“You can just feel that she is meant for greater things.”

Season 1 Episode 3 — September 27, 2024

This episode is supported by Pacific Mercantile Company.

The fire that sparked Alyssa Nilemo’s interest in politics happened when she started working in local government. Her involvement in a congressional campaign fueled her passion of addressing a crisis in Colorado, where there are no Asian American elected officials in state government. Learning from mentors who represent the wide spectrum of political views in the state, Alyssa now channels that energy into building her own team in Douglas County as an Asian American candidate.

Featured Guests

Alyssa Nilemo

Herb Atchison

Neal Walia

Paula Smith

Logan Davis

JD Mangat

References

Neal Walia’s Campaign Website — nealwaliaforcongress.com

Asian Pacific American Institute for Congressional Studies Candidate Pipeline — apaics.org/aapi-candidate-pipeline

Transcript

[Advertisement] This episode of Middleweight is supported by Pacific Mercantile Company. For 80 years, Pacific has provided essential goods and services for Coloradans. Pacific Mercantile Company: Finest Asian Foods and Gifts.

Alyssa Nilemo: So the primary ballots came out, and this very real moment of seeing my name spelled out on the official government documentation that just makes everything very real.

When Colorado holds state elections every two years, the general election happens in November, but before that, there are primary elections in June. Back in June, I asked Alyssa to send me a voice memo when she received her mail-in ballot for the primary.

Alyssa Nilemo: And so seeing my name there, I had this mixed feeling of relief and excitement, but also it’s very scary, realizing just how big what I’m trying to do and how much work has already gone in. And we’re kind of only at this, like, first mile marker. You know, the general election is going to bring this onslaught of challenges and struggles and some really long, hard nights. Next time I see my name on a ballot, it will not be there alone. Where this one is a night of sort of checking the box and seeing who else gets through their primaries, the general is going to be all knots and stress. So I am trying to enjoy how just lovely this moment is, but I can’t deny it is also kicking up that anxiety internally about what is just around the corner.

Alyssa’s a first-time candidate, so seeing her name on the primary ballot was surreal for her. I think she’d like me to emphasize that she earned 100% of the vote during that primary. As you heard in her voice memo, she was the only candidate in her race. Regardless, she’s now the Democratic Party’s nominee going up against the Republican incumbent for HD44. By this point, she had formed a campaign team. Over the next few months, they were fundraising, recruiting volunteers, seeking endorsements, and establishing name recognition—to where now she says the campaign machine is more-or-less built. And from September until general ballots get mailed to voters in October and Election Day in November, it’s more about getting out the vote. When I started following her campaign and tuning into team calls, I was amazed to see the group of dedicated people who Alyssa surrounded herself with. Meeting volunteers and members of her staff, I learned about how much work it took Alyssa to get to this point. You can uncover her political origin story by going back about six years to her work in the City Manager’s office in Westminster and her subsequent involvement in a US congressional campaign in Denver. Alyssa introduced me to her mentors from these periods of her life. And by talking with them, I learned where she gained the knowledge necessary to navigate the complexities of Colorado politics and, maybe more importantly, the courage to use her voice for change. She’s now running to become the only Asian American elected member in Colorado’s state government, and I figure out what that means and why that’s important, especially in an area like Douglas County. Alyssa Nilemo is a fourth-generation Coloradan running for the Colorado House of Representatives District 44. By narrating her story, I reflect on my own civic duty as an American citizen.

Imagine a physics classroom demo on space-time. A heavy object is placed at the center of a stretched-out bedsheet, and as marbles roll across the warped fabric, they follow circular paths around the weight in the middle. What if every part of ourselves was one of these middleweights that attract other bodies in the universe toward us? Welcome to Middleweight, a podcast about the interlacing connections that create communities and cultures. My name is Toshiki Nakashige. This is District 44, Episode 3: “You can just feel that she is meant for greater things.”

In 2018, Alyssa started working as an Executive Aide for the City Manager’s Office in Westminster. Westminster is a northern suburb of Denver and located in Adams and Jefferson Counties. Alyssa was born in Denver and grew up in Jefferson County. She had lived in various parts of the Metro Area after high school, but by 2018, she was living in Douglas County, having moved into her house in Parker that summer. Although Alyssa didn’t live in Westminster, the job was appealing because it would be her first opportunity to gain experience in government. She had various jobs in early childhood education and hospice care throughout her twenties, and she wanted to turn the act of taking care of others into a career. Compared to Douglas County, Westminster is generally less conservative, but Alyssa remembers moments when loud conservative voices impacted the government’s ability to carry out certain public-funded programs.

Alyssa Nilemo: I was working in a city manager’s office very closely with a council that was experiencing what I think was happening in a lot of places where it was a pretty moderate, maybe slightly left council. And then something in the community lit some activation on the far right, and the whole council changes. When you’re that close, when you’re, like, the direct employee under, you just see this like ripple immediately. And you see projects that you really care about get hemorrhaged. And you see people, who you think are absolutely fantastic, just run from the job.

