As the United States nears its 250th anniversary in 2026, the occasion invites celebration, but also an honest look at who gets included in the national story. For Asian Americans, many of whose families arrived in large numbers after the 1965 Immigration and Nationality Act, the Semiquincentennial is a moment to say plainly: our lives, labor, and political fights are part of American history, not an add-on to it.
A Growing Community, and a Longer History Than People Assume
Asian Americans are a little over 7% of the U.S. population, but we have been present at key turning points for generations. Chinese workers blasted tunnels and laid track for the railroads; Filipino laborers organized in the fields; Japanese Americans served in uniform even as their families were incarcerated; South and Southeast Asian activists pushed civil-rights battles in workplaces, schools, and neighborhoods. Long before we were widely seen, or even counted, we were building and defending the country alongside everyone else.
The past six decades, in particular, reshaped the size and visibility of Asian America. Today our communities show up everywhere: in labs and hospitals, small businesses and startups, classrooms, newsrooms, city halls, and the arts. We are not a single story or a single culture; we are many, and we are increasingly part of the decisions that shape what the country becomes.
What 2026 Can Mean for Us
If the Semiquincentennial is a national mirror, it should reflect Asian Americans too. Here is what’s worth marking:
- Belonging: We’re no longer on the margins of American life; we’re in every industry, every region, and every kind of community.
- Progress: More AANHPI leaders are winning local races, leading schools and agencies, and running community organizations.
- Possibility: A younger generation is organizing, speaking up, and stepping into leadership without asking for permission.
- Pluralism: The country’s diversity is not a footnote; it’s the engine. Asian Americans are part of that engine.
None of this requires pretending the country has lived up to its ideals. A real celebration makes room for both: pride in what people built, and clarity about what still needs fixing.
What Still Has to Change
If we want to be fully present in the country’s next 250 years, we can’t treat citizenship as something that happens to us. It takes choices like these:
- Show up civically: vote, serve on boards, run for local office, and build leadership in our neighborhoods.
- Tell the truth about our past: in schools, museums, family archives, and public memory, so our history doesn’t disappear between chapters.
- Build coalitions that last: partner with Black, Latino, Indigenous, and other communities on shared fights for fairness and safety.
- Defend democratic norms: push back on hate and political violence, and don’t let disinformation set the terms of our debates.
In other words, our place in the story isn’t something we wait for. We claim it by participating, organizing, and leading.
Renewing the Ideals America Claims
Anniversaries can become empty pageantry if they don’t lead to repair. The United States has faced recurring tests, including corruption, polarization, and distrust, and it will face more. Keeping a democracy healthy is not only the job of elected officials; it depends on what ordinary people demand, tolerate, and choose to do together.
Asian Americans can contribute to that work in practical ways, including:
- Protecting elections, voting rights, and the rule of law
- Expecting, and practicing, ethical, accountable leadership
- Investing in innovation, from science and technology to climate solutions
- Building cross-cultural understanding and showing solidarity when it matters
Renewal, in the end, looks like people refusing cynicism and then doing the unglamorous work: showing up, staying informed, and holding power to account.
Pride, Dissent, and the World We Live In
In a time of war and humanitarian crisis, from Ukraine to the Middle East, it can feel complicated to take pride in a nation that projects power abroad. But pride doesn’t have to mean endorsing every decision made in our name. It can be grounded in:
- The ideals of liberty, equality, and justice—even when the country fails to deliver them.
- The freedom to dissent, to protest, to organize, and to argue for peace, rights that are not protected everywhere.
- The contributions of our communities, which often reflect the country at its best.
Patriotism, at its healthiest, isn’t blind loyalty. It’s the willingness to insist the country live up to its promises, especially when it’s uncomfortable.
Looking to the Next Chapter
As America turns 250, Asian Americans can help write what comes next through coalition politics, public service, and the everyday work of making communities safer and more fair. Our collective history in the United States may feel recent to some, but it is already deep, and it is stitched into the country’s institutions and culture. The next 250 years will be shaped by who participates; we should be among the people shaping them.
