As debates about immigration and civil rights rage across the country, a new PBS documentary about the extraordinary life of San Jose native Norman Mineta carries a new resonance.

In “Norman Mineta and His Legacy: An American Story” (9 p.m. May 20, KQED), former President George W. Bush recounts how Mineta’s harsh ordeal as a 10-year-old Japanese-American held in an internment camp during World War II served as a cautionary tale in the wake of the 9/11 terrorist attacks.

Mineta, then serving as Secretary of Transportation in Bush’s cabinet, had previously related accounts to the President of his time in Wyoming’s desolate Heart Mountain camp, where his family and thousands of others were surrounded by barbed wire and armed guards because their own nation viewed them as wartime threats.

As an anti-Muslim fervor gripped parts of the country in 2001, Bush recalled those stories.

“One of the important things about Norm’s experience is that sometimes we lose our soul as a nation,” Bush says in the hour-long film. “… I didn’t want our country to do to others what had happened to Norm.”

Mineta’s biography is well-known by South Bay residents and Asian-Americans across the country. His leadership qualities were evident from early on as he became student body president at San Jose High School. From there, he graduated from UC Berkeley with a degree in business administration and, after serving in the Army, appeared destined to be an insurance salesman, just like his father.

But politics came calling and, in 1971, Mineta made national headlines when he was elected mayor of San Jose — the first Asian-American to lead a major city. It was just one of several trails blazed by Mineta. He went on to become the first Japanese-American outside of Hawaii to be elected to Congress, and the first Asian-American to serve in a presidential cabinet as Bill Clinton’s Secretary of Commerce.

Directed by Dianne Fukami, an Oakland resident known as a prolific documentarian of the Japanese-American experience, “Norm Mineta and His Legacy” is more of a straightforward love letter than a rigorous examination of his life and long political career.

However, there’s no denying his substantial contributions to a nation that once turned its back on him. Among his loftiest achievements: The Civil Liberties Act of 1988, which granted reparations to Japanese-Americans who were imprisoned during WWII.

Says Clinton in the film, Mineta’s is “a worthy life and should be honored. More important, it should be emulated.”

Interviews with Mineta, now 87, are peppered throughout the hour, and occasionally give viewers glimpses into the moments that would leave indelible imprints on his personal makeup. He recalls, for example, his sadness over having to surrender his dog, Skippy, when his family was ordered to leave their home (“He was a great friend. I never saw him again.”). And he remembers waking up the morning after his mayoral election to find a vicious racist statement spray-painted on his garage door (“You don’t make a big thing of it, but you store it away.”).

Mineta’s experiences clearly produced in him a well of empathy for society’s underdogs. The film recalls how, as San Jose’s mayor, he spent some time in a wheelchair to get a feel for the challenges it presented. Years later, as a Congressman, he co-authored the Americans with Disabilities Act.

The documentary also celebrates his willingness throughout his storied political career to reach across political and ideological divides. In pushing for the American Civil Liberties Act, Mineta, a Democrat, was supported by Wyoming’s Republican Senator Alan K. Simpson, who first met Mineta during a visit to the internment camp. Mineta was also the only Democrat in Bush’s cabinet.

That spirit of cooperation seems pretty mind-boggling against the political divisiveness that now exists in Washington, D.C., and that clearly frustrates Mineta.

“The word compromise today is even a bad word,” he says forlornly. “People think of it as a weakness, rather than a strength to get things done.”

Contact Chuck Barney at cbarney@bayareanewsgroup.com. Follow him at Twitter.com/chuckbarney and Facebook.com/bayareanewsgroup.chuckbarney.