Michelle Wu, the daughter of Taiwanese immigrants, made history by being elected mayor of Boston in November 2021, winning 64% of the vote and becoming the first woman, the first person of color, and the first East Asian American elected as Boston’s mayor.  Previously, Wu was the first Asian American woman to serve on the Boston City Council (2014-21) and was Council President from 2016-18. Wu has been in public service since the age of 25. 

Wu overcame hardship and drew on her resilience early in her career. After college, Wu worked as a consultant at Boston Consulting Group. When her mother became ill, she had to leave the job, moving back to Chicago to care for her mother and two younger siblings. To support her family financially, she started a teahouse business. She often draws from her experience of being a small business owner when tackling public policy. “It’s figuring out how to serve your community in a different way,” she said in a Boston.com article. “Entrepreneurs are resourceful, resilient, and make such a difference in anchoring our neighborhoods.”

During Asian American History month in May of 2011, she wrote in Teen Vogue: “I’m an Asian American woman, a mom of two young kids, and an elected official. Growing up, I wouldn’t have believed that combination to be possible. And I certainly couldn’t have imagined that it would be my journey — from introverted daughter of immigrants to caregiver for a mom living with mental illness and candidate for mayor of Boston.”  As a mayoral candidate, Wu addressed AAPI invisibility by telling her own story and speaking out against anti-Asian racism, tweeting, “There’s no place for anti-Asian hate or racism of any kind in our politics & in our Commonwealth.”  Michelle Wu shows us that Asian American women can take unique journeys, overcome hardships, and tell their stories to ultimately represent people like themselves and others in city government.