Why did Asians swing towards Obama in 2012?

[darklordoftech]

In 2008, Obama won 62% of Asians and McCain 35%, but in 2012, Obama won 73% of Asians and Romney won 26%. What happened?

[BaldEagle1991]

Obama was more of an appealing candidate to Asians that year. Plus birtherism against Obama strikes an emotional reaction among US-born Asian Americans, and many of them didn't like that.

[Senator Incitatus]

Probably because so many of them live in California, which has gotten less and less attention in each election, or the greater NYC tri-state, which was hit by Sandy and saw some of Obama's biggest swings.

Asians are also becoming less Eastern and more Southern.

[TML]

Older Asian immigrants came from please like China & Vietnam, which were under communist control, and this tended to make them favor Republicans. Their US-born descendants, however, tend to favor Democrats due to the Democratic party putting greater emphasis on minority rights than the Republican party. In addition, later Asian immigrants tend to be from China (after the start of modern Western contact) & India, and many have higher education, thereby making them more liberal and supportive of the Democratic Party.

[ملكة كرينجيتوك]

Maybe there's a better source of data available, but according to the exit polls on Wikipedia (which are sourced to Edison Research):

Asian voters:
2000: D+14
2004: D+12
2008: D+27
2012: D+47
2016: D+36

While everybody shifted in 2008 for obvious reasons, the Asian shift in 2012 is stunning. I dont see Romney as particularly anti-Asian compared to other Rs either. So, are there any theories on why Asians shifted so much? Was it the appointment of many Asians to Obama's administration? Or is it just too small a sample to draw meaningful conclusions?

1) Obama was a good fit for Asian voters. His life story of growing up with multiple cultures resonated with many of our experiences (both immigrant and native-born).

2) The birther controversy reflected the Republican Party's broader shift towards White Christian identity politics and nativism during Obama's tenure, which alienated many AAPIs and Muslims.

In addition, later Asian immigrants tend to be from China (after the start of modern Western contact) & India, and many have higher education, thereby making them more liberal and supportive of the Democratic Party.

Paradoxically, more recent Chinese and Indian immigrants are also more receptive to the Trump-era GOP in ways that more established immigrants, 1.5+ gens, and other AAPI groups aren’t. This doesn’t make sense from a Reaganite religious right perspective, but it does when you consider things like affirmative action, social justice movements, illegal immigration, and foreign policy. I want to say this is why CA AAPIs were slightly less D than CA Latinos in the most recent UC Berkeley poll.

For decades, articles about Asian Americans and politics have described the community as one of untapped potential. In the eighties and nineties, Asian Americans were believed to be drawn to the Republican Party, owing to their fiscal conservatism and opposition to Communism. Nowadays, studies show that they tend to favor the Democratic Party, despite growing pockets of conservatism among newer immigrants from China and India.

[It’s so Joever]

Asians are likely going to stay pretty solidly Democrat in the future,
Especially as the education gap grows. They are not like other minority groups when it comes to this metric.
The only exception might be in elections where China is a big issue, in which case some may swing towards the more hawkish candidate (or the opposite for others)

[Sol]

Mitt Romney defined himself as strongly anti-immigration in the primary when he came out in favor of 'self-deportation' laws in the vein of AZ or AL. This of course ended up backfiring in that he did significantly worse with Vietnamese and other Republican Asian-Americans, as well as Republican Latinos.

[Bootes Void]

-The republican party after Bush took an anti immigrant turn and Romney campaign was seen as very white and not friendly with immigrants compared to McCain and Bush
-McCain probably had some goodwill from some right leaning or older Asian voters for fighting communist in Vietnam that Romney did not
- Romney did not appeal and reach out to the Asian american voting bloc at all while Obama did
- Some moderates can still see something to like in McCain but not much in Romney
- Race was maybe less talked about in 2012 compared to 2008 so maybe some Latinos or Asians who were suspicious of blacks came to like Obama a little after four years

[MargieCat]

McCain's daughter Bridget was adopted from Bangladesh, but I doubt that made a difference.

I know that many Vietnamese and Filipinos are more Republican.

[BaldEagle1991]

McCain's daughter Bridget was adopted from Bangladesh, but I doubt that made a difference.

I know that many Vietnamese and Filipinos are more Republican.

Filipinos are becoming more Democratic now. I think this community suffered a lot from COVID since many are in the health care industry and if they’re not they’re usually working in menial “essential” jobs like grocery store retail, sanitation, etc. So this pandemic might help push them further into the Dem column.

[Ogre Mage]

Because Obama had proven himself to be a competent president.

But also because the Asian vote had been trending toward Democrats since the 1990s.

1992:  Clinton 31% / Bush 55%
1996:  Clinton 44% / Dole 48%
2000:  Gore 55% / Bush 41%
2004:  Kerry 56% / Bush 43%

[Agonized-Statism]

Longterm trend and the Tea Party/emerging right-wing populism. Like the rest of the nation, Asian voters might have been swayed on national security when it was more of an issue during the War on Terror.