Alyssa worked in Westminster from 2018 to 2022, which coincided with the four years she was a part-time MSU Denver student working on her political science degree. Her Executive Aide position supplemented her academic coursework by giving her practical experience. She was tasked with working with people who thought differently from her to accomplish shared goals. Alyssa was registered Unaffiliated at the time and generally identifies as left-leaning, and I think the opportunity to work with more conservative members in the City Council was important to her growth.

Alyssa Nilemo: I had had the privilege of working under a council that I just very much so respected—didn’t necessarily politically align with. The mayor is actually one of my early supporters of that. And I think him and I are not necessarily close when it comes to our politics, but I respected that he really put people and the community first. And his support of me I think was really from there, like, “Yes, let’s just lift up young people and do that.” And so I think that was when a little, a very tiny, like, fire was lit.

One of Alyssa’s mentors was Herb Atchison.

Herb Atchison: My name is Herb Atchison. I’m the former mayor of the city of Westminster. I was involved with the city for 41 years.

Throughout 41 years in municipal government, Herb was elected to the City Council three times and appointed as a commissioner to the city before serving as the mayor from 2013 to 2021. Alyssa worked in the city manager’s office during most of Herb’s second term as mayor.

Herb Atchison: Currently I am semi-retired. I am the chairman of what’s called the Great Valley District for Scouting America for Colorado. And I do that part-time, and part-time I don’t do anything, except go out to coffee once in a while.

Herb invited me to one of his coffee outings at a golf course where I had the chance to talk with him about his political career and experiences working with Alyssa.

Herb Atchison: When I first started voting, I was 21 because that was the law at that time. And I was a Republican for 50 years, and then I saw what was going on with the Republican Party in the State of Colorado and nationally. And I didn’t like it.

Herb tells me that there wasn’t a singular event that compelled him to switch his party registration from Republican to Unaffiliated. But especially in the last ten years of his career, he witnessed how party allegiance was preventing elected officials from getting important work done, to the detriment of their constituents. Like in many other municipalities in Colorado, the mayoral and city council positions in Westminster are nonpartisan. But like I’ve heard elsewhere, national culture war issues were negatively impacting local politics there.

Herb Atchison: I have always worked as an elected official with both parties and those who were part of neither party because that’s just what local politics is. It has to be including of everyone. A good example. There are no Republican or Democratic potholes. They belong to everybody.

To understand how Herb got to know Alyssa, I’ll give you a description of the relationships between Mayor, City Council, and City Manager. If you think of the city as a corporation, the mayor and city council are elected members of the company’s board of directors. They represent the interest of the shareholders—in this case, the citizens—and make the big-picture decisions about the direction of the city. On the other hand, the city manager is appointed by the city council—or essentially hired as the company’s CEO. This non-elected position is responsible for the day-to-day operations to fulfill the policies outlined by the mayor and city council. The city manager also oversees the city’s departments and staff, including individuals like Alyssa who directly worked for the Deputy City Manager. As an Executive Aide, Alyssa occasionally attended meetings with Herb and gained firsthand experience working with legislators. Herb tells me that Alyssa was always eager to learn about the hows and whys of local government.

Herb Atchison: My experience showed me that she was someone who cared about what was going on locally and how municipal elections or state or county, how they affected people. And at times, she would ask if she could ask questions and stuff and try to gain knowledge of why did I think people were doing one thing or another. And I can tell you that she truly was interested, was not somebody just putting on fluff. It was somebody who’s truly trying to gain knowledge. She stayed with me for quite a few years there at the city hall, and then she decided to go out on her own. 

Even after his tenure as mayor, Alyssa kept in touch with Herb, updating him about new political activities she became involved in. In 2022, she joined the US congressional campaign of Neal Walia.

Neal Walia: My name is Neal Walia. I serve as the chair of the Colorado South Asian Democrats Initiative under the Colorado Democratic Party. I’m a board member of the Asian American and Pacific Islanders Commission for the City of Denver. And I’m also a precinct organizer for the Denver Democrats.

Before landing those positions in Colorado, Neal was working in Washington, DC. And about seven years ago, one of his colleagues organized a professional development trip for MSU Denver students to Washington, DC, to meet with various people working on Capitol Hill, including Neal. Alyssa was part of this group, and they met briefly. Neal says that they didn’t really build a relationship, though, until a few years after that, when they met again in Colorado. This time at an event following the shootings in Atlanta where eight people died. Six of the victims were Asian American women.

Neal Walia: It was on the heels of the spa shooting that took place in Atlanta. And so in response to that, a number of community leaders in Denver and across Colorado organized a rally on the west side of the city in a very, I’d say, historic Asian American venue.

The way that prominent politicians spoke about the cause of the Covid-19 pandemic incited racism and violence toward Asian Americans, which even I remember experiencing firsthand. The shootings happened on March 16, 2021, and a few days after that, community leaders, including Neal and Alyssa, gave speeches in front of a Vietnam War Memorial located in the Alameda Square Shopping Center. This area along West Alameda Avenue and Federal Boulevard, called Little Saigon Business District, showcases the diversity of Denver’s Asian American community. Neal is a second-generation Indian American and felt it was necessary to stand up for all Asians living in America.

Neal Walia: We both spoke, just condemning the act of violence, but also condemning the police response and a lot of the bigoted rhetoric that was coming out of not just our president at the time, but a lot of elected officials when it came to Asian Americans and racial injustice.

