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Trump Resister Senator Andy Kim [1]

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Date: 2025-03-09

Senator Andy Kim–Another Strong Fighter in the Trump Resistance February 3, 2025

When Demagogue/RIC (Racist-in-Chief) Donald sent his ICE agents to question the status of both immigrants and native-born American citizens in Newark, New Jersey, on January 23, 2025, U.S. Senator Andy Kim strongly rebuked him. Along with his fellow Democratic Garden State Senator Cory Booker, Senator Kim stated, “Actions like this one sow fear in all our communities–and our broken immigration system requires solutions, not fear tactics.” Kim indicated that condemnation of ICE’s tactics was not enough. He stated that he had reached out to the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), which oversees ICE, to get more answers about this warrantless raid. For Senator Kim, immigration and ethnicity are not something he just reads about in position papers and discusses in Congress. It is personal. Meet Senator Kim.

First-term Senator Andy Kim (43) is currently New Jersey’s junior Democratic U.S. Senator. He is NJ’s first Korean-American Senator and the first Asian-American-U.S. senator from the Garden State. Boston, Massachusetts native Kim grew up in South Jersey. He is the son of Korean immigrants. His father was a geneticist and his mother a nurse. A 2000 graduate of Cherry Hill High School East, Kim spent two years in the very small and extremely selective Deep Springs College in CA. He transferred to the prestigious University of Chicago where he graduated Phi Beta Kappa with a 2004 political science degree. While in college, Kim was an intern at the United States Agency for International Development and at the Chicago Coalition for the Homeless. He received a Rhodes Scholarship and while at England’s Oxford University studied U.S. policy in Iraq. At Oxford, Kim became friends with fellow Rhodes Scholar Pete Buttigieg whom he endorsed in the 2020 Democratic presidential primary and who later became President Biden’s Transportation Secretary. Kim worked at the State Department and was a civilian adviser to General David Petraeus in Afghanistan. Kim became the Iraq Director of the National Security Council under President Obama where he helped set policy for dealing with the ISIS terrorist network. He wrote a plan that was implemented under Obama to strike ISIS.

In 2018, Kim returned to New Jersey to run against Trump friend and loyalist Tom MacArthur in the then GOP-leaning NJ 3rd Congressional District (CD). This CD contains the famous beach town Atlantic City and the Philadelphia exurbs. Republican MacArthur played a leading role in 2017 in cutting a deal on the House GOP bill to repeal Obamacare. Later on in 2017, MacArthur was only one of the five NJ House GOPers to vote for Trump’s regressive tax cut legislation that aided the top 1%. This measure was very controversial because of its cap on deductions for state and local taxes. Kim ran for a U.S. House seat because he was upset by Rep. MacArthur’s attempts to repeal Obamacare. During this campaign, Trump ally MacArthur tried to portray Kim as a D.C. “elitist and outsider.” The NJ GOP Party ran an ad describing Kim as “Real Fishy” in Wonton font on a picture of a dead fish. This ad was criticized for its racial undertones. Why should we be surprised at Trump backers employing the race card? On election night 2018, the race was considered too close to call. However, after eight days, MacArthur conceded. Kim won this contest by fewer than 4,000 votes or just over 1% of the votes cast in NJ’s closest congressional race. At that time, Kim became the first Asian American Congress Member from NJ. In 2020, Cong. Kim won re-election by eight points against another GOP rival, 53%-45%. In 2022, after redistricting, which made the NJ 3rd more Democratic Kim handily defeated another GOP opponent by an 11.8 percentage margin, 55.4 %-43.6%.

In the House, then Cong. Kim became active on national security issues while he sat on the Armed Services Committee. On that influential committee, Rep. Kim gained the post as the top Democrat on the Personnel Subcommittee. Kim was an ally of the Democratic leadership and made it a point to outreach to Asian Americans across the U.S. Because of these actions, in 2023, Cong. Kim gained a seat on the Select Committee on China. On the Armed Services Personnel Subcommittee, Kim worked to help veterans dealing with mental health issues. With his Armed Services Committee seat, Cong. Kim was instrumental in supporting the major military installation, Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst located in his 3rd Congressional District. Kim additionally worked with Cong. Judy Judy Chu (D-CA) in recruiting more Asian American congressional candidates by creating a leadership political action committee. In April, 2020, the House leadership appointed Kim to the House Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus crisis. Despite originally being in a very swingy-GOP leaning district, Kim voted with President Biden 100% of the time in the 117th Congress (2021-2022). In 2021, labor’s AFL-CIO gave Kim a 100% rating and the ACLU gave him a perfect 100% score in 2022. The pro-environmentalist LCV, League of Conservation Voters, gave Kim perfect scores in both 2021 and 2022. Kim supported Biden’s key Inflation Reduction Act, his American Rescue Plan, as well as his CHIPS and Science Act. During his time in the House, Cong. Kim did not lose touch with his constituents. He made an effort to host at least one Congressional town hall meeting a month. He was a member of the Congressional Progressive Caucus. He voted for aid to Ukraine, Israel, and Taiwan. Kim is proudly pro-choice. He was “outraged” by the U.S. Supreme Ct. overturning “Roe v. Wade” and in 2024 stated he would vote to codify reproductive rights into law. Kim supports universal health care and is open to different options in this area, including single-payer or multi-payer systems. Kim voted in 2022 to enshrine interracial and same-sex marriage protections into federal law.

On January 7, 2021 after voting to certify the 2020 presidential election for Biden, Kim gained additional media attention. He was photographed cleaning up trash left behind after the January 6, 2021 Trump-incited fatal Capitol attempted coup. Kim donated the blue suit he wore in that photo to the Smithsonian Institution. The Smithsonian was collecting items from the riot.

On September 23, 2023, Cong. Kim announced that he would mount a primary challenge to incumbent U.S. Democratic Senator Bob Menendez the day after Mendenez was indicted on federal corruption charges. Kim stated he was running to restore integrity in politics. Kim was later challenged by New Jersey’s first lady, Tammy Murphy, the wife of current Dem. Gov. Murphy. Kim was endorsed by PA U.S. Democratic Senator John Fetterman, and Cong. Grace Meng (D-NY). Tammy Murphy later dropped out of the primary race. On June 4, 2024,Kim won his primary against two other challengers with 75% of the vote.

Kim endorsed Kamala Harris when Biden dropped his plans to run for re-election. On being convicted on all counts in his corruption trial, Menendez resigned from office on August 20, 2024. Menendez requested that his name be removed from the ballot. In the November, 2024 general election, Kim handily beat his GOP rival Curtis Bashaw by a 9.62 percent margin, 53.61%-43.99%.

Sen. Kim’s defense of immigrant rights and condemnation of ICE raids is in line with his strong progressive voting record which he will certainly continue in the U.S. Senate. Sen. Kim is the type of legislator that Democrats and moderates must elect and keep electing to keep Demagogue /Racist-in-Chief Trump in check.

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