Ever since Michigan Senate candidate Pete Hoekstra raised eyebrows with his racist Super Bowl ad (as The Atlantic's James Fallows put it, "This ad is embarrassing for America!"), some folks have wondered about the ad's star: Where do you find an Asian-American woman to appear in such a xenophobic spot? Well, several bloggers have identified her as part-time model/actress Lisa Chan. The Angry Asian Man blog, one of the first and loudest critics of the ad, reports that Chan is a recent graduate of UC Berkeley, and that she founded a non-profit organization for at-risk youth She recently competed in the Miss California pageant. (Yep, that does indeed appear to be her.) He and others are treading lightly in questioning Chan's motives, noting that she's probably a struggling actress who is less deserving of criticism than Hoekstra himself.
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Chan hasn't spoken publicly yet, but Angry Asian Man reports that she is "proactively trying to address and undo her role in the racist messaging of Hoekstra's campaign, and has partnered with a community organization to release a statement with her version of the story." We can't wait.
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