I’m running to represent California’s 40th District in Congress because we can’t keep electing the same cynical career politicians and expecting different results. I’m a working mom, an entrepreneur, and a problem solver. I don’t just talk — I roll up my sleeves and get things done. And I’m not afraid to fight hard for the issues that matter.

My Story: Built on Grit and Determination

Both sides of my family fled communist oppression in North Korea during the Korean War. After escaping on foot to South Korea, my grandmother, who lived with my family and helped to raise me, was a single mother selling rice and fixing umbrellas to feed her two young children.

Through family reunification visas, my parents came to America with nothing but a few hundred dollar bills and the grit to pick themselves up after a string of failed business ventures including a shiitake mushroom farm and a scrap metal business. Eventually, my father succeeded in building a janitorial services company that employed hundreds of immigrants just like him.

I was the first in my high school to attend an Ivy League university. At Yale, instead of becoming a lawyer or doctor like many children of immigrants, I fell in love with history and artists. I continued my art history studies as a Doctoral student and researcher at Columbia University, where fellow graduate workers organized to start a union to advocate for better wages. Our union, Graduate Student Workers of Columbia-UAW, was finally recognized in 2014.

During this time, the fight for fighting for unseen labors in the creative and academic industry led me to turn my living room as an exhibition space to feature unknown artists in my community. Over time, I would build from scratch the livelihoods of dozens of living American artists as young as twenty-two and as old as eighty-two. Over and over again, I pursued a vision of the American Dream for myself and those around me. In 2024, The New York Times profiled my achievements and called me a visionary, but I’m just someone who believes in turning “impossible” into “done.”

And I'm someone who puts my money where my mouth is. I've worked with the NRDC to push for stronger protections for clean air and clean water, supported food equity efforts to bring healthy and affordable food into underserved neighborhoods, and advocated for arts education because creativity and culture shouldn’t be limited to families who can afford private lessons or well-funded schools.

Whenever I have the chance, you’ll find me on with my 8 year-old daughter participating in regional rodeos in the barrel racing category.