AAPI turnout has surged in the past decade. Organizers hope it continues.
In a cozy backroom of Hopstix brewpub in Chamblee earlier this month, a group of young social media content creators learned to mix matcha. Organizers of the event hoped the influencers would urge their thousands of followers to register to vote.
The meetup was hosted by AAPI Victory Fund, a national organization dedicated to turning out the diverse and fast-growing voter bloc for Democratic candidates. Its leaders hope Asian American and Pacific Islander voters will turn out in numbers large enough to impact outcomes nationwide and particularly in battleground states like Georgia.
Pari Chowdhary, a public health and social justice content creator, said the diverse community is still often.
“There’s just this assumption by the political parties that this group is going to turn up, regardless,” Chowdhary said. “There needs to be an investment made, not just in terms of resources, but also in terms of real coalition building with AAPI folks across the spectrum.”
AAPI voters must “demand space and show that we belong” she said.
Registered AAPI voters in metro Atlanta have more than doubled since 2016.
A decade ago, there were fewer than 94,000 registered voters — 3% of Georgia’s total registered voters. When registration closed for the Nov. 3 midterm election, the number had more than doubled to more than 214,000 registered voters.
Members of the AAPI caucus under the Gold Dome are also looking to grow their political power through down ballot races and add to the number of AAPI state lawmakers.
“Our community has been and can be the margins, especially in these state House races,” said Jyot Singh, who is running to be the first Indian American and Sikh member of the General Assembly.
Historic early voting numbers across metro Atlanta counties with dense AAPI populations has leaders optimistic that the community is voting in higher numbers than previous midterm elections.
“Seeing Gwinnett, metro Atlanta, my county of DeKalb having as strong of a turnout as it is — it gives me hope,” said state Rep. Long Tran, a Dunwoody Democrat. “Because we can’t have this level of turnout without having not just AAPI voters but the whole immigrant American community out voting as well.”
At the end of the first week of early voting, Democratic strongholds of Cobb and Gwinnett counties were running about 15% ahead of the same stage of the last midterm election.
But the GOP-heavy counties of Cherokee and Forsyth experienced even greater spikes.
“Just like the Democratic Party, there’s mobilization going on in the AAPI community from Republicans, too,” said Joseph Hsiao, a restaurant executive and Rick Jackson supporter.
“It’s all about getting the message out and bringing people together to support great candidates,” he said.
A month out from Election Day, AAPI organizers recruited major reinforcements to drive up energy. Illinois U.S. Sen. Tammy Duckworth, the first Thai American woman elected to Congress, and Mayor Aftab Pureval, Cincinnati’s first Asian American mayor, joined Democrats in Forsyth County.
“People will tell you Georgia has drifted, that the window has closed, that what you accomplished was a moment, and that moment has passed. And that is crap,” Pureval told the crowd. “This is the state that is going to reelect Jon Ossoff this November because we have to. Because showing up when it matters most isn’t a new story for Georgia.”
Asian American Pacific Islander voter turnout in Georgia increased by 84% between 2016 and 2020, according to AAPI Data, a research and policy institute based at the University of California, Berkeley. That increase was more than any state in the country, helping fuel a blue wave across metro Atlanta that delivered the state for former President Joe Biden.
Pureval told the Atlanta Journal-Constitution AAPI politicians across the country are working to counteract fears around voting spurred by the Trump administration’s crackdown on immigration and threats of federal law enforcement at the polls.
“Even if you follow the rules, there’s a lot of rumors, there’s a lot of fear about engaging in any federal process — whether it’s voting or the census,” he said.
The early October blitz of events hosted by the AAPI Victory Fund wasn’t the organization’s only stop in Georgia. The week ahead of the election, hundreds gathered at the Royal Banquet Hall in Alpharetta to see Keisha Lance Bottoms speak.
“Twenty years ago, we could never have assembled this room,” said Shekar Narasimhan, founder of the AAPI Victory Fund. “People didn’t know that Asian Americans, Pacific Islanders, Indian Americans, that we even existed as a voting group.”
SreeRam Royyala is a community organizer in Forsyth County who recently hosted an Indian American meet-and-greet with Jackson and other down ballot Republican candidates.
Regardless of party lines, he said, the goal is the same: to engage more AAPI voters in local politics.
“Democracy only works if people participate,” he said.