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CALIFORNIANS IN CONGRESS CREATE SIKH CAUCUS, OBSERVE ARMENIAN GENOCIDE
89.3 KPCC, CA
April 24 2013
A pair of California House members have announced the formation of
a new group to acknowledge a large religious group in California:
the Sikh Caucus.
Nearly 40 percent of the nation's estimated Sikh population --an
estimated 250,000 -- live in California. Early immigrants worked on
the railroad and farms in California's Central Valley. The first Sikh
Temple built in California, Gurdwara, opened in 1912.
Rep. Judy Chu, D-Monterey Park, and Rep. David Valadao, R-Hanford,
will co-chair the new caucus, an informal group created to educate
members of Congress and the general public about American Sikh issues.
"More than a decade after 9/11, too many Sikhs across America face
discrimination, bullying, and even bias-motivated violence from
misguided individuals associating them with the terrorist attacks,"
Chu said Wednesday. "This caucus will be the voice for American Sikhs
in the House of Representatives."
According to the Associated Press, Sikhs have been targeted in more
than 700 violent incidents over the last decade, including a shooting
at a Sikh temple last year in Wisconsin.
Also on Wednesday, Rep. Adam Schiff, D-Burbank, made a speech on the
House floor - in Armenian to commemorate the 98th anniversary of the
Armenian Genocide. An estimated million and a half Armenians were
killed in 1915 by the Ottoman government and Schiff's district is
home to a large Armenian-American community in Glendale.
"I speak to you in the language of the survivors who came to America
for freedom and made a new life," he said. "I speak to you in the
language of those who were lost. Their voices drift across the decades,
begging us to remember."
http://www.scpr.org/blogs/politics/2013/04/24/13428/california-representatives-in-congress-create-sikh/
89.3 KPCC, CA
April 24 2013
A pair of California House members have announced the formation of
a new group to acknowledge a large religious group in California:
the Sikh Caucus.
Nearly 40 percent of the nation's estimated Sikh population --an
estimated 250,000 -- live in California. Early immigrants worked on
the railroad and farms in California's Central Valley. The first Sikh
Temple built in California, Gurdwara, opened in 1912.
Rep. Judy Chu, D-Monterey Park, and Rep. David Valadao, R-Hanford,
will co-chair the new caucus, an informal group created to educate
members of Congress and the general public about American Sikh issues.
"More than a decade after 9/11, too many Sikhs across America face
discrimination, bullying, and even bias-motivated violence from
misguided individuals associating them with the terrorist attacks,"
Chu said Wednesday. "This caucus will be the voice for American Sikhs
in the House of Representatives."
According to the Associated Press, Sikhs have been targeted in more
than 700 violent incidents over the last decade, including a shooting
at a Sikh temple last year in Wisconsin.
Also on Wednesday, Rep. Adam Schiff, D-Burbank, made a speech on the
House floor - in Armenian to commemorate the 98th anniversary of the
Armenian Genocide. An estimated million and a half Armenians were
killed in 1915 by the Ottoman government and Schiff's district is
home to a large Armenian-American community in Glendale.
"I speak to you in the language of the survivors who came to America
for freedom and made a new life," he said. "I speak to you in the
language of those who were lost. Their voices drift across the decades,
begging us to remember."
http://www.scpr.org/blogs/politics/2013/04/24/13428/california-representatives-in-congress-create-sikh/