Outside of her position in Westminster, Alyssa had been involved in various Asian American organizations. And she was invited to speak at this rally as a board member of the Asian Chamber of Commerce. Alyssa tells me that it was really the first time she spoke up against racism in such a public way.

Alyssa Nilemo: Yes, I was emotional about what I was talking about, but I was also terrified to be at a mic saying these things. And what I was talking about was—people don’t believe us now that this is about racism because, in my opinion, in my spaces, we didn’t speak up enough about the daily microaggressions. We don’t complain. We don’t tell people. And now they’re not believing us that there is any problem because we are just muscling through and saying, “It’s all fine.” And, “There aren’t any issues.”

News reports say that more than 200 people were gathered at the event, and many people took notice of Alyssa.

Neal Walia: And I remember when Alyssa spoke, I thought to myself, “OK, she’s got something special about her.” I appreciated what she said. I appreciated the direct nature of, you know, what she was saying to people.

By March 2021, Neal had decided that he’d run for the US House of Representatives First Congressional District seat the following year.

Neal Walia: We ended up getting coffee shortly after just because I think I said, “Hey,” like, you know, “Let’s catch up.” And when we got coffee, I just kind of let her know, like, “Hey, actually, I’m thinking about running. I’m going to challenge Congresswoman DeGette for a seat, trying to do something for the community, trying to center our story, our origin, and champion that on the campaign trail.”

Alyssa was inspired by Neal’s leadership and jumped at the opportunity the same way I did when Alyssa told me she was running.

Neal Walia: And immediately, before she knew more details that she probably could have gleaned, she was like, “I want to be a part of this journey.” And she was one of the first people that expressed an interest to work for the campaign. And yeah, I said, “Yeah, let’s partner on this. And you know, it evolved from there.”

Neal and Alyssa were only really acquaintances at the time, but they quickly got to appreciate their mutual dedication toward having new voices heard by the political establishment. CD1 is primarily based in the City and County of Denver and is the most Democratic congressional district in Colorado. Challenging the Democratic incumbent Representative Diana DeGette who’d been serving in Congress for about 25 years at the time, Neal couldn’t find strong support within the Colorado Democratic Party to get his name on the primary ballot. Instead, Neal went through the petition process, which required collecting 1,500 signatures by registered Democratic voters.

Neal Walia: It was a tough endeavor. Me, Alyssa, and I’d say, like, five to ten very dedicated volunteers for like a month were just out in the streets of Denver begging people for signatures. You need 1,500 signatures. We submitted 2,700, because typically the math will tell you that almost 50% might not be qualified, right? Because maybe the address is different. The data they’ve provided isn’t matching up with what’s on the system. And so, yeah, it was really, really tough, but you know, really proud of the fact that we made the ballot with, you know, so few resources and such, like, a small grassroots kind of team. 

Neal is proud to have reached one of his big goals—simply getting on the June 2022 Democratic primary ballot. But Neal—as a first-time candidate—and Alyssa—as a political science undergraduate and employee in city politics—were often learning things on the fly.

Alyssa Nilemo: We campaigned, and we learned everything on the ground. I mean, we really had no idea. We were learning the paperwork as we were going. I was filing, you know, everything using, like, Google to double check. Like, am I doing this right? Like, I have no idea. And then by the end of that, we had learned so much, like probably more than I’ve ever learned in any other experience in my life.

Under Neal’s mentorship, Alyssa held a few roles on his campaign, eventually serving as Deputy Director. But beyond the organizational skills she could contribute, I think one valuable resource she provided for the campaign was the input of a long-time Denver-area politician.

Herb Atchison: I received calls from her periodically saying, “Hey, this is something that’s going on. What are your thoughts?” And I went and met with her and the person she was working for and sat down and just gave them my experience and said, “These are my thoughts. But they work for me. They may not work for you.”

Issues relevant to voters in Denver, Westminster, and Douglas County are so different, so the specific policy positions that Neal fought for aren’t that relevant here. But I’ll note that Neal was viewed as the more progressive candidate in his primary race, a contrast to the—still liberal but—more moderate positions of Diana DeGette. Even though their political leanings are different, I think Herb’s willingness to give advice to someone like Neal reflects the more critical message in this story that all of the people involved here, including Alyssa, care more about who they would be representing more than party allegiance. Despite his team’s grit and the guidance from mentors like Herb, Neal lost his primary, receiving 18.9% of the vote. Nonetheless, he felt encouraged by the 1,300 donors and those 18,000 voters who believed in his message. Proud of the successes in his campaign, he feels he moved the needle in the conversation about providing support for more marginalized communities.

Neal Walia: It honestly changed my life in a lot of different ways, right? Like even in loss, we gained so much. I had the opportunity to debate my opponent publicly at a forum. We attended so many different rallies and meetings. And I think, for me, it mattered because I got validation from people who said, you know, like, “We think this race was maybe not the one to get involved with, but like, we do believe in what you’re saying. We believe in your policy vision, your story. And we believe that you do have what it takes to eventually crack in. Don’t give up.” That was a positive affirmation for me.

This experience led to Neal now working with the Colorado Democratic Party and to opportunities like serving as the chair of the Colorado South Asian Democrats Initiative.

