The Supreme Court kept the Voting Rights Act (VRA) alive for another day with its decision in Allen v. Milligan that Alabama’s racially gerrymandered redistricting violates section 2, which bars voting procedures that “result in a denial or abridgement of the right of any citizen to vote on account of race.” The decision is good news for minority voters, especially Black voters.
Unfortunately, many Asian American and Latino Americans still won’t have their votes counted for president.
Like Black voters, these minority groups struggle with political representation — indeed, they have even fewer delegates in Congress and no claims on the White House (so far) — but their electoral success under VRA section 2 has been more limited. Their quandary is that the minority voter dilution provision oversimplifies racial identity and underspecifies political behavior for new American voters, who are linguistically and racially diverse and comprised of former immigrants. There are a few spots where Latino voters can satisfy section 2, but most Asian American voters cannot despite their common attributes, interests and experiences with discrimination.
How many people are we talking about? About 5 million new Americans, primarily from Asian and Latin American countries, have recently become U.S. citizens and therefore eligible voters. They make up an influential voting block by virtue of their sheer numbers and the trajectory of continuing growth as a share of the population. But only half of them cast a ballot in 2020 (54 percent foreign-born voters collectively), which is 8 points less than native-born American voters (62 percent U.S.-born voters).
These new American voters are naturalized citizens who have met all the statutory requirements to vote: they have lived in the U.S. for five years, passed civic and English language tests, and pledged allegiance to the United States. They work hard and pay taxes and, in many cases, are married to native-born citizens or have U.S. citizen children. In 2020, one in 10 eligible voters, or 23 million people, were newly naturalized Americans. That was nearly double the number in prior elections, according to a Pew study.
The absence of new Americans from upcoming elections will be consequential. There’s evidence from studies of the 2020 elections that new Americans were left out in key battlegrounds: Florida, Georgia, Arizona, Michigan, Pennsylvania, North Carolina and Wisconsin. Even where it didn’t flip outcomes, studies show that their absence could be why the election was so close in 2020. That’s why we need to get new Americans engaged in the political process and to the polls in the coming election.
Latino persons are the largest group of new American voters, at 34 percent of the newly naturalized citizens in the 2020 election, and they show an increase of 30.9 percent in voting. While the majority supported Democratic nominee Joe Biden, their vote was far from a sure bet. Detailed analysis in a UCLA Latino Decisions report shows their political preferences were consequential, with their increased participation and decisive support for Biden concentrated in Arizona, Florida and Texas. Indeed, Latino voters flipped the outcome from Republican to Democrat in Arizona for the first time since 1996.
Below the top line, the Latino vote is more nuanced and makes them competitive. In all-important Florida, the Cuban share of the Latino vote trended Republican, and male Latino voters in multiple jurisdictions favored former President Donald Trump. Whichever politician appeals to Latino voters will dramatically boost their odds of winning the election.
Asian Americans are the fastest-growing group of new American voters, with increases in voter turnout outpacing other groups. Their voting preferences show a similar pattern to Latino voters: overwhelmingly favoring Biden in 2020 (61 percent) and Democrats (2:1 nationwide), but competitive in swing states such as Nevada and Georgia. Moreover, their overall voting block masks internal differences, a point underscored in a recently released study. Korean American, Chinese American and Indian American voters favor Democrats more than Vietnamese and Filipino voters and a large share characterize themselves as independents. Foreign policy issues, including the U.S. stance on China loom large — and promise to remain prominent in the next election.
Even where new Americans aren’t the biggest block of swing voters, they matter to democratic legitimacy. New Americans are a diverse group with distinctive perspectives. They are multiracial, multicultural, majority women and age diverse, according to a nonprofit that monitors the group. As it stands, too many Americans are left out of politics, and we’re seeing the regressive results. That’s why all eligible voters are important to consider — our democracy will resist progress and become increasingly nonrepresentative of America if it excludes new voices.
America needs to make politics reflect America. For this reason, the issue of disengaged new Americans is the problem of all Americans, if they care about representational equality. New voters face obstacles with registration, mobilization and getting attention from candidates and political parties. This is particularly true for young people. Fixing these problems for new Americans will benefit all Americans.
To be sure, some will think the effort to expand the electorate is a cynical ploy to boost the fortune of the Democratic Party. We are living in politically polarized times. But not all immigrants are Democrats — the modal new American voter is independent or chooses not to affiliate with a party — and this is not just about partisan politics. Faith in American democracy is at an all-time low, with 58 percent of American voters across all demographics and ideologies saying the American government needs a major overhaul. Whatever our political views and affiliations, we need to rebuild democracy to enhance the legitimacy of the U.S. government in the eyes of Americans across the political spectrum.
Expanding access to American politics is the best way to enhance its legitimacy and to formulate safeguards against abuses of political power. Despite the Supreme Court’s Allen v. Milligen decision and the entry of minority candidates into the presidential race (Nikki Haley, Vivek Ramaswamy and Kamala Harris are partly South Asian, and Ron DeSantis represents a state where more than a quarter of residents are Latino), established politicians are closing ranks and manipulating electoral districts to maintain their power. Thirty-six states have enacted voter identification laws that create more obstacles to voting, particularly for non-White and naturalized voters, and eight states have withdrawn from ERIC, a bipartisan partnership to prevent voter fraud. Alabama was hardly alone in gerrymandering its districts following the 2020 census. Some of these schemes are being challenged in courts, but they show that mostly GOP-led states are gearing up to prevent diverse voters from being heard.
American politics can be revived by incorporating fresh faces in American politics. President Biden’s executive order to expand voter access by enlisting agencies like the Department of Education and U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services shows promise, and some states use automatic voter registration to eliminate obstacles. A broad commitment to voting equality, including counting votes fairly when redistricting, is needed to enhance democracy for all.
Ming Hsu Chen is professor of race, law, and politics at UC Law San Francisco and director of the Center for Race, Immigration, Citizenship, and Equality. She is a PD Soros Fellow and a Public Voices Fellow of the Op-Ed Project.