Winning Akron鈥檚 mayoral primary wasn鈥檛 just a big win for Shammas Malik, it was a big win for political representation, as he is set to become the first racial minority to serve as mayor of Akron.
If racial demographics were the only predicter of votes, the odds were against Malik, a Pakistani American Muslim in a city that, according to the U.S. Census Bureau, has less than 6% people of Asian descent.
The Asian American Coalition of Ohio (AACO) is a nonpartisan organization that encourages Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders to become involved in civic engagement and political leadership.
鈥淗im being able to win is big,鈥� AACO chair Vincent Wang said. 鈥淭hat means Asian Americans are receiving recognition as far as their capability, their ability to participate and to lead.鈥�
Wang said Malik's win shows a strong desire by Ohioans to have more diversity in their political leaders and represents Ohio's growing diversity, which the 2020 census proved.
鈥淚t鈥檚 a big milestone. It shows that Asian communities are getting voices heard and they also want to be seen by the community,鈥� Wang said.
Ohio has never had a racial minority in the governor鈥檚 seat, nor in either of its U.S. Senate seats. And Ohio鈥檚 congressional delegation is predominantly white. It鈥檚 easy to paint the picture that Ohio doesn鈥檛 tolerate diversity in elections.
Jackie Jerneicic, AACO civic engagement advisor, said Malik鈥檚 victory disproves that.
鈥淢inority people can still win an election if you have the right message. It鈥檚 really encouraging,鈥� Jerneicic
said.
Wang believes Malik鈥檚 victory will encourage other people of color not only to vote in future elections, but to strive for political leadership roles.
鈥淚 hope this will start a new era of politics for Ohio, get more diverse groups to participate. That way the politics itself, the policies being made, can reflect the interest of the diverse groups we have right now,鈥� Wang said. 鈥淚 hope more minority leaders show up and prevail.鈥�
Malik isn鈥檛 the first Asian American mayor in Ohio. Aftab Pureval is of Indian and Tibetan descent and became Cincinnati鈥檚 mayor in 2022. In the region, Filipino American Ron Falconi has been Brunswick鈥檚 mayor since 2014.
Jerneicic said these elections show that people are willing to go against identity politics, the concept of voting solely based on race, religion or other social backgrounds.
鈥淭he election of these minority people, they are based on merits,鈥� Jerneicic said. 鈥淭hey have to win over not just minority people, not just the people of the same race, but really the majority of the people.鈥�
Malik said it speaks to the people of Akron to elect a racial minority mayor for the first time. The two other top candidates in the race are also racial minorities, Tara Mosley and Marco Sommerville, both Black.
鈥淚 think it means that people in this city understand the need for change and they鈥檙e open to change that doesn鈥檛 necessarily look like kind of the same thing they鈥檝e seen in the past,鈥� Malik said Wednesday morning on 91制片厂's the "Sound of Ideas."
It鈥檚 not lost on Malik that this election was historic, but he said the work to be done is beyond just being Pakistani American.
鈥淚t is an important, I think, symbolic gesture as a city, that they would embrace someone who doesn鈥檛 look like mayors in the past,鈥� Malik said. 鈥淚 think it鈥檚 also incumbent on me to recognize that making substantive change around racial disparities, particularly, it's not something that is just going to happen because my skin is a little bit darker than someone else."