Neal Walia: You know, I’ve been building ever since, and I think for me, though, the most important outcome has been Alyssa now taking her stand.

By the end of that campaign in the summer of 2022, Alyssa was inspired to support other Asian American candidates, perhaps Asian American women candidates, running for office.

Alyssa Nilemo: I’m going to get other people to run now. Like, now I kind of understand what it is. Although I was a little biased, there are so many fantastic women in our Asian American community here in Colorado. I was like, “Let’s go.” I’m going to get them to run. We’re going to win, and all of these great things. And so I was really pushing that angle. And then conversations started popping up more and more that it was like, “Well, if you think other people should run, why don’t—why don’t you run?” And then one of those conversations popped up that someone figured out I lived in Douglas County because, up to this point, I had been really doing everything in the Denver area. And so someone said, “Oh, you live in Douglas County, but you give all your time to Denver politics.” That’s like, “Why? Why aren’t you more plugged in at home?”

Alyssa had lived in Parker for about 6 years at that point, and she started learning about what was going on in Douglas County. She felt passionate about her own community, but as a volunteer or even staff member for a Democratic candidate’s campaign, she could remain as registered Unaffiliated. But if she ran as a candidate herself, she knew that she would have to register as a Democrat.

Alyssa Nilemo: And I was like, “I don’t know, running in Douglas County sounds really scary, especially since I’ll have to go from Unaffiliated to a Dam to run. I don’t know how I feel about party politics. I don’t know that that’s really what I’m looking to do.” So I just started having conversations with every single human that I have ever respected or had, and really sitting down and like asking them what they thought and put through. I’ll let you know, not every conversation lean towards “you should run.” There are definitely some people who I respect a lot and I care a lot about who are like, “I don’t think you should do this to your life. I think you are too ‘feeling’ for this side of politics. I think you do care about kindness too much. And I think this is going to chew you up and spit you out.”

Some people felt that her philosophy of bringing kindness into politics was too idealistic. But she also had mentors who believed she had exactly what it took to be a great candidate.

Herb Atchison: So she started getting involved and then finally called and told me that she thought she was going to run for the State House. And I truly encouraged her to do it. She’s young. She’s very smart. She’s very dedicated to trying to work with her community and make things better. And I think she will do fine.

While Alyssa was making the decision to run, Herb became one her most important advocates, connecting her with current elected officials in the state legislature to show her the practical and perhaps mundane parts of the job. By August 2023, she officially decided to run for the House District 44 seat and switched her party affiliation to Democrat. Even if it just meant moving the needle ever so slightly to be more inclusive and support public services for marginalized communities, she could do for Douglas County what Neal’s campaign did in his race. Bob Marshall had flipped HD43 in 2022, and then after the Douglas County school board elections in November 2023 where three less conservative members won their elections, Alyssa felt that she had a real chance of winning.

Alyssa Nilemo: And for me, that was the moment where I was like, “OK, I’m all in. I’m going to give this absolutely everything I have.”

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I bore the assumption that politicians generally have some sort of government experience before they get elected. But I’ve learned that that’s not really the case, especially at the local and state levels. So for Alyssa, Herb Atchison emphasizes that her prior experience working in local government is a strength.

Herb Atchison: Most people elected to the State House have never served anywhere in local government. They don’t understand it, much less understand state government. But she will come from a point of having an experience of working in local government and then being part of it herself that her constituents will find that she is going to be that much better off serving them than if they go with someone who has no background or experience in government at all.

Alyssa’s now running for the Colorado House of Representatives with the support of her county’s Democratic Party, and I know she’s grateful for that. But because it’s so easy to become complacent in this space of “group think,” I think one of her responsibilities going into this election is remembering why she entered politics in the first place.

Herb Atchison: The fallacy of what I've seen over the years, and this seems to be getting worse—people, after they get in office, forget why they ran for office or why they got elected. Then it all becomes about them or the party and not the people who put them in office. And that's a downfall of, I think, too much emphasis on which party you are versus why you went to the office and started with.

Over his 41 years of public service, Herb has seen the downfall of effective governance because of party allegiance. Alyssa started out in municipal government where she worked with nonpartisan elected members, and Herb believes she has the necessary background to achieve her goal of putting People Before Politics.

Toshiki Nakashige: Thank you so much for this interview. This was wonderful.

Herb Atchison: Glad to do it.

When Alyssa first described Herb to me, she mentioned that he was an unlikely mentor because of how different their political views were. Herb was a lifelong Republican turned Unaffiliated, and as an older Caucasian man, he has this traditional politician aura about him. When I met him at the golf course, I recognized him immediately because of his cowboy hat. On the other hand, Neal Walia describes himself as liberal. Despite the apparent differences between Herb and Neal, there was a central theme that was present in their mentorship of Alyssa. It was never about the political party. It was about addressing the needs of the people she would serve.

Neal Walia: What Alyssa understands and that what I understand is you have to meet people where they are. And we have to also be comfortable in having our own individual vision, but then also balancing that with the culture, the vision, and the needs of the districts and the people that we would be representing. 

