For the Media

The 2008 presidential election is a watershed for the Asian American vote, at least in California. Of course, I fully acknowledge Hawaii's historical role in politically mobilizing this population as an effective voting bloc, and in consistently electing "their own" into state and national offices. Very recently, the Golden State has joined the Aloha state as a place where Asian Americans constitute a significant electoral force, one that cannot be easily ignored.

My colleague Don Nakanishi foresaw this development many years ago, and he and I argued in 2006 that the Asian American population is the new and awakening "sleeping giant" in California politics, much like Latinos were a generation ago. The demographic facts are strikingly similar. In 1990, 2.4 million Latino were eligible to register to vote, comprising 13% of all adult citizens in the state. In 2007, 2.7 million Asian Americans achieved the same status, comprising over 12% of California's eligible individuals. According to at least one estimate, the latter group now comprises about one in eight registered state voters. Their presence could have been even greater if community and advocacy groups have had the resources to help naturalize immigrants, register them, and turn out the vote.

One indicator of the growing importance of the Asian American vote is the media coverage during the 2008 presidential primary. Never before in my memory did national newscasters discuss this group's impact on the finally tally, but the news networks did as the results from Super Tuesday (February 5) trickled in. The story line was that Asian Americans played a key role in giving Hillary Clinton a victory in California. Another indicator is the increasing number of elected state officials. We had pioneers dating back to the 1960s, including Alfred Song, March Fong Eu, and Tom Hom. What is different today is that electing a person of Asian ancestry is now a common and reoccurring phenomenon.

Unfortunately, too little is known about the Asian American vote because so little quantitative research has been done in the past. The population was too small in most surveys to yield conclusive findings. It was too expensive to over sample this group given its linguistically diversity and geographically dispersion. Fortunately, both barriers are coming down with population growth and greater organizational capacity to interview in multiple languages. This has enabled several political scientists (Professors Jane Junn at Rutgers, Taeku Lee at UC Berkeley, Karthick Ramakrishnan at UC Riverside, and Janelle Wong at USC) to recently collect opinions from 1,891Asian Americans in California, an amazing accomplishment. An equally important development is a current effort by one mainstream public-interest group to sponsor a large-scale survey of this population to inform the organization's voter outreach program. Findings from these surveys are replacing racial stereotypes with hard facts.

The 2008 survey and other sources yield extremely interesting and informative insights. Not surprisingly, naturalized immigrants comprise a large majority. Gaining citizenship and participating in politics are positive signs of meaningful commitment to this nation and engagement in civil society. Asian American voters are not overwhelmingly Democrats or Republicans, with half registered as an independent or not declaring a party affiliation. This population is still up for grabs, an observation that should motivate both major parties to ramp up their outreach. Asian Americans have unique concerns, mainly culturally related issues such as the conflict between some public-health regulations and the culinary practices of ethnic businesses. Not the largely unfounded but titillating charges of eating certain types of meat, but rather more mundane issues such as how Asian delicatessens handle and display roasted duck and pork. Asian Americans are more concerned about foreign affairs, particularly when developments affect their home countries.

Immigrant specific concerns, however, do not define the Asian American vote. They share the same concerns and priorities as other Americans, particularly when it comes to the major challenges facing this nation. The 2008 survey found that the top three issues for Asian Americans are the economy, Iraq and health care. Previous surveys, including my own of Asian American voters in San Francisco, show similar commonalties with the larger public. They also appear to share the majority's support for Obama, although there are substantial differences along Asian ethnic lines.

An interesting question is which state or states will see a break through for the Asian American vote in future presidential elections. From now to 2030, the number of Asian Americans eligible to register to vote will double, and much of the growth will occur outside of California and Hawaii. But, I am getting ahead of myself. Let's take care of Tuesday's business first. Go out and vote!

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