MEDIA ADVISORY

FOR IMMEDIATE DISTRIBUTION

PRELIMINARY POST-ELECTION POLL RESULTS OF ASIAN AMERICAN VOTERS TO BE RELEASED IN WEBINAR CO-HOSTED BY APIAVOTE

Early findings show record AAPI voter turnout; with the AAPI vote contributing a net 1.4 million votes to President Obama’s total popular vote margin of victory

Issues driving the AAPI vote included immigration, racial discrimination, health and environment

WASHINGTON—Asian and Pacific Islander American Vote (APIAVote) will co-host a webinar with Asian American Justice Center and the National Asian American Survey (NAAS) to discuss the preliminary findings of a  post-election poll of Asian American voters. Conducted in nine different Asian languages, in addition to English and Spanish, this poll is the most comprehensive of its kind and demonstrates the strength, breadth and depth of AAPI voters, 71 percent of whom voted for President Barack Obama.

The webinar will be held on Wednesday, December 12, at 2 p.m. EST, and feature discussion and Q&A by Mee Moua, AAJC’s president and executive director,Christine Chen, APIAVote’s executive director, and Karthick Ramakrishnan, National Asian American Survey’s director.

Please register at https://attendee.gotowebinar.com/register/7939506740883130368for instructions on how to join the webinar. For an embargoed copy of the report, please email comrequests@advancingequality.org or call Kimberly Goulart at (202) 499-7027, x103.

This preliminary report, “Behind the Numbers: Post-Election Survey of Asian American Voters in 2012,” includes 2,785 interviews and builds on pre-election polls conducted by AAJC, APIA Vote and NAAS that showed an increase in voter enthusiasm, high levels of support for key issues such as healthcare, education and the economy, and an unprecedented number of undecided voters within the Asian American community.

A full report, with detailed findings and analysis based on 7,000 interviews and information on national origin groups and Pacific Islanders, will be released in early 2013.

The preliminary post-election poll report’s key findings include:

• The Asian American electorate has been steadily growing with each presidential election and is projected to be close to 3% of all votes cast in the 2012 election.  (pages 3-4)
• 71% of Asian Americans voters in November 2012 cast their ballot for President Barack Obama, and 28% voted for Governor Mitt Romney. (page 5)
• We estimate that about 3.2 million Asian Americans cast ballots in November 2012, with about 2.3 million for Barack Obama and 900,000 thousand for Mitt Romney.  (page 5)
• Obama’s total popular vote margin of victory is estimated at 4.7 million. The AAPI vote contributed a net 1.4 million votes to this margin. Without the AAPI vote, Obama’s popular vote margin would have been 3.3 million.  (page 5)
• In 2012, there was a significant increase in voter mobilization efforts by community organizations; still, most Asian American voters (65%) report that they received no contact about the election. (page 7)
• Among those who were contacted by political parties, contact by Democrats was more frequent than contact by Republicans. (page 7)
• On issues relevant to Asian American voters, the strongest gaps in support for Obama over Romney were on issues of immigration, racial discrimination, health and environment.  The smallest gap was on national security issues. (page 9)
• Nearly one half of Asian American registered voters remain independent or undecided with respect to their party identification, pointing to the possibility that many remain open to persuasion and outreach in future elections. (pages 9-10)