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NEW YORK - Asian American voters prefer Sen. Barack Obama, 41 percent to 24 percent nationally, over Sen. John McCain, according to a new national survey on Asian Americans released Monday, Oct. 6.
But that’s not the entire story.
According to the study, a high portion, or 34 percent of those surveyed, remains undecided. For the researchers, this is a key finding and a development that could set the stage for Asian Americans to play a pivotal role in the outcome of the November election.
The numbers could make a difference especially in battleground states where there is a growing Asian American population. Among the general population, national polls conducted since the major party conventions show that undecided voters are approximately 8 percent of the electorate.
The study shows that Filipino American voters support Obama, 35 percent over McCain, 29 percent. 34 percent remains undecided.
“A very large number of Asian Americans are non-partisan. The Asian American vote is very much up for grabs: Non-partisans who see either the Democratic or Republican party as closer to them on issues that matter to them are much likelier to vote for that party’s candidate,” UC Berkeley associate professor of political science Taeku Lee explained.
Karthick Ramakrishnan, an associate professor of political science at UC Riverside, agreed that with such a high proportion of undecided voters, “Asian Americans are a critical source of potential votes for either candidate in the final weeks of the campaign”
This groundbreaking study, released at a Washington, DC, press conference last October 6, was conducted by researchers from four leading universities: Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey; University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley); University of California, Riverside (UC Riverside); and University of Southern California (USC).
The researchers’ 2008 National Asian American Survey (NAAS) shows that 41 percent of Asian Americans are likely to favor Obama, while 24 percent support John McCain. In battleground states, where either candidate could win on Election Day, Obama leads with 43 percent of Asian Americans supporting him and 22 percent favoring McCain.
The multi-ethnic, multi-lingual survey of more than 4,000 Asian Americans likely to vote in the election was conducted from Aug. 18 to Sept. 26. It is the most comprehensive survey to date of the political views of Asian Americans, with interviews conducted in English, Cantonese, Mandarin, Hindi, Japanese, Korean, Tagalog and Vietnamese.
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