Turnout spiked among Asian voters in last month’s election for San Diego’s Council District 6, where the race’s two Asian candidates conducted unprecedented outreach efforts aiming for such an increase.

The numbers, compiled last week by National University from Registrar of Voters and census data, prompted community leaders to predict that a long-awaited rise in political participation could be coming in the local Asian and Pacific Islander community.

Ballots were cast by 41.8 percent of the Asians registered to vote in District 6, which was redrawn in 2010 to increase the chances the City Council would have a member identifying themselves as Asian for the first time in four decades.

It includes Mira Mesa, Kearny Mesa, Clairemont and an Asian-dominated sliver of southern Rancho Penasquitos.


Registered Asian voters in the rest of the city turned out at a rate of 35.7 percent.

And if the 52nd Congressional District is removed because the hotly contested race there between Scott Peters and Carl DeMaio sharply boosted turnout, Asian voters in other areas outside of District 6 participated at a rate of 32.6 percent.

“It shows the results of all the efforts we put into getting out the vote,” said Councilman Chris Cate, a Republican who defeated Democrat Carol Kim in the race and was sworn in Dec. 10. “It’s truly a culmination of work by many groups.”

That work, which was conducted primarily by the two campaigns and the Asian Pacific American Coalition, included multilingual fliers near Asian businesses, multilingual door hangers and voters receiving calls from people who speak their native language.


“We worked hard to let them know they need to participate instead of standing on the sideline,” said Mitz Lee, co-founder of the coalition and the third-place finisher in June’s District 6 primary, where Cate and Kim took the top two spots.

Outreach efforts among Asians by the Peters and DeMaio campaign also helped, because all of District 6 is included in the 52nd Congressional District.

Both candidates being Asian — Cate is a Filipino-American and Kim is a Korean-American — also played a role, said Vince Vasquez, senior analyst for the National University System Institute for Policy Research.

“Some element of the voting process is about candidates that look like me or share my values or life experience,” he said.


In a 2013 special election runoff between two black candidates for Council District 4 in southeast San Diego, black turnout was 25.5 percent while turnout among non-blacks was only 14.3 percent, Vasquez said.

The ethnic data comes from a program used by political consultants called Political Data Inc., which compares the last names of voters with the most common last names attached to different ethnic groups on census forms.

“It’s the industry standard, but they are best guesses,” Vasquez said.

A factor making the Asian data perhaps more precise is that voters include the country where they were born on voting records, and a majority of Asians in California were born outside the U.S.


Vasquez said that highlights another reason why Asian turnout has typically been the lowest among major ethnic groups, far behind whites and trailing Latinos and blacks by a smaller margin.

“They don’t have the ingrained traditions of participatory Democracy,” he said, noting that many of the countries they come from are dictatorships. “They don’t believe change happens at the ballot.”

Kim agreed, but predicted this fall’s outreach efforts helped send the message that voting means having a voice and that it’s a key opportunity to make a difference.

“We planted seeds in the minds of our community members,” she said.


Cate agreed that the work is far from over, adding that he’s been encouraging Asians to seek appointments to the city’s many boards and commissions.

Vasquez said he was also optimistic, but predicted it will take money for similar outreach efforts in many consecutive elections for Asians to emerge as a political force.

“It’s going to require more time and education,” he said.

Cate being elected to the council will also help Asians see the possibilities, he said.


“I think it’s going to have lasting effects.” Vasquez said.