California is home to more AAPIs than any other state, but two stories this week show how life there is changing for some communities. ICE arrests of AAPIs have shot up in 2025, while in Daly City, Filipino families are finding it increasingly difficult to afford the city generations of Filipinos made home.
In New York, Zohran Mamdani surprised people with his Mandarin, drawing praise, accusations of AI and the predictable “communist” attacks. We’re also looking at Trump’s decision to cut U.S.-South Korea military exercises short and what Mike D’Antoni had to say about Jeremy Lin during his Hall of Fame induction.
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ICE arrested 1,100% more AAPIs in California last year, analysis shows
Nearly 3,000 AAPIs were arrested by ICE in California in 2025, an increase that far outpaced the rise among detainees overall. A new analysis from the USC Equity Research Institute found AAPIs went from 4% of ICE arrests in the state to 11% in a single year.
The people being picked up also look different from what the usual rhetoric around immigration enforcement might suggest. Fifty-six percent had no criminal record, up from 19% the year before. Arrests of AAPI women and children increased as well, while community groups say the fear is changing how some families work, travel and go about their daily lives.
What else we’re tracking
Bay Area’s Daly City getting too expensive for the Filipino families who made it home
Daly City has been one of the Bay Area’s best-known Filipino enclaves for decades, but fewer Filipino families are able to stay. A San Francisco Chronicle analysis of Census Bureau data found nearly 4,000 fewer residents identifying as fully or partly Filipino than five years earlier. That’s an 11% decline in a city where the typical home value reached about $1.1 million in 2024.
Mamdani’s spot-on Mandarin draws praise, pisses off haters
Zohran Mamdani got New Yorkers talking after delivering a Mandarin-language pitch for free Broadway tickets for high school students. His pronunciation impressed fluent speakers. Other viewers were so skeptical that they accused him of using AI, forcing his press secretary to clarify that the video was real.
Trump cuts U.S.-South Korea drills short as Seoul asks who has its back
Annual U.S.-South Korea military exercises will end six days early after Trump ordered them scaled back, saying he did not want to send a hostile signal to North Korean leader Kim Jong Un. Trump is also reportedly pushing for another meeting with Kim as early as this fall.
Jeremy Lin gets his flowers during former Knicks coach’s Hall of Fame induction
Fourteen years after Linsanity took over New York, Mike D’Antoni made sure Jeremy Lin had a place in his Hall of Fame speech. Lin was sitting in the audience as the former Knicks coach recalled how close the Taiwanese American guard had come to losing his roster spot before his sudden breakout in 2012. “Jeremy gave New York and all of us the ride of our lives,” said D’Antoni.
Why read Issue #247?
We spend years building communities and making a place our own without knowing how long any of it will stay. Times change and people move on. Even the moments that once felt enormous can fade from memory.
We know nothing lasts forever and permanence isn’t really what gives something meaning. Sometimes a community, a connection or even a brief moment matters simply because it was there. And while it’s ours, we shouldn’t be so willing to let someone else decide when it’s time to give it up.
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The Rebel Yellow is supported in part by funding from The Asian American Foundation (TAAF). Funders do not influence story selection, reporting, or editorial decisions. All editorial content is independently produced by The Rebel Yellow team.