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Why Don't Chinese-Americans Vote Republican?

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By: inoljt, http://mypolitikal.com/

The Democratic Party has always been the party of immigrants. Even as everything else about the party has changed, as it has turned from a party of Southern whites to the exact opposite, immigrants continue to vote Democratic. In the 1850s the immigrants were Irish-Americans. Today they are Mexican-Americans.

Of course, not all immigrants support the Democratic Party. Many immigrants, such as Cuban-Americans and Vietnamese-Americans, vote strongly Republican. There is a very simple explanation for why this is so, an explanation that requires merely one word:

Communism.

More below.

Former Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger provides a story that resonates with many Republican-voting immigrants:

When I was a boy, the Soviets occupied part of Austria.

I saw their tanks in the streets. I saw Communism with my own eyes. I remember the fear we had when we had to cross into the Soviet sector…I remember how scared I was that the soldiers would pull my father or my uncle out of the car and I would never see them again. My family and so many others lived in fear of the Soviet boot…

I finally arrived here in 1968…The presidential campaign was in full swing. I remember watching the Nixon-Humphrey presidential race on TV…I heard Humphrey saying things that sounded like socialism, which I had just left.

But then I heard Nixon speak. He was talking about free enterprise, getting the government off your back, lowering the taxes and strengthening the military.

Listening to Nixon speak sounded more like a breath of fresh air.

I said to my friend, I said, “What party is he?”

My friend said, “He’s a Republican.”

I said, “Then I am a Republican.”

This is a common experience with immigrants from communist countries. Many Republican-voting immigrants are refugees of communism. In the Democratic Party’s economic program they hear echoes of the communist countries which they fled. They therefore turn to the Republican Party.

Which brings us to the biggest Communist country of them all: the People’s Republic of China.

There are a lot of Chinese-Americans in the United States. Many of them constitute immigrants who suffered tremendously under communism, through the Great Leap Forward and then the Cultural Revolution.

Yet Chinese-Americans are also a highly, highly Democratic constituency. One exit poll put 73% of Chinese-Americans as voting Democratic. Why does the Schwarzenegger experience not resonate with Chinese immigrants?

One reason might be that most Chinese immigrants are not communist refugees. Many anti-communist immigrants were persecuted as a specific class or individually by communist governments. They then fled to the United States. On the other hand, a lot of Chinese immigrants came to the United States as students, workers, or via family connections. Many of them represent people who benefited from the system in China. This is especially true for those who came as students or workers.

There is also the fact that China’s Communist Party is by far the most successful of all the communist parties out there. This dilutes the potential opposition against it. For instance, the Chinese community would probably not support an American embargo on China aimed at toppling the communist government there. This is quite different from the Cuban emigrant community.

Yet there is still an element of strangeness about the Chinese community’s utter lack of anti-Communist sentiment. Does not the Democratic Party’s mantra of helping the working class recall the Maoist slogan of a proletariat paradise? Does not its support of abortion bring to mind China’s controversial one-child policy?

Apparently not, judging from the way the Chinese community votes.


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/ 7 Comments

7 comments

  1. kalmoth

    neither the Soviet Union nor China were/are Communist – they are administrative-command economies. Communist rhetoric is just window dressing. As for the different patterns of vote for immigrants from, say, Eastern Europe vs. Asia, I suspect that the reason for that is cultural differences, but, to be honest, I don’t quite understand the phenomenon. It is common for people who were very liberal, say, in the Soviet Union, to have moved to the United States and to become rabid Republicans. It mostly applies to immigrants from the former Eastern bloc, and I don’t understand the reason. If anything, in terms of ideological rigidity, Republicans should remind these folks of Soviet-era apparatchiks…

  2. Its the Supreme Court Stupid

    here prior to the Revolution.  And, I believe that a significant proportion of the newer immigrants have come here from Taiwan, and, thus, have never experienced Communism.

    That being said, most of these immigrants have and the question you pose is valid.  

  3. plf515

    but from what I know, there is substantial anti-Communist feeling among many groups of Chinese immigrants, and substantial pro-Communist feeling among others.

    I don’t think the reason that the different groups you name vote more or less for Democrats is communism, I think it is more their status in the “old country”.

    The older Cuban immigrants (strongly Republican) were wealthy (at least by immigration standards) people fleeing someone who was going to hurt them, economically. Similarly, many Vietnamese were fleeing the takeover of what was South Vietnam; many were from the wealthier classes.

    Yes, both Castro and the North Vietnamese were communists (in name, anyway), but so was Mao. However, the Chinese fleeing here were poorer (in general) than the Vietnamese or Cubans (at least, the early Cubans). In addition, as others pointed out, the Chinese have been coming here for a long time. They have a history of being discriminated against here, and that makes them more likely to be Democrats (and I think something similar is happening to younger Cubans – the children and especially the grandchildren of those who fled Castro).  

  4. kishik

    generational differences.  There were plenty more voting republican if they were the generation born out of the depression.  With the new wave of immigrants, you can factor in their countries politics.

    But you know, essentially, my take on why many don’t vote repub is similar to other immigrant populations.  The repubs pretty much have ignored the immigrant communities… especially those that are racially and ethnically different.  The party that is more mindful to these populations have been the dems – and simply by the gesture of getting that personal introduction into those communities will mean better recognition.  Then the next step is to assist in some way.

    Dems being more pro-immigrant will have their local offices set up to help out the immigrant population as they try to wend their way through american society and trying to either gain a green card, citizenship or other social services.  While all political electees are supposed to offer these services, not sure if simply they figure they are not a good pay out on the voting end (if the immigrant is not yet a citizen) or if they simply don’t allocate more staff or funds towards this part of their constituent responsibilities.  

    I live in the NYC area, so immigrant pops are very high all around.  I definitely can’t speak for other parts of the country!

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