Lee's Supporters Call for Presidential Pardon

By Ned Randolph

San Francisco (Sept. 22) -- As a Senate committee examines whether race was a factor in jailing Taiwan-born scientist Wen Ho Lee for allegedly mishandling nuclear secrets, local Asian-Americans are petitioning President Clinton to pardon the 60-year-old scientist.

They are saying the experience of Lee, a naturalized citizen, must never be repeated. Posting White House fax and phone numbers on their web sites and circulating email signup lists, these groups are signaling a new effort by Asian Americans to become more politically active.

Lee pled guilty to one felony count of mishandling sensitive documents after spending nine months in solitary confinement. Activists say the government engaged in "racial profiling" by targeting Lee first and later linking him to a different crime later -tantamount to pulling over motorists because they are black or Hispanic.

"It's downloading while Asian," said Bob Kim, an ACLU attorney in San Francisco who worked on Lee's defense. Kim said Latino and African American motorists are stopped all the time because of their ethnic appearance, known as "driving while black or brown."

"There is a whole broad picture that people of color are being targeted as criminal suspects based on race or ethnicity -- on streets or in laboratories," said Kim.

And it has jolted the Asian American community.

"We all now realize what happened to Dr. Lee could happen to any one of us," Kim said. "You're considered a criminal first."

Activists say racial prejudice is common for Asian Americans. According to a report by a Justice Department task force, many Asian American employees in government laboratories say they work in an atmosphere of distrust and suspicion. They feel that managers and supervisors question their loyalty and patriotism. Employees at Lee's former laboratory at Los Alamos say supervisors do not penalize individuals who engage in discriminatory behavior.

According to one activist in California, Asian Americans face a biased government because they have few public officials to champion their causes.

"In a state where we have 12 to 15 percent Asian Americans, there is no representation in the State Senate, and even in the State Assembly there might be two or three," said Victor Hwang, director of the San Francisco-based Asian Law Caucus. He said because Asian Americans are diverse in ethnicity, they support different candidates.

To bring more clout to the Asian American community, one political group involved in the Wen Ho Lee petition advocates a strategy of voting in a single bloc. The 80-20 organization, which was formed two years ago by former UC Berkeley Chancellor Chang-Lin Tien, has amassed an email list of 400,000 people. Its strategy is modeled after the behavior of other immigrant groups -- particularly Jews, who represent a small population in the United States but make a formidable group that votes together on issues.

"We do not show any real benefit for any party to court Asian Americans," said 80-20 spokesman Al Fong. "If we don't have a voice, people label us a weak race. If we can come with a bloc vote, we'll have the ability to unite."

A San Francisco organizer sees the Wen Ho Lee case as an impetus to bring Asian Americans together.

"Because of Wen Ho Lee, a lot of people are upset," said Chan Liao, director of the Chinese American Political Association, which represents about 2,000 families in the Bay Area. "We know these things are going to happen if we don't unite."

He says an increase in legislators sympathetic to Asian American issues could inject them into the national discussion of the nation's policy makers.

"If you get a vote in the legislature and have a voice in America, then you can prevent Wen Ho Lee types of cases from happening," he said.

For now, the supporters of Lee have united with other Asia Pacific groups to pardon Lee and search for ways to promote Asian American issues. The organization is calling for a full presidential pardon to exonerate Lee on the guilty charge.

"We have got his freedom, but we have not brought justice," said Cecilia Chang, Fremont Human Relations Commissioner who also runs the Wen Ho Lee web site, www.wenholee.org. The web site lists email signup lists and the phone and fax numbers of a White House hotline that registers petitioners.

Meanwhile Sen. Arlen Specter, R-Pennsylvania, has convened a Judiciary subcommittee to investigate the factors surrounding Lee's arrest. Chang is cautiously supportive. She says Specter has seemingly reversed his position.

"He was demanding the Attorney General to resign for failure to pursue the case aggressively," she said. "We're not going to jump on board to say (Specter) is going to be our champion."

The Senate inquiry at present is the only hope that the supporters of Lee have to correct what they consider a an unjust punishment. Chang says she hopes some investigation will expose the Justice Department, the FBI and other prejudicial witnesses of the trial.

According to Kim, counterintelligence within the FBI and Justice Department points to others who also mishandled restricted materials and were not prosecuted.

Judge James Parker ordered the government's attorneys to turn over files that could have shown whether Lee was prosecuted because of his Chinese lineage. But when Lee agreed to the plea deal, he was released two days before the judge's deadline. Parker expressed disappointment that the evidence would be sealed from the eye of the court.

Some argue that the prosecution was using the plea deal to circumvent the deadline.

"Wen Ho Lee was in solitary confinement for nine months, he had an incentive to get out," said Kim. "I doubt he could have waited before the plea agreement was withdrawn."

And that is where the inquiry should focus, says Hwang.

"It certainly looked like -- from the Judge's statements and from the prosecution's actions -- there is something they are trying to hide," he said.