In the past several years, national Democrats and Republicans as well as grassroots organizations have increasingly targeted the Asian American constituency in Orange County in an effort to tip the influence of the growing voter bloc in their favor.
Even still, many of these efforts have been partisan and done largely in English, at times by individuals without deep roots in the community, local leaders say.
That prompted the leaders of the four largest Asian American organizations in Orange County — Korean Community Services, Orange County Asian Pacific Islander Community Alliance, South Coast Chinese Cultural Center and Southland Integrated Services — to launch the OC Asian American Initiative.
Their goal is to expand accessibility to voting materials in a variety of languages and increase Asian American voter turnout in November.
That may look like in-language text and phone banking, in-language voter registration drives, ethnic social media, working with ethnic media, door-to-door canvassing and in-language mailers in Asian-centric cities, including Garden Grove, Irvine, Westminster, Fullerton and Buena Park, said Ellen Ahn, executive director of Garden Grove-based nonprofit KCS.
The four groups have already been doing voter engagement work, such as canvassing, phone banking and get-out-the-vote campaigns — OCAPICA for several decades now — but Ahn said the partnership will allow them to be more strategic in increasing voter turnout, registration and education across the entire county.
“This is the first time we’re actually coming together and leaning into our strengths and coordinating efforts to make our impact broader and deeper,” she said.
“Our community has been quiet for so long. We want to make noise, and we want to be heard,” said Yulan Chung, executive director of South Coast Chinese Cultural Center. “I hope the community members understand democracy comes from the individuals.”
According to the Pew Research Center,…
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