Alysa Liu lifts Team USA to gold in Olympic figure skating team event
Figure skating star Alysa Liu delivered a 74.90-point short program to help Team USA win the gold medal in the Olympic figure skating team event Sunday night in Milan.
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The Rebel Yellow - Issue #178
Figure skating: Alysa Liu scored 74.90 in the women’s short program, helping Team USA win gold in the Olympic figure skating team event in Milan. The U.S. beat Japan by just one point overall.
NFL: Filipino American kicker Jason Myers made Super Bowl history, hitting five field goals for 15 points in the Seattle Seahawks’ 29–13 win over the Patriots. He also became the first NFL player to score 200 points in a season including the playoffs.
Immigration: A disabled Bangladeshi American woman told Congress that ICE agents forcibly pulled her from her car during a January arrest in Minneapolis, even after she said she is autistic and has a traumatic brain injury.
Crime: New Jersey prosecutors charged the son of former Japanese American Citizens League president David Lin with two counts of first-degree murder in the deaths of his parents.
Politics: President Donald Trump drew widespread condemnation after sharing a video that depicted Barack and Michelle Obama as apes, with civil rights groups and lawmakers calling it racist.
Entertainment: YouTube creator Markiplier said his self-funded horror film Iron Lung performed strongly at the box office, expanding to over 3,000 theaters and earning about $30 million in the U.S.
Japan: The long-running Super Sentai franchise aired its final episode, ending a 51-year streak of uninterrupted annual superhero series.
Alysa Liu lifts Team USA to gold in Olympic figure skating team event
Figure skating star Alysa Liu delivered a 74.90-point short program to help Team USA win the gold medal in the Olympic figure skating team event Sunday night in Milan.
The U.S. finished with a one-point margin over Japan after combining results across women’s, men’s, pairs and ice dance segments. The 20-year-old competed in her first Olympic event since returning from a two-year break following the Beijing Games.
The team event combines results across all four disciplines, with cumulative points determining final placement rather than head-to-head matchups. Liu’s score in the women’s short program helped set the Americans’ position early in the competition as the event progressed through the remaining segments. The gold was one of Team USA’s first medals of the Milan Cortina Games and continued its success in the event after also winning the team title at the 2022 Olympics.
Asian American athletes contributed across multiple segments of the U.S. lineup. In pairs, Ellie Kam competed as part of Team USA, making her Olympic debut in the team event. The gold medal also marked a milestone for ice dancer Madison Chock, who earned her first Olympic gold alongside partner Evan Bates after previously finishing on the podium at earlier Games.
Meanwhile, San Francisco native Eileen Gu, competing for China, won the silver medal in women’s freeski slopestyle after finishing second behind Switzerland’s Mathilde Gremaud. The 22-year-old star athlete led after the first run with an 86.58 before being overtaken on the final attempt.
The Milan Cortina Winter Olympics run through Feb. 22, with Asian American athletes from Team USA and other nations still scheduled to compete in upcoming snowboarding, short track speed skating and figure skating events.
Filipino American kicker Jason Myers sets Super Bowl field goal record
Filipino American Seattle Seahawks kicker Jason Myers made Super Bowl history on Sunday by converting five field goals, the most ever by a player in a single championship game.
The 34-year-old NFL star accounted for 15 points with kicks ranging from the low 30s to beyond 40 yards. His output surpassed the previous Super Bowl record of four field goals and represented the highest scoring contribution by a kicker in the game’s history.
The record-setting performance helped lift the Seattle Seahawks to a 29-13 win over the New England Patriots at Levi’s Stadium in Santa Clara, California, securing the franchise’s second Super Bowl championship. Myers was perfect on all five attempts, repeatedly converting when Seattle’s offense stalled in scoring range, including a 26-yard kick in the second half that extended the Seahawks’ lead. While quarterback Sam Darnold threw a touchdown pass to AJ Barner and Kenneth Walker III rushed for 135 yards, Seattle’s scoring advantage was built largely on Myers’ consistency.
The Super Bowl performance capped a historic season for Myers, who also became the first player in NFL history to score 200 points in a single season including the playoffs. Speaking on “Good Morning America” the morning after the game, Myers downplayed the personal accolades and emphasized execution, saying, “My goal all week was just to come through when my time was called. As a specialist, you can’t really force a game. You just got to go out there and do your best.” His five field goals pushed him past the previous Super Bowl record of four and capped a postseason run defined by consistency under pressure.
Myers has also used his platform to speak publicly about issues affecting Asian American communities. In a 2021 post addressing rising anti-Asian violence, he wrote, “We’ve seen an increase of violence & discrimination against the Asian American & Pacific Islander community. As a person of Filipino descent, I stand firm with my community and everyone who has been impacted and hurt.”
Speaking previously about his identity, Myers said, “I wish I would take more opportunity to dig into my Filipino roots, but I am proud to say I am Filipino. It’s made me who I am.”
Trump’s attack on the Obamas is an attack on Asian Americans
Donald Trump’s video that depicted Barack and Michelle Obama as apes goes beyond an assault on one Black couple.
The Truth Social post, which promoted false claims about the 2020 election, was deleted after about 12 hours of backlash last week. But the president, whose popularity has suffered over ICE’s actions in Minnesota, refused to apologize. “I didn’t make a mistake,” he stated, clarifying his vision for an America where citizenship has a color.
