The New American Economy found that more than 300,000 Asian residents living in seven swing states are not registered to vote, which could affect the outcome of the election if they register and vote immediately on Election Day.
Agency director of quantitative research Andrew Lim said, the United States has seven swing states, including Iowa, Michigan, Minnesota, Nevada, New Hampshire, North Carolina and Wisconsin, all allow eligible residents on voting day, at the same time registered as voters and vote. Since there are far fewer stray voters in this election than in the 2016 election, the voting intentions of these unregistered eligible voters will be especially important.
The number of newly naturalized U.S. citizens has risen steadily over the past few years, hitting a five-year high in 2018, with one in 10 eligible voters in the U.S. eligible to vote through naturalization; however, surveys show that nearly 40 percent of the naturalized population is not registered to vote, Andrew Lim said, noting that the number of U.S. residents naturalized in order to vote has increased since the last election.
He mentioned that Asian voters are often overlooked in partisan election campaigns, such as in North Carolina, where there are more than 50,000 eligible but unregistered Asian residents, and that if they were willing to vote, the results of the presidential and senate elections would change.
Andrew Lim continued, pointing out that for many Asian voters who settled in the Midwestern states, they come from Southeast Asia. Where they were born, voting is not part of their lifestyle and they have no intention of exercising their right to vote. He cited the example of his own Asian parents who were not very enthusiastic about voting and decided to vote only after he had been encouraged to do so many times.
He added that Asian residents with a university degree or higher were more likely to come out to vote and that the Asian community needed to develop a voting culture in order to encourage more Asian residents to vote.
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