Alyssa’s time in Westminster was formative in understanding the political landscape of a Denver suburb, and her experience working on Neal’s campaign showed her the importance of representation for Asian Americans. Neal’s parents immigrated from India to the US, where he and his sister were born in Seattle, and his family moved to Colorado when he was eleven. Especially during times of heightened xenophobia like in the aftermath of 9/11, the South Asian American community was important for him to feel a sense of belonging. Attending college and graduate school in Colorado, Neal had been involved in state and national politics throughout his career. But 2022 was the first time he had run for political office himself. He feels that running was important for the visibility of Asian Americans. 4.5% of Colorado is Asian, but the number of Asian American elected officials is far less than that.

Neal Walia: What I loved was that, I think, for the first time, people from our community, meaning like the larger Asian-American community, were finally able to see somebody from their heritage, their story, someone that they could see themselves in, do this thing that not many Asian Americans, unfortunately, do in Colorado. Right? To give you perspective, we have zero representation in state government. We have zero representation in federal politics here. We have a handful of people in very local positions throughout small municipalities in our state, but there’s a big gap in representation. And so that mattered, educating people like, not just Alyssa, but other people and volunteers who are on our team, who are from our community, so that they could understand how to do this in the future was important to us. And I think both of us, meaning me and Alyssa, understood that no matter what happened as a result, that this was the start of our journey, of our movement to kind of solve this crisis.

Neal is passionate about addressing the “crisis” that there aren’t Asian American elected officials in the Colorado state government or in Colorado congressional positions. Beyond symbolism, the absence of Asian Americans in leadership roles has practical consequences. Foremost, there isn’t someone who’d personally be invested in allocating resources for these historically marginalized communities. And even if programs to support Asian American Pacific Islander communities did exist, the people who’d benefit from them might not know about them because there isn’t someone personally invested in communicating that information to their constituents. Neal views his campaign as part of a broader movement for AAPI leaders to run for office in Colorado, and he continues to champion the needs of these communities. When I asked him if he would run for office again, he smiled. I know how much Alyssa values Herb’s and Neal’s mentorship during formative stages of her career. And their willingness to chat with me is a reflection of how they’ve become advocates for her throughout her own political candidacy. So at this point in Alyssa’s story, it’s January of this year. She announced her intention to run early so that she could start fundraising and convince people in the party that she would be a good candidate, but she was still looking for someone to help run her campaign.

Paula Smith: My name is Paula Smith, and I live here in Highlands Ranch.

Alyssa met Paula Smith, who, on top of working a full-time job, is now Alyssa’s campaign manager.

Paula Smith: In addition, I’m a mother of two. I’ve got a 14 year old and a 11 year old.

Paula has lived in Douglas County since 2008 and has children who’ve attended public schools here. So she’s witnessed the evolution of the Douglas County school board. Paula’s first venture into political campaigns happened when she was approached by community members who identified her exceptional organizational skills and asked her to become a campaign manager for Brad Geiger, one of the three school board members who eventually won their elections in 2023. Although it was a lot of work, she credits the campaign’s success to people who were highly invested in ensuring that Douglas County public schools stay accessible to all students. Paula hadn’t had campaign experience before, but she learned quickly. And everyone around her started to take notice.

Paula Smith: A mutual friend of Alyssa’s and mine approached me and said, “You know, I”—actually kind of fooled me and made me go to have coffee. And I thought we were just going to talk about fun things. And you got to remember, I was still basking in the glory of relaxation.

That winter after the adrenaline high of Brad’s win, she was happy to be able to spend more time with her family and catch up with friends.

Paula Smith: So I went and had coffee, and they were like, “OK, so, well, it’s great catching up. But really what I have you here for is because I met this wonderful candidate who’s running for House District 44. And I just think he would be a fantastic campaign manager for her. But, you know, definitely why don’t you meet her and kind of see what you think?”

By then, Alyssa had been expressing interest in the HD44 election for a few months, and by canvassing for school board candidates and showing commitment to public education in Douglas County, she was making a name for herself. Paula loved getting involved with the community, but she also loves being a mom. The election took a lot of time away from her kids and husband, and even though she was curious to learn more about Alyssa, she had second thoughts. When Paula asked her family whether it would be OK to pursue this new opportunity, her children asked her to promise them certain things. One of them was attending as many soccer games as she could. Her husband initially discouraged her from joining the campaign because of the time commitment. But upon reflection, he understood how much getting involved in the community meant for Paula, and he knew that her work could impact their childrens’ futures.

Paula Smith: Dan came back to me, my husband, was like, “You know, I actually fully support you. I think this is for a good cause. And I’m very proud of the work that you did with the school board. And I think your organization skills that you bring to this is a niche that, you know, lends your specific skill set into campaign management. So I’ll suck it up and support you through this because I think it’s wonderful.”

You can probably tell by this point that Paula is the type of person to weigh all the options before making decisions. So yes, she had the blessing of her family, and she had heard high praises regarding Alyssa. But she needed to meet her in person.

Paula Smith: So fast forward, I think it was just a couple of weeks. I sat down with Alyssa. I mean, anybody who’s ever met Alyssa, you can just feel that she is meant for greater things. Her aura that she has around her, the calmness that she has, her level headedness. She’s very mature. I mean, it just spoke so much to me. And I said, “You know what? We need people like her up in an area where they’re making laws for the rest of us that aren’t just looking at things from one angle because she looks at things from many angles.” But they’re not just looking to forward her—she’s not looking to forward her own political career. She’s not looking to do anything more but to make right what her current representative in the House District 44 is not doing.

