She drew controversy in 2003 by praising Osama bin Laden, comparing him to Malcolm, Che Guevara, Patrice Lumumba, and Fidel Castro.

[6] Soon after, the Kochiyama family's home was ransacked by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), where they discovered photographs of Japanese naval ships.

This, combined with her father's friendship with prominent Japanese figures, including Ambassador Kichisaburō Nomura, led the FBI to suspect him of espionage.

[7] On February 19, 1942, President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed Executive Order 9066, which called for the forced internment of all people of Japanese ancestry living on the West Coast.

[8] Kochiyama's father, who had been experiencing health issues that were exacerbated by his imprisonment, died two days later on January 21, 1942, just after being released from the penitentiary.

[9] Despite being imprisoned, many Nisei (second-generation Japanese American) men joined the United States military as part of the 442nd Infantry Regiment.

[2] While imprisoned at Jerome, she continued her work on the letter-writing campaign; wrote for the camp newspaper, the Denson Tribune; and volunteered with the United Service Organizations (USO).

They struggled financially for some time before Bill found work as a public relations officer for the Japan International Christian University Foundation (JICUF).

[17] The couple also joined the Nisei Sino Service Organization (NSSO), which worked to support Asian American soldiers, and advocated for the Hiroshima Maidens, a group of 25 hibakusha (lit.

[22] Kochiyama attended the protests with her children and was at one point arrested alongside her son Billy for disorderly conduct, spending half a day in jail before her release.

Malcolm invited Kochiyama to meet with him at his office to discuss his stance on integration further, but was unable to do so initially due to fears for his personal safety arising from his public conflict with Nation of Islam (NOI) leader Elijah Muhammad.

In a speech before the gathered activists, Malcolm compared the plight of the hibakusha with the racism experienced by Black Americans and praised Asian communist leaders like Ho Chi Minh and Mao Zedong.

[30] While it is not entirely clear what happened that night,[d] Malcolm was shot multiple times by several assailants wielding shotguns and semi-automatic handguns.

[38] Beginning in 1966, the FBI began monitoring her activities, describing her as a Black nationalist "ring leader" and potential "Red Chinese agent".

[51] In 1975, her son, Billy, committed suicide by drowning himself in the Hudson River after being severely injured in a car accident in 1967, which left him without a leg.

Although highly controversial, independentistas and supporters like Yuri claim that because the U.S. government is responsible for the conditions of devastation and dependency in Puerto Rico, targeting the symbols of American imperialism—the president’s residence and Congress—is a legitimate form of resistance, even self-defense, from a revolutionary perspective.

[55] In 1979, President Jimmy Carter commuted the sentences of Lebrón, Flores, and Cancel and posthumously granted clemency to Figueroa, who had died of cancer in 1978.

[53] In the 1980s, as organizers of East Coast Japanese Americans for Redress and Reparations, Yuri and Bill advocated for reparations and a government apology for the incarceration of Japanese Americans during World War II and spearheaded the campaign to bring the Commission on Wartime Relocation and Internment of Civilians (CWIRC) to New York.

[56] In the 1980s, following her husband's retirement, Kochiyama began working with the United Methodist Committee on Relief (UMCOR), a Christian organization that helped communities recover from disasters.

[57] She also taught international students English, volunteered at homeless shelters and soup kitchens, and continued her support for prisoners, including Mumia Abu-Jamal, a Black activist sentenced to death in 1982 for the murder of Philadelphia police officer Daniel Faulkner.

[60] In 2004, Wong's conviction was overturned by the Appellate Division of the New York Supreme Court, granting him a new trial where his charges were ultimately dismissed.

[61] Kochiyama also formed a similar support committee for Yū Kikumura, an alleged member of the Japanese Red Army convicted of planning to bomb a United States Navy recruitment office in the Veterans Administration building in 1988.

However, according to Kochiyama, after being given "reading materials" by RCP member Phil Farnham to "become ‘educated’ on the real situation in Peru", she "came to completely support the revolution" there.

In 2000, she moved to a retirement home, and in 2004, she published the memoir Passing it On, which discusses her early life, her time at the Jerome War Relocation Center, her friendship with Malcolm, and the deaths of her children.

Journalist Elaine Woo, writing for the Los Angeles Times, describes Kochiyama as "straddl[ing] black revolutionary politics and Asian American empowerment movements".

[e][72] Fujino contends that Kochiyama's views on race first developed as a result of her time at the Jerome War Relocation Center; then developed further when she moved to New York City, where she maintained relationships with Black and Puerto Rican neighbors and observed the mistreatment of Black soldiers as a waitress, noting that they "couldn't walk on any main drags in the south, even in uniform"; and then even further when Kochiyama moved to Harlem, where she began to become more politically active and where she met Malcolm.

[75]Kochiyama's integrationist stance was challenged by her time attending lectures at the OAAU Liberation School, whose instructors advocated for self-defense as opposed to nonviolence and emphasized both international solidarity and the systemic causes of racism.

[79] According to Fujino, Kochiyama may have developed an appreciation for the effect exclusionary, autonomous spaces had on white supremacy from observing BARTS's policies and practices.

She also praised Vietnamese revolutionary Nguyễn Văn Trỗi, who had attempted to assassinate United States Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara on May 2, 1964, by planting a mine under a bridge that he was set to travel over.

[29][95] In 2010, she received an honorary doctorate from California State University, East Bay, and in 2011, a song titled "Yuri Kochiyama" was released on the Blue Scholars album Cinemetropolis.