Jenny Kwan

In 1993, Kwan at age 26 was elected as the youngest-ever member of Vancouver City Council. She was the sole representative of the Coalition of Progressive Electors throughout her term on council.[2]

In 1996, Kwan entered provincial politics. After being nominated, she was elected as the MLA for Vancouver-Mount Pleasant, in East Vancouver. She succeeded Premier Mike Harcourt, who at the time had just resigned over a series of serious fundraising scandals, including the Bingogate Scandal.

In 2001, Kwan, along with Joy MacPhail, was one of only two NDP MLAs to survive the party's electoral collapse in the 2001 British Columbia general election at the hands of a BC Liberal landslide upset.[3][4] She was re-elected in 2005, 2009, and 2013.[5]

In December 2010, Kwan released a statement to the media criticizing NDP leader Carole James, and calling for an immediate leadership convention, after party candidates suffered defeat in the 2009 election.[4][6][7] In response to Kwan's statement, James called an emergency caucus session to address opposition to her continued leadership.[8][9] Before the caucus meeting was held, however, James announced her resignation as party leader.[10][11] While Kwan was accused of self-interest, at the time she claimed to have no plans to run for the leadership of the party.[12]

In March 2014, an audit of the Portland Hotel Society showed that Kwan's ex-husband, Dan Small, had improperly expensed the cost of a family Disneyland trip to the society.[13][14] At the time of the trip, Kwan had still been married to Small and had participated in the trip with their children.[15] When the audit became public, Kwan held a press conference where she denied any knowledge that the society had paid for the trip, and said she would reimburse the society.[16] Following the conference, Kwan took a brief leave of absence.[17]

In January 2015, Kwan announced that she would be seeking the NDP nomination in Vancouver East for the 2015 federal election.[18] Mable Elmore was also seeking the party's nomination in the riding.[19] Kwan was nominated on March 22, and sought to replace Libby Davies as the MP for the riding.[20][21] She was elected to the House of Commons in October 2015, defeating Liberal Party candidate Edward Wong and Conservative Party candidate James Low by a wide margin.[22] On November 12, she was appointed as her party's critic for immigration, refugees and citizenship.[23] She was re-elected in the 2019 federal election. On 12 May 2023, it was reported that Kwan was approached by the Canadian Security Intelligence Service about a meeting concerning Kwan being threatened by Chinese diplomats.[24]