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Ed Lee, the mayor of San Francisco, died suddenly this morning. He was 65.
Lee is the son of Chinese immigrants and became the first Asian American to become the city’s
mayor. According to reports, Lee was shopping at
a local grocery store when he reportedly suffered a major heart attack.
Lee had recently seen his city make national news when Kate Steinle was killed by an illegal
immigrant on a San Francisco pier. Despite the outcry over policies that they say contributed
to her death, Lee insisted the city would continue its sanctuary city policies.
The Washington Post reports.
San Francisco Mayor Ed Lee, the son of Chinese immigrants who was the first member of his
family to attend college and eventually became the first Asian American to lead the city,
died early Tuesday.
Former mayor Willie Brown told the San Francisco Examiner that Lee was shopping at his neighborhood
Safeway when he suffered a heart attack. Lee died just after 1 a.m. at Zuckerberg San Francisco
General Hospital, his office said in a brief statement.
“It is with profound sadness and terrible grief that we confirm that Mayor Edwin M.
Lee passed away,” the statement read, adding that “family, friends and colleagues were
at his side.”
The 65-year-old Democrat — an affordable housing advocate who presided over a time
of ballooning rents and explosive real estate prices in his city — was remembered by political
leaders as a defender of civil rights and, according to Gov. Jerry Brown (D), “a true
champion for working people.”
Lee, an activist lawyer before he began working for city agencies, was a strong proponent
of what he called “aggressive measures on climate change” and had recently clashed
with President Trump in declaring that San Francisco would remain an immigrant-friendly
sanctuary city