Jane Kim

Jane Jungyon Kim (born July 9, 1977) is an American attorney and politician, and the first Korean American elected official in San Francisco.

Jane Kim was born in Manhattan on July 9, 1977, to South Korean parents who immigrated to the U.S. from Seoul in 1971.

Kim grew up learning both the English and Korean languages.

Her mother owned a store selling women's clothing.

Her father joined Kiss Products, a global cosmetics company, while she was in college.

At age 14, Kim began studying taekwondo, eventually earning a black belt.

She was involved with community activism, especially the issue of homelessness.

While attending Spence School, a New York prep school, she stopped reciting the Pledge of Allegiance in her teens—she rejected the Pledge words "with liberty and justice for all," because she saw that LGBT people were not treated equally.

Kim graduated from Stanford University with a bachelor's degree in Political Science and Asian American Studies.

She settled in San Francisco and attended the UC Berkeley School of Law.

In 2003 while campaigning for Green Party mayoral candidate Matt Gonzalez, Kim observed that Asian Americans were not well represented in San Francisco politics despite the size of its population.

In 2004, she decided to run for the San Francisco Board of Education.

In a field of 12 candidates seeking four seats, Kim came in seventh place; her bid failed in part because she was a member of the minority Green Party and did not have the backing of the Democratic Party.

In 2005 Kim was elected president of the San Francisco People's Organization (SFPO), made up of many notable San Francisco activists and organizers.

SFPO worked against several California ballot propositions in November 2005, and assisted with health care and affordable housing measures for San Franciscans through 2006.

In 2006, Kim mounted a stronger campaign and she came in first in a field of 15 candidates seeking three seats.

Kim was the top vote getter in every district except Marina/Cow Hollow, West of Twin Peaks and Castro/Noe Valley.

In 2006, the school board took up the issue of whether to continue the 90-year-old Junior Reserve Officers' Training Corps (JROTC) program in San Francisco high schools.

The board voted to phase out the JROTC program over two years.

In December 2006, previous to taking office, Kim learned about a death threat against her that was sent from a JROTC cadet to his friend on Facebook.

The cadet had also used MySpace to threaten a high school girl who argued prominently against JROTC.

Kim spoke to the cadet herself and reported that he sincerely regretted his actions.

Kim took the position that the JROTC program should not be hosted by San Francisco as long as the U.S. military continued its "don't ask, don't tell" policy.

In 2007, she became the first Korean American elected official in San Francisco.

Kim's election was part of a more liberal shift in the school board joining Fellow Green Mark Sanchez, Eric Mar, and Kim-Shree Maufas.

In June 2008 Kim and Norman Yee submitted a proposal to accept JROTC programs as optional after-school activities, without giving students physical education (P.E.) credit toward graduation.

In October, Kim proposed an alternative program called Student Emergency Response Volunteers (SERV) that would train students in emergency preparedness and disaster relief.

In March 2008, Kim and Sanchez traveled to Israel as members of the U.S. Green Party to investigate whether the party should continue to support the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions program targeting Israel for its occupation of Palestine.

Kim earned a J.D. degree and was admitted to the State Bar of California in 2009.

After graduating from Stanford, Kim worked as a Fellow at Greenlining Institute in San Francisco and then as a Youth Community Organizer at the Chinatown Community Development Center (CCDC).

Reverend Norman Fong, who interviewed her, took a risk in hiring Kim as she was not Chinese American and did not speak Chinese but “she won him over.” Kim successfully led a youth volunteer and leadership program in San Francisco Chinatown for six years.

Through her community organization efforts, she met power broker Rose Pak.

The bid to remove or replace JROTC failed in a 3–4 vote held in May 2009.

She represented San Francisco's District 6 on the Board of Supervisors between 2011 and 2019.

She is a member of the San Francisco's Democratic County Central Committee.

She is executive director of the California Working Families Party.

Prior to her election to the Board of Supervisors, Kim was a member and then president of the San Francisco Board of Education.

In 2016, she ran for the 11th California State Senate District, but lost to Scott Wiener in a run-off election after finishing first place in the primary.

She was a candidate for mayor in the 2018 San Francisco mayoral election, finishing third with 24.03% of the first-round vote.

She was the California political director and national regional political director for Bernie Sanders' 2020 presidential campaign.