Before I go any further, I want to underscore here that I’m not here trying to portray Alyssa’s opponent, Anthony Hartsook, like he’s a terrible politician. Alyssa doesn’t feel that way, nor does any one on her team. But to highlight what former Westminster mayor Herb Atchison said earlier—that he’s seen politicians forget why they got into politics in the first place—I think it applies in this particular situation.

Paula Smith: I think some of the words she used to me at the time was, “When he ran, he ran on this—I’m a moderate.” And she was like, “I was just so disappointed because I went and I saw him”—I think at one of his town halls, I think she said—“And I saw how he was being used as a puppet by the extreme county GOPers. So where he might have had good intentions when he came in, he is unable to keep them because he’s a puppet. And so he’s no longer looking after what Parker needs, right? He’s looking after what his party needs.” When she was telling me that, I was like, “Wow, just the fact that she was—one—saying that she didn’t have a problem with the guy initially told me that it didn’t matter what his political affiliation was. It mattered at what was within his heart and what he was going to do for the people. And when she could see that change, that that disheartened her. So it wasn’t the political party. It was the person. And she saw how he stopped representing the people. And that’s what we all need to get to. We all need to start stepping away from the political parties because the reality is, is we’re all tools of the political party. Right? We really need to be looking after the people because whether you agree with every person that’s out there—we never have all agreed with each other. But somewhere along the way, we’ve decided there is a black and white line. You agree with me or you don’t. And if you don’t, you’re on this line. And if you do, then we can be friends. And we’re never going to heal what we need to if we don’t have representation, representation in the house that can represent that. So that’s why I decided to represent Alyssa.

Paula says that she probably took a day or two to get back to Alyssa, but it was an easy decision to be a part of her campaign. Paula told me that she’s a registered Democrat, and although her opinion of the Republican Party has declined over the past several years, she didn’t become Alyssa’s campaign manager because of her party affiliation. She became Alyssa’s campaign manager because of Alyssa. A lot of what Anthony Hartsook has accomplished as the representative for HD44 is public information, but to do my due diligence, I asked political experts outside of Alyssa’s campaign to tell me more about the Republican incumbent in her race. This is political consultant Logan Davis. 

Logan Davis: Hartsook has been in the job for one term, just less than two years at this point. He has not made a huge impression. A lot of that isn’t his fault, admittedly, right? Like he arrived in a chamber where the Republicans had 19 of 65 seats.

Democrats have a supermajority in the Colorado House of Representatives, so even though they have some sway in public opinion, Republicans have difficulty getting any sort of legislation that’s viewed as partisan passed.

Logan Davis: And leadership in that caucus is not made up of the moderates. The assistant minority leader of the Colorado House Republicans as a member of the Proud Boys. They are a very radical group, and when you have folks like Hartsook, who—I’ve looked at the bills he sponsored and they all seem a little bit more business oriented, et cetera. And that’s all well and good, but when you only have 19 people, and then a majority of those 19 people are more interested in talking about QAnon and conspiracy theories than doing your “let’s cut taxes for the rich” stuff, you can’t even get those things done. So yeah, I mean, I think there are much, much more objectionable people in the House than Hartsook. But he’s kind of doubly damned in that he’s in a minority, and then he’s in a minority within that minority within the chamber. And unfortunately, that leaves the people of that district without a particularly effective voice—again, not through any particular fault of his own—but it is what it is. And right now, HD44 is represented by somebody in the House who effectively cannot do anything for them.

Anthony Hartsook won the 2022 general election by 17 points and won his 2024 primary unopposed, so there’s certainly support for him in House District 44. However, I think it’s important to examine what he’s done as an elected official. And it appears that he prioritized party allegiance over the needs of his constituents. One of these needs is more funding for public schools, which is an issue that Paula is passionate about. But there’s also a very personal reason that Alyssa’s story resonated with her. I continue talking with Paula after this break.

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When Alyssa Nilemo introduced me to her campaign manager Paula Smith by email, I had assumed by her name that she was white. So when I met Paula over Zoom the first time a couple months ago and saw that she was phenotypically Asian, I guess you could say that I was pleasantly surprised. I made the assumption that she’s Asian, probably second-generation Asian American because of her American accent, and because when I told her where I was raised, she mentioned growing up in Texas too. Smith must be the surname of her husband who’s probably white. I was mostly correct and only learned the details of Paula’s background when I asked her that awkward question, “So what kind of Asian are you?” 

Paula Smith: I was born in Korea back in the 70s, mid 70s. My parents, my adoptive parents, came over from Japan. They were stationed in Okinawa, so my dad was in the Air Force at the time. Both of my adoptive parents were white. They were both Caucasian. And so when my parents divorced, my mom grew up in Texas and brought me back to Texas to Nebron Falls, Texas, which is kind of in the hill country near Austin, but not like Austin, not liberal like Austin is. So I ended up growing up in this very rural part of Texas. I had many people speak very loudly to me for a long time, even though my first language was English. They see me think, “Oh, you must not speak English, so I’m going to speak loudly to you.” I always thought that was really funny. Back then, it was kind of still shocking to see, I think, a little Asian girl with a white mom. Right? And so there was a lot of confusion around, you know, “Wait, is that your mom?”

