California Voters Are Concerned by Anti-Asian Hate Crimes — and Want Government Action
By Evangel Penumaka
Note: this piece is part of a series on anti-Asian racism and hate crimes, focusing on how voters in California feel about anti-Asian racism and hate crimes. The other two installments in this series are about national voter attitudes concerning anti-Asian racism, and national voter attitudes on what the government should do to combat anti-Asian hate crimes.
As anti-Asian American hate crimes surge across the country, California has experienced particularly high levels of racially motivated incidents and violence. According to the non-profit Stop AAPI Hate, 40 percent of anti-Asian American hate crimes over the past year were reported in California, despite California being home to just 30 percent of the nation’s Asian Americans.
As part of our national polling assessing voters’ attitudes towards anti-Asian racism, we also examined voter attitudes in a state-wide survey of 627 likely voters in California. Our polling in California is an important addition to our broader analysis on anti-Asian hate crimes due to the high rates of hate crimes reported in the state, as well as its unique demographic context: after Hawaii, California has the highest population of Asian-Americans in the nation. Our California survey asked the same set of questions to respondents as the national survey, results of which you can read about here and here.
Data for Progress first asked voters about their perceptions of how much discrimination different racial groups in the U.S. face in general. We find that a plurality of likely voters in California (42 percent) agree that Asian Americans face a lot of discrimination. Among Asian respondents, this increases to 49 percent. Latina/o likely voters in California are more likely to view people who are Asian as facing a lot of discrimination (46 percent) than white voters (40 percent). We find these perceptions diverge by partisanship: 62 percent of self-identified Democrats, regardless of race, believe Asians face a lot of discrimination, while only 20 percent of Republican likely voters believe the same. As a result of the diverse demographics in California, Asians may not feel like they face as much discrimination as other parts of the U.S. where anti-Asian racism may be more pronounced.
Next, we examined how aware and concerned California voters are about the recent increases in anti-Asian hate crimes. A majority of likely voters in California had heard or read a lot (53 percent) about the increases in anti-Asian hate incidents and violence, and a majority also expressed concern over these events (79 percent).
Likely voter concern remains high across demographic groups, from party identification to race. However, Democrats and Asians in California overwhelmingly express the highest levels of concern — 92 percent and 91 percent, respectively, say they are concerned about growing Asian American hate crimes. Additionally, 74 percent of Asians are very concerned about the increases, compared to 52 percent of Latina/os and 45 percent of white likely voters. Asian-Americans in California are likely more concerned about anti-Asian hate crimes given the high concentration of hate crime reports in the state: Stop AAPI Hate reports nearly 44 percent of all incidents reported in the U.S. have come from California.
We then examined levels of concern about experiencing hate crimes and discrimination specifically due to the pandemic. For this question, we also included other relevant concerns that people may have because of the pandemic, including job and income loss, losing access to health care, losing loved ones, increases in personal debt, and transmitting the coronavirus. The following results examine the top three issues with the highest net concern.
California voters are most concerned about losing loved ones (76 percent), transmitting COVID-19 (68 percent), and losing income or jobs (64 percent). Losing loved ones due to the pandemic is the top concern among both Latina/os and whites. Latina/o voters’ second and third priorities are loss of income and jobs (85 percent) and increases in personal debt (84 percent), while white voters express concern over transmitting COVID-19 (67 percent) and loss of income and jobs (62 percent).
Asian Californians express the highest levels of concern over transmitting COVID-19 (85 percent) and experiencing hate crimes and discrimination (82 percent). However, looking at the “very concerned” responses, Asian Americans are more likely to be concerned over experiencing hate crimes and discrimination than transmitting the coronavirus: 63 percent of Asians say they are very concerned about experiencing hate crimes and discrimination, compared with 59 percent of Asians who say they are very concerned about transmitting the coronavirus. Again, it’s worth noting how this is also likely heightened among Asian Americans in California, where many of the reports of hate crimes are coming from.
Further, we find that a majority of likely voters (62 percent) in California believe that the federal government should be doing more to combat racially motivated hate crimes and violence. This is consistent by race: 63 percent of Asians, 68 percent of Latina/os, and 63 percent of white likely voters agree the government should be doing more to stop racially motivated hate crimes. We do find variation, however, by party identification. Seventy-eight percent of self-identified Democrats and 55 percent of independent likely voters would want to see more action by the federal government. Republicans are more split: while a plurality (40 percent) believe the government should be doing more, 32 percent think the government does not need to take action.
We also find that 55 percent of likely voters in California believe racially motivated extremists pose the highest domestic terrorist threat to the United States, compared with 39 percent that believe that protest groups like Antifa pose the highest threat. We find some variation by race: 56 percent of Asian likely voters and 55 percent of white likely voters agree with the sentiment that racially motivated extremists pose the highest threat. Latina/o likely voters, however, display a higher level of agreement at 63 percent. We also find voters are more split on this issue by education. While a plurality of non-college educated likely voters (49 percent) think racially motivated extremists pose the highest threat, 45 percent believe groups like Antifa pose the highest threat. College-educated voters are more likely to believe racially motivated extremists pose the highest threat at 63 percent — a 14-point increase compared to non-college likely voters.
Conclusion
In this last part of our series examining anti-Asian hate crimes and attitudes more broadly, we find Asians in California are slightly less likely to express they face a lot of discrimination in contrast to our national findings — perhaps a reflection on the diverse demographics of California, particularly in metropolitan hubs like San Francisco and Los Angeles where many AAPI people live. In contrast to our national polling, we also find more agreement, particularly across racial groups, that the government should be doing more to stop hate crimes, and that racially motivated extremists are the largest domestic terrorist threat.
However, despite these somewhat more progressive attitudes among Californians overall, Asian Americans in California express overwhelmingly high concern over the rise in anti-Asian hate crimes and about experiencing a hate crime specifically due to the pandemic — to the point where their fear of hate crimes is even higher than their worry over other devastating challenges the pandemic has posed. These findings and the particular concentration of hate-crimes in California are a reminder of the way Asian Americans in the U.S. have been racialized, scapegoated, and treated as less than. While the national attention given to anti-Asian hate crimes is a much needed step, it’s clear that we need continued discussion to improve reporting on and understanding of hate crimes to ultimately make sure Asian-Americans feel safe in the U.S.
Methodology
From March 20 to 23, 2021, Data for Progress conducted a survey of 627 likely voters in California using web panel respondents, with an oversample of Asians. The sample was weighted to be representative of likely voters by age, gender, education, race, and voting history. The survey was conducted in English. The margin of error is ±4 percentage points.