Alex Tse appointed as second Chinese American judge in the history of Bay Area federal courts

(SAN FRANCISCO) Alex Tse is always one of the pioneers in the Asian legal community for 30 years. He has been named Magistrate Judge to become the second Chinese American judge in the history of Bay Area federal courts.

Asian populations are fast growing in the Bay Area. Chinese are the largest group among Asians. Asian judges are disproportionately underrepresented in the federal justice system. There was no Asian judge in the Bay Area until 2001 for Judge Edward Chen to be selected as a magistrate judge and confirmed as district court judge in 2011. 19 years later, Tse followed Chen’s footsteps.

Tse has made history throughout his legal career. He is a graduate of UC Berkeley in Economics and UC Hastings Law School. He began his private practice in 1990, became a federal prosecutor in civil division in 1994 and the deputy chief of civil division in 2001.

Tse left the U.S. Attorney Office to join the San Francisco City Attorney Office in 2006 to be the assistant chief attorney. He returned to the U.S. Attorney Office in 2012. Tse was the first Chinese American to be a First Assistant U.S. Attorney In 2016. From 2018 to 2019, Tse became the first Chinese American to hold the position as the U.S. Attorney in the Northern California District.

“I am not the person who always wants to be a judge,” Tse said in the courthouse interview. He believes it was a career path for him to try from a prosecutor to be a judge. Ten years ago, Tse did the first try to apply when there was an opening for magistrate judge. It was not successful. Ten years later, he succeeded.

Tse was raised in the Seattle region. His father was an immigrant from Hong Kong. His mother was from Guangzhou. His grandparents and many relatives have lived in the Bay Area.

Currently 30 federal judges are in the district. Four of them are Asians. The latest census data in 2019 indicates that Santa Clara County has the highest Asian population of 38.3%, while 35.9% of San Francisco and 31.8% of Alameda County’s population are Asians.

Henry Huie, former president of the Chinese Consolidated Benevolent Association in San Francisco Chinatown, worked as a financial specialist in federal court for 17 years until he retired in 2013. He is so pleased to see Tse joining the federal bench. He had seen over the years that the number of Asian employees increased at different departments in federal court. But the number of Asian federal judges had been so low that it could not reflect the demographics in the Bay Area.