As a graduate student at the McCombs School of Business, alumna Lily Trieu joined the Nonprofit Studies Portfolio program at the RGK Center to gain a better understanding of nonprofits.
”Becoming a nonprofit founder was completely by accident,” said Trieu.
Trieu is the co-founder and executive director of Asian Texans for Justice (ATJ), a nonprofit dedicated to engaging Texas's diverse Asian American and Pacific Islander communities in the democratic process. Her leadership at ATJ is shaped by her experience in the RGK Center’s Nonprofit Studies Portfolio Program, her business degree from McCombs, and over a decade in the private sector.
“I always say I run my nonprofit like a business, and I know nonprofit people don't generally like that,” Trieu said. “There are things in the way I run the organization that do come from business, but I was only able to get that [perspective] by taking classes from different schools.”
Representing Texas' Asian American and Pacific Islander (AAPI) communities means ATJ must advocate for a wide range of voices, as the term AAPI encompasses more than 50 ethnic groups and over 100 languages, Trieu said.
“We are all immigrants in this country, either a new immigrant or we're descendants of immigrants,” she said. “At ATJ it’s really about, how do we celebrate those differences, but also try to build common ground through that shared Asian American identity.”
Since the pandemic, the rise in both anti-Asian violence and negative rhetoric have often been cited as reasons for higher AAPI voter turnout. While Trieu acknowledged these influences, she emphasized that AAPI voters are also motivated to vote by the same political polarization and everyday issues that drive other Texans to the ballot box.
“Everyone is kind of struggling right now, either financially, or they're worried about their kids’ safety, or women are worried about their health care,” Trieu said. “That applies to AAPIs too.”
ATJ’s research is focused on creating more accurate representations of AAPI perspectives in Texas politics. The organization shares qualitative and quantitative data on its website on Texan AAPI political perspectives, concerns, and barriers to civic participation.
“We actually published three reports over the course of the last several months that really tell the story of who Asian Americans are,” Trieu said of the project, called Deep in the Heart of Asian Texas. “We asked polling questions about how excited AAPIs are to go vote, and the numbers are really encouraging.”
This election season, ATJ introduced a new multilingual ballot-building tool. Texan voters can access the tool online, type in their address, and receive race and candidate platform information specific to their county.
“What's really cool about it is you can do it in English, in Chinese and in Vietnamese,” Trieu said. “There really hasn't been a tool like that in the past in Texas that's language accessible.”
To encourage younger AAPI Texans to vote this year, Trieu recognized the need for a creative approach. “Phone banking and door knocking is not always the only tool available,” she said. This fall, ATJ launched a statewide AAPI influencer campaign.
“The influencers were able to create videos and posts that were authentic to them, but that shared why, as an AAPI content creator, they thought it'd be important to vote.” Trieu said.
Nonprofits, she said, have a unique quality that makes them effective in the impact space – their trustworthiness.
“People know that ATJ is nonpartisan,“ Trieu said. ”In this era where the media is called fake news, and a lot of messengers are no longer trusted, I think nonprofits can still be a trusted messenger if they are really thoughtful about the language they use and the way they engage with the community.”
For those interested in founding a nonprofit, Trieu advises extensive validation of their ideas—an essential step emphasized in her nonprofit classes with the RGK Center, she said. If they discover that their concept is unique, she encourages them to embrace the work without fear.
“Don't reinvent the wheel. If something already exists, join them, help them really build out their idea,” Trieu said. “But if what you want to build does not exist, which was what ATJ was for me, then in that case, don't be scared to just do it.”
