Mission

NAKASEC’s mission is to organize Korean and Asian Americans to achieve social, racial and economic justice. With our network of grassroots-based affiliates, we engage multigenerational Korean and Asian Americans and immigrants.

Vision

Our vision is a future in which low and middle-income, immigrants, people of color, and marginalized communities are working together as change-makers. We have transformed cultures, power relationships, systems, and policies in the United States, all in a broader global context.

NAKASEC’s history is rooted in the democratic movement of South Korea.

The Korean War in the 1950s ravaged the peninsula and its people. In 1953, an armistice agreement was signed between the now-North and South Koreas and their political allies, enacting a ceasefire and formally dividing the peninsula.

Following the armistice agreement, two dictators assumed control of what became South Korea. As a result, the South Korean people – especially workers and students – began to organize. In May 1980, the South Korean people rose up in the southern region of Gwangju to resist decades of oppressive military dictatorship rule. One of the student organizers of the Gwangju People’s Uprising, Han Bong Yoon (“Mr. Yoon”), had no choice but to flee South Korea or be persecuted for his activism.

Civic Engagement

Empowering Asian American Voices

We recognize civic engagement as a critical way to amplify Asian American voices and make changes to the systems and structures that impact our lives. With our local affiliates, we aim to increase the electoral participation of Asian Americans across the country through voter education, registration, mobilization, research, and assistance.
 

Adoptees For Justice

Adoptees For Justice is an intercountry adoptee-led project of NAKASEC that formed in 2018. Many of its members have been working for justice in adoptee, immigrant, racial, and social justice spaces for years.

Adoptees For Justice’s first project is to educate, organize and advocate for an Adoptee Citizenship Act that is inclusive of all adoptees, including those with criminal backgrounds and who have been deported. Adoptees For Justice firmly believes that ALL intercountry adoptees should have U.S. citizenship, and that no adoptee should be left behind. We view this commitment as part of the larger immigrant justice and human rights movements.

A 24/7 confidential hotline is available for live assistance in English and Korean at (844) 500-3222.

Last Updated: 03/28/25