A poll of Chinese Americans in San Francisco was conducted in May 1998, just before the June primary election, and an exit poll of this same demographic group was conducted in conjunction with the November 1998 general election. Both polls were conducted for the Chinese American Voters Education Committee (CAVEC) and, to ensure the authenticity of the data, the interviewers in both cases spoke in English, Cantonese or Mandarin, depending on the respondents’ preference. SA|Opinion Research also conducted a poll of Asian Americans in Los Angeles and Orange counties who voted absentee in November 1998. These interviews, for the Asian Pacific Legal Foundation of Southern California, were conducted in Korean, Tagalog and Vietnamese as well as English and the Chinese dialects.

While the interviews covered a broad range of political attitudes and interests, they focused on the United States Senate race with Republican Matt Fong on the ballot during California’s first open primary and in the general election along with incumbent U.S. Senator Barbara Boxer. In the primary, Chinese Americans voted overwhelmingly for Fong, including a plurality of those who were registered Democrats. In the general election, Chinese Americans continued to prefer Fong over Boxer but not quite at the same level as in the June primary. In November, the Democrats split evenly between Fong and Boxer. Most interesting was that support for Fong did not extend beyond the Chinese American voters. Other Asian subgroups voted for Boxer.

Research Analysis: This suggests that it may not be wise to focus on Asian Americans as a voting bloc, but rather that one has to look more closely at ethnic differences within the Asian-American population.

Perhaps the most interesting point about Asian voters ­ Chinese in particular ­ is their independence. While other immigrant groups historically looked upon joining the political party process as an avenue to achieve success, this is not the case among Chinese Americans. They are three times more likely than other voters to register as decline-to-state than as members of political parties. Asian Americans are becoming increasingly important in California as their numbers increase. But they are not as easily categorized as other ethnic immigrant groups have been in the past.

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