I think to this day, Paula doesn’t have a strong sense of Korean American or Asian American identity because of her adoptive upbringing, but she’s aware that her appearance has impacted social interactions she’s had. As someone who likes to call it what it was, Paula identifies many of those encounters with white people as racism. She didn’t have the language back then, but now with children who look Asian like her, she teaches them about racism.

Paula Smith: I had a lovely childhood, though. It was fine, you know. But when I see my children encounter racism, because it still exists, you know, I am able to have more intelligent conversations around it and say, “No, you don’t have to accept it. You can say, ‘I don’t like the way that makes me feel when you treat me like this.’”

When she met Alyssa, a Japanese American who was running in a county that’s about 85% white, Paula realized how important it would be for her children to see someone like Alyssa in a position of leadership.

Paula Smith: When Alyssa and I sat down to speak and she was talking specifically about representation, I was like, “Oh, yeah, yes. You’re absolutely right. You know, there should be representation. We should be able to look across the board and say we are represented no matter whether you’re women, you’re Asian, you’re Jewish. People who are making the laws should—we should be able to see that people represent us. And the fact that we don’t have that representation. I mean, it’s not like we don’t exist here, you know? Why don’t we have people who can represent us who can understand. You don’t understand until you go through the systematic racism. I mean, the reason it’s people don’t understand is because it’s systematic. It’s built into the system. Nobody realizes that you’re being discriminated against even at a soft level unless you have lived through it. And we deserve to have somebody making the laws that can be up there and say, “Have you considered this population of people?”

Paula will be back on the podcast as I delve into the campaign’s activities as Election Day nears, but I’m going to take this opportunity to talk about Asian American elected officials in Colorado. Currently there are no Asian electeds in the Colorado state government or in US congressional positions from Colorado. Alyssa says that she’ll be the only Asian elected member of the state legislature, but she wouldn’t be the first. There’s a third-generation Japanese American named Stan Matsunaka who was a Democratic member of the State Senate from 1995 to 2003. He also served as the President of the State Senate for two years during his tenure. There’s also first-generation Indian American Janak Joshi who was a Republican member of the State House of Representatives from 2013 to 2017. This year, he ran in the US House of Representatives CD8 race and lost in the Republican primary. As a scientist, I tried to be as scholarly as possible, cross referencing databases to check whether there were other Asian Americans in the state legislature, and what I realized is that there historically hasn’t been rigorous documentation of this type of information. The APA Institute for Congressional Studies collects data about elected officials and candidates of Asian descent, but their resources only go back to the 2018 elections. The continent of Asia encompasses a diversity of ethnicities, and after some research, I learned that there are different standards of ethnic identification depending on who’s keeping track of the data. For example, some may consider West Asia, such as the Middle East, to be classified as AAPI. In these ambiguous cases, self-identification is a factor. With that said, there are currently no elected officials in the state legislature who identify as Asian American. Looking through all the State House of Representative and State Senate races this year, I saw that there were a few Asian American candidates who either lost their primary in June or have withdrawn from their race. But to my knowledge, there aren’t any other candidates besides Alyssa who’ll be on the general election ballot who identifies as Asian American. This was a roundabout way of saying that, while there’s been some history of Asians in Colorado state government, yes, Alyssa would be the only Asian elected member if she wins her race. I’ve been focusing on the state level, but there are several elected members of Asian descent in local government. Although he’s not part of Alyssa’s campaign, I thought it was important to include the voice of at least one of those elected officials.

JD Mangat: My name is JD Mangat. I live in Lafayette, Colorado.

Lafayette is a city northwest of Denver located in Boulder County. JD Mangat has long been involved in giving back to the Lafayette community, serving on the City Council starting in 2018. He was elected mayor in 2021.

JD Mangat: ​I also serve as a teacher. So I work with eighth graders, teaching them government and history in their social studies class.

Described as a trailblazer, JD is the first South Asian mayor in Colorado and the youngest mayor of Lafayette, and he’s proud to represent his ethnic community.

JD Mangat: I am Indian American. I was born and raised here in Colorado. My parents are from Punjab, India. So I’m Punjabi, and you know the religion that I was brought up with is Sikhism—S-I-K-H. And we have a temple here in Colorado that we visit, and my dad’s super involved in.

I’ve been talking about the importance of Asian American representation in politics at a big-picture level, but talking with JD helped me understand the real effects that having a voice in government has on a minority community. Why Asian Americans don’t get involved in politics, at least in the numbers proportional to their population, is complicated. What I’ve heard throughout the Japanese American community, especially in the aftermath of World War II, was that many Japanese people just wanted to assimilate. They wanted to go unnoticed, and there’s a belief that, if they sought leadership roles, their communities would be scrutinized more. As a second-generation Indian American, JD feels that that sentiment is common among various Asian American ethnic groups.

