Allan Fung

Crown colony Chinese immigrants from British Hong Kong, his family settled in Rhode Island in 1969, and ran a restaurant on Cranston Street and Gansett Avenue in Cranston, Rhode Island.

Allan Wai-Ket Fung (born February 25, 1970) is an American attorney and politician who served as Mayor of Cranston, Rhode Island from 2009 to 2021.

Allan W. Fung, born on February 25, 1970, at Providence Lying-In Hospital (now known as Women & Infants Hospital), is the eldest of Kwong Wen and Tan Ping's three children.

Fung graduated from Classical High School in Providence, Rhode Island, in 1988, in the same class as future Providence mayor Angel Taveras.

Fung earned a Bachelor of Arts degree from Rhode Island College in 1992 and a Juris Doctor from the Suffolk University Law School in 1995.

Prior to his municipal leadership career, from 1999 to 2001, Fung served as a prosecutor, acting as Special Assistant, for the Rhode Island Attorney General.

Fung served from 2001 to 2009 as the government relations counsel for Metropolitan Life Insurance Company MetLife.

In 2003, he was elected to the Cranston City Council.

In 2004, Fung was honored as a Rhode Island Bar Foundation Fellow.

He was also a Providence Business News 40 Under Forty honoree.

Fung was chairman of the Rhode Island Governor's Insurance Council from 2005 to 2008.

He succeeded Michael Napolitano, who defeated him for the position in the 2006 election by 79 votes.

Elected to the mayorship in 2008, Fung became the first mayor of Chinese ancestry in Rhode Island.

He was previously a state prosecutor and attorney on legislative and regulatory affairs before serving on the Cranston City Council as a citywide councilman.

A Republican, he was elected mayor in November 2008, beating Democrat Cynthia M. Fogarty by 63% to 37%.

He is the first Chinese American elected as mayor in the state.

He received the Classical High School Distinguished Alumni Award in 2009.

Fung was re-elected in 2010 against Richard R. Tomlins by 76% to 24% and in 2012 against only write-in opponents by 97% to 3%.

Fung is a council member for the Republican National Committee's Asian Pacific American Advisory Council.

Because of term limits established in 2012, Fung could not re-run for mayor in 2020 and instead endorsed Kenneth Hopkins, who went on to win the election against Democratic candidate Maria Bucci.

On January 4, 2021, Fung planned to attend the inauguration of Hopkins and administer the oath, but instead tested positive for COVID-19 and immediately left Cranston's City Council chambers, the location where the ceremony was being held.

He received several high-profile Republican endorsements during the campaign, including former Rhode Island Governor Lincoln Almond, former Massachusetts Governor and 2012 presidential nominee Mitt Romney and former Massachusetts Governor William Weld.

In November 2013, Fung announced his candidacy for Governor of Rhode Island in the 2014 election.

He was the Republican nominee for Governor of Rhode Island in the 2014 and 2018 elections as well as the Republican nominee for U.S. representative for RI's 2nd congressional district in 2022.

In Fung's 2014 gubernatorial campaign, he disclosed that he had been involved in a fatal car crash in 1989.

Fung said he lost consciousness and struck and killed James W. Skipper Jr., who had stopped on the side of the road to change a tire.

Fung was charged in the incident but a grand jury did not indict him.

Fung said he reached an out-of-court settlement with Skipper's family.

He said no drugs or alcohol were involved in the incident.

On September 9, 2014, Fung defeated Ken Block in the Republican primary, with a 55% majority.

Soon thereafter, the Republican Governors Association President also endorsed him.

Democrat Gina Raimondo would go on to win the three-way contest by a 5-point margin.

Fung won re-election to a fourth term as Cranston mayor in November 2016, by a margin of 2 to 1.

Under Fung's leadership, Cranston became one of the Top 50 Cities to Live in America for three years in a row according to the website 24/7 Wall Street.

Cranston, according to Alarms.com website, was also named one of the Top 100 Best Cities to Raise A Child in 2017.

In October 2017, Fung announced he would again seek the governorship, but went on to lose to Democrat Gina Raimondo with 37.2% of the vote.

In February 2022, Fung announced his candidacy for the Republican nomination for the United States House of Representatives in Rhode Island's 2nd congressional district after incumbent Democrat James Langevin announced his retirement.

He won the nomination unopposed and then lost to Democrat Seth Magaziner in the general election.

Fung describes himself as a "'Rhode Island Republican' -- moderate, but fiscally conservative".

An Eyewitness News political analyst described Fung as "a more moderate Republican".