategy. Clients have included the Australian Labor Party, the AFL-CIO, Microsoft, and numerous others. Prior to joining the New Paradigm team, Joon coordinated fourteen independent expenditure campaigns in six states, on behalf of the Communications Workers of America.
Joon’s expertise lies in designing, managing, and implementing sophisticated campaigns that combine digital, grassroots field operations, turnout programs, and vote-by-mail programs. He has extensive experience in voter identification, targeting, coalition building, digital and grassroots organizing. Joon has advised campaigns in Australia and the U.S. at all levels.
Charlotte Koh is a media executive and producer with over 20 years of professional experience. In addition to being the founder of Hulu Originals, where she oversaw the production and development of Emmy-nominated scripted and unscripted television, she has also worked on Oscar-nominated feature films, managed teams of digital/social video producers, and executive produced audio storytelling at Hello Sunshine, Marvel, HuffPost, and Searchlight.
Her credits include: Shine On with Reese (Netflix), Get Organized with The Home Edit (Netflix), The Wrong Mans (Hulu), The Awesomes (Hulu), East Los High (Hulu), The Last King of Scotland (Searchlight) and Notes on a Scandal (Searchlight). She is an adjunct professor at USC’s School of Cinematic Arts Peter Stark Producing Program, from which she earned an MFA, and she holds a BA from Stanford University.
Taeku Lee is George Johnson Professor of Law and Professor of Political Science at the University of California, Berkeley. His interests are in racial and ethnic politics; immigrant political incorporation; public opinion and survey research; identity and inequality; deliberative and participatory democracy.
Lee is currently Associate Dean of Berkeley School of Law and Managing Director of Asian American Decisions. He has also been co-Principal Investigator of the National Asian American Survey, served on the Board of Overseers of the American National Election Studies (twice) and the General Social Survey, and is serving his second term on the National Advisory Committee for the US Census Bureau. He was previously Assistant Professor of Public Policy at Harvard, and has visited as Robert Wood Johnson Scholar at Yale, Fernand Braudel Senior Fellow at the European University Institute, and Non-Resident Senior Fellow at the Brookings Institution.
Lee was born in South Korea, grew up in rural Malaysia, Manhattan, and suburban Michigan, and is a proud graduate of K-12 public schools, the University of Michigan (A.B.), Harvard University (M.P.P.), and the University of Chicago (Ph.D.). He is a crossword enthusiast, tennis junkie, and “Dad joke” maven.
Mimi McAndrews is an attorney in the West Palm Beach office of Cole, Scott& Kissane, P.A. She practices in the areas of Insurance defense, including first party property claims and insurance coverage disputes. Ms. McAndrews also has experience defending professionals sued for malpractice, including attorneys and engineers, and defending insurers in disputes involving various types of insurance policies, including commercial general liability and auto policies. Ms. McAndrews’ experience also includes governmental experience as a city attorney and former service in the Florida Legislature.
Ms. McAndrews is admitted to the Florida Bar and the US District Courts for the Southern, Northern and Middle Districts of Florida. She was City Attorney and served in the Florida State Legislature, representing District 85 from 1992-1994. She was the first and perhaps only Korean American ever elected to the Florida State Legislature. She has her JD from Georgetown.
T. James Min II is currently a Partner with the law firm of LimNexus LLP in their Washington DC office where he specializes in international trade law including customs, export control, economic sanctions, CFIUS, corporate internal investigations, free trade agreements, etc. He was formerly the Vice President and Chair of the International Trade Law Practice for the Deutsche Post DHL Group. Prior to DHL, James practiced international trade law in both the private and public sectors, including as a trade adviser to the Bush Administration and adviser to the governments of Russia, Ukraine, Arab League nations, as well as global institutions such as the UN and the World Trade Organization.
James has served on the boards of the Northern Kentucky International Trade Association, the International Air Cargo Association, and a US-based nonprofit organization operating in North Korea since 1997. He obtained his undergraduate, MA, and law degrees at The Johns Hopkins University and The American University. He is a member and legal advisor to the National Committee on North Korea. He is a member of the Federalist Society, National Republican Lawyers Association, the NRA, and other conservative organizations. James resides outside Cincinnati, Ohio.
Sam Oh is a Vice President at Targeted Victory where he helps lead the firm’s political campaign division. Oh has over ten years of experience managing and consulting candidate campaigns and ballots initiatives at the local, state, and federal level. Sam mostly recently served as the lead strategist on two of the most high-profile and expensive congressional races in the country, and made California history defeating two incumbent Democrat members of Congress for the first time in 26 years. Oh previously served as Chief of Staff to a U.S. Representative who served on the House Energy & Commerce Committee, House Republican Leadership team, and who also served as the Deputy Chair of the National Republican Congressional Committee.
Dan Koh is the Chief Operating Officer of a HqO, a software platform designed to change the way we interact with the world around us. He has played a key role in growing the company to almost 100 employees, $51 million in capital raised, and 110 million square feet under management.
At the age of 29, he was tapped to be the Chief of Staff to Boston Mayor Marty Walsh, where he championed data-driven approaches to governing and city services. Prior to that he had been at the Huffington Post in a variety of roles, including Chief of Staff to its founder, Arianna Huffington.
Dan is Korean-Lebanese. His father and uncle both served President Obama in Senate-confirmed leadership positions at the Health and Human Services and State Departments, respectively.