JD Mangat: I think that’s in a lot of communities. Like, don’t get into trouble, get everything you need lined up to be successful on your own, because I think—folks—there’s this misconception that if you run for office or get involved you’re asking for trouble. Then people are going to start looking into you, looking into your background, your parents’ background, your family’s background. And like, they want to just kind of stay hidden. But the issue with that is if you do run into trouble and you’re not involved and unaware of everything that’s going on, then you’re going to have no one to turn to to help you.

JD learned through his own family that there are positive outcomes to getting involved in politics.

JD Mangat: I think, you know, my, my father has done a really good job of getting our community more involved in government. We now have electeds coming to our temple. I think Jared Polis was one of the first governors in the entire country to visit a gurdwara, which is the name of our Sikh temple. And he came in there and spoke to everyone, hung out with everybody. And then we have lawmakers like Yadira Caraveo. She’s visited our temple—a bunch of folks have—just to eat with us, sit with us.

In addition to current elected officials making more room for his communities, JD has also seen benefits to his own political trajectory.

JD Mangat: We can also be super influential in elections, too. Like our community recently has gotten much more, like, financially invested in these elections. And so, you know, the truth of the matter is we become more of a priority to these candidates when they win. And I’m not going to complain about that.

JD attributes his start in politics to mentors who had a vision for the future of the South Asian community, and he’s proud that he works with a city council that’s racially and ethnically diverse.

Toshiki Nakashige: Thank you so much for your time. This was a lot of fun.

JD Mangat: Of course, yeah, anytime. Thank you.

It’s important to contextualize Alyssa’s candidacy within Colorado’s Asian American representation crisis. But for now, I’m going to return to where she was around March of this year. Paula was on board as campaign manager. Initial fundraising began. Alyssa needed to secure her name on the Democratic primary ballot. Unlike Neal Walia’s congressional run, Alyssa didn’t have to get signatures from voters to get on the primary ballot because she had the support of her county’s Democratic Party. Instead, she went through what’s called the Assembly Designation Process.

Alyssa Nilemo: It’s a meeting that was over Zoom. Everyone breaks down into their house districts, the precinct organizers and the executive committee members for my house district all get to vote. They voted and said, “Yes, let’s put Alyssa Nilemo on.”

The way she describes this chapter of her campaign makes it sound like some underground operation, but it’s really the official political process.

Alyssa Nilemo: You go fill out paperwork that tells the Secretary of State that the party did that, get certified by the party. We did that in the back room of a restaurant. So it was exciting. All the candidates who had gotten nominated came together. It was really late. We all filled out our paperwork together, and then the party submits it. And then you appear on the Secretary of State’s website that says, all right, these are the candidates. You watch that happen for the other side, so you know who your competition is.

After that, as the official Democratic candidate, she ramped up fundraising efforts, and then June came.

Alyssa Nilemo: And then here in Colorado, we’re really, really lucky. We have an amazing mail and ballot voting system. So ballot arrives in my mail, and I open it up. And there’s my name. Primary was really fun because it’s just my name. So you just watch all the votes come in for you. and you get a hundred percent of the vote. And you go, “Wow, I really rocked that. That was so easy.” I think up to that point you’re, like, speed walking. You’re, like, trying to save your energy, and it’s this speed walk. And then the primary hits and passes. And that’s kind of the mile marker that tells you like, “All right, start jogging.” Like, “This is your moment to start pushing.”

So Alyssa and her campaign did just that. They started pushing. Alyssa’s campaign has gone through many phases, and now with dedicated staff, donations, endorsements, and a team of volunteers running various events every weekend, she’s in the final stretch before general election mail-in ballots are sent to voters in October. Tracing a line from her position in the City of Westminster, you could say that Alyssa’s journey to become a politician started in 2018. But the worldview that informs her approach to politics? I believe it originated way before she started working with leaders like Herb Atchison. I’ve said over and over again that Alyssa is a fourth-generation Coloradan, and I’ll say one more time that she’s a fourth-generation Japanese American. She grew up in the Japanese American community here in Colorado. I’ve had the privilege of getting to know various Japanese American communities in different states, and this one—the Denver-area Japanese American community that I’ve come to know and love in the past two months—is special. Because of the history of Japanese Americans settling here in the early 1900s, because of Governor Ralph Carr, because of the caravan, because of Amache, because of Sakura Square, the Japanese American community in Colorado is intertwined and has developed its own culture. Alyssa’s political outlook was influenced by this multifaceted community I think in ways she even hasn’t fully realized. I explore the Japanese American community of Colorado next time on Middleweight: District 44.

Glenn Tagawa: When he was here last year, he saw the water tower, and he just started crying.

Stacey Shigaya: That builds that compassion, where you realize, you know, we all have the same blood running through our veins. We breathe the same air. It’s just, we have differences in how we solve these different issues.

Charles Ozaki: The effort was for the kids to become educated and have the choice to do whatever they wanted to do for their own futures.

Middleweight is produced by me, Toshiki Nakashige. The art for the podcast was created by Yoko Takahashi. Music was composed by Tim Greer and performed by Steve Denny and Gary Tsujimoto. For more information about the podcast, please visit middleweightpodcast.com, and subscribe to the show wherever you listen to podcasts. My name is Toshiki Nakashige. Thanks for listening.