At first glance, Chandler City Council candidate Joseph Yang’s policy platform leaves much to be desired in terms of details on the city’s more contentious issues.
Outside of lobbying for more pickleball courts, something the incumbent council has already addressed, Yang’s campaign has avoided mention of any overtly partisan positions.
And for those in the know of Yang’s partisan views and past political activism, that was likely for a good reason.
As a member of the Chandler Public Library board, my initial introduction to Yang occurred just over a year ago, when, during a particularly contentious board meeting on Sept. 19, 2023, Yang falsely accused library staff and the board of making what he described as “porn,” widely accessible to Chandler youth.
During his lecture, Yang parroted lines that would later appear in an inaccurate op-ed he authored for AZ Free News a few days later. In his op-ed, Yang claimed that the desktop computers at each of the Chandler Public Library’s branches lacked internet content filters.
Setting aside the fact that Yang’s claims about the lack of internet filters were false, the more concerning element of this incident is that Yang, an aspiring public servant, did not even have the common decency to investigate and self-verify his claims before putting pen to paper and doubling-down on his inaccuracies vocally in last year’s meeting
In the process, he unfairly attacked Chandler staff and volunteers, while harming our city’s reputation with fake news.
Furthermore, when I placed Yang’s concerns on the agenda for the following library board meeting on Jan. 16, 2024, Yang failed to show up, likely because it was no longer politically palpable for him to express his extremist views on our library system, having filed his statement of interest for the (Chandler) City Council race on Jan. 24, 2024 in a crowded field of seven candidates.
What Chandler’s residents and library patrons won’t find on Yang’s campaign website is his professed support for book bans and censorship of library materials that he has collectively deemed inappropriate on behalf of every other adult and child in Chandler.
During that same September meeting last year, Yang sought to institutionalize the practice of book bans by proposing that the library board ditch its longstanding and effective collections management policy to instead form a subcommittee that would effectively undo and redo the work of city librarians — at an added cost to taxpayers.
Not only does Yang’s support of a “censorship committee” fly in sharp contrast to the virtues of democracy and the constitution, it is also a thinly veiled attempt to introduce “nanny state” policies, whereby some Chandler residents are given full authority to choose what we all can and cannot access at our public libraries.
Thankfully, my colleagues and I on the Chandler Library Board made the correct step last year in maintaining the existing collections review policy with a 7-0 vote, ensuring our librarians are empowered to do their jobs and can continue to serve Chandler residents with varied interests in literature and library programming.
My vote was based on the fact that up until the September meeting, our library board had only received two complaints in 2023, with both complaints being for the same book.
Joseph Yang is far from the first Chandler resident to promote censorship of library materials, and likely will not be the last. The library board has encountered similar waves of book ban efforts before.
However, for as much as I strongly believe in every parent’s right to regulate the content their own child comes across, I am vehemently opposed to the notion that one resident’s objection should dictate what the other ~279,999 or so of our residents can or cannot access at the public libraries that we contribute to as taxpayers.
Having made it to the run-off election, Yang faces incumbent councilmember Christine Ellis. And for as much as I welcome the civic and political participation of young Chandler leaders like Yang, there is something to be said about being accountable for your policy positions.
Joseph Yang owes it to Chandler voters to either stick by his views or clarify his past positions, even if it isn’t electorally beneficial for him in the runoff.
In an official statement made by his campaign on July 5, Yang wrote “I will always commit myself to the community first and not divisive politics.”
Yet, in a Sept. 26, 2023 post coming from his official page on X, formerly known as Twitter, Yang wrote “You don’t have to be full MAGA start to finish you can run moderate and win then go full MAGA on everyone.”
Which statement shows the true face of Mr. Yang? The people of Chandler deserve to know.
We invite our readers to submit their civil comments on this topic. Email AZOpinions@iniusa.org.
