Alex Wagner

“Politics remind us of the big divide between different parts of the country, but also that we all have to run this ship together. Were all married to one another and there is no divorce happening.”

“To be white in President Trumps America is to fundamentally belong.”

“You have to have at least some kind of baseline coverage under the studio lights. It's not like normal makeup; it's like walking around with a wet coat of paint on your face.”

“I have a cat that I'm obsessed with. His name is Rooster and he's an orange Bengal. He is one of America's great cats. We found Rooster at a rescue organization, and within minutes it was obvious - that's our cat.”

“My mother grew up during the sunset of British colonialism and attended English schools, where she was not allowed to be called Tin Swe Thant, but was instead required to have a Western 'school name.'”

“Today I was trying to eat a beignet on camera. You cant do that. You cant even eat a beignet on a date, let alone in front of an audience of a million people. I still havent learned my lesson.”

“The biggest reveal was that a lot of these DNA test companies, they're commercial enterprises, right? So they basically purchase or acquire DNA samples based on market demand.”

“Even more troubling, not only are Asians largely unseen at the front line of the immigration debate, they are not using the resources available to help them manage their undocumented status.”

“My goal is to show the intermingling between politics and pop culture.”

“Sometimes a young person is so intent on proving themselves that they don't actually listen to people who know things.”

“This would seem to be a truism in contemporary American politics: The electorate opts for serious leaders, but almost always men who are able to poke fun at themselves - and the gravitas of their position.”

“I am more forgiving because I realize that all of our family histories - definitely mine - its populated with thieves and liars and incompetent people who werent bad people and who Im not ashamed of, but who are my family.”

“Undocumented residents and even green-card holders may fear that filling out the census could put them at risk of deportation and decide its better not to be counted at all.”

“Like nearly every other electoral subgroup in U.S. polling, 'Asian' is a label that masks the diversity among its peoples-perhaps even more than 'Hispanic' belies the significant variances between the cultures designated as such.”

“In my off hours, I'm definitely not a product-driven person. I've always thought less was more.”

“As a former music magazine editor, I still pine for the days when I used to know about all the best jams and new bands.”

“I wanted to know who my people were. And I - I think like a lot of Americans - thought that I could find those people in the past. I could find this mythic tribe of elders who would ground me in a story that was irrefutable, undeniable, that was unique and my own, and it would satisfy all my cravings.”

“Humor borne out of cruelty happens to be the easiest and therefore lowest form of comedy: It is cheap stuff and it does not elevate the candidate, nor make him a more fundamentally sympathetic character.”

“My grandmother would talk about having bananas at teatime and carrying palm fronds when the monsoon rains came, and I accepted all of those stories because they were like poetry.”

“When I had my first son, in 2017, we decided to give him a Burmese middle name. I picked Mindon, after the penultimate king of Burma. It sounded strong and regal, and it wasnt too difficult for a Western speaker.”