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By Randall Yip, Executive Editor
The Democrats Friday announced a new $35 million campaign in a bid to win back control of the House.
The money specifically will go towards targeting minority voters for multilingual paid digital, direct mail, print, and radio ads in Vietnamese, Korean, and both simplified and traditional Chinese, said the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee.
“So that’s the historic figure that we’ve been pointing folks to that encompasses the research, the organizing, the paid media investments across our constituencies and across the country,” said Sarah Lin, National AANHPI Engagement Deputy Director.
The Asian language campaign will be directed to five congressional districts in California, three in New York, two each in Ohio and Virginia along with single districts in Colorado-08, Indiana-01, New England-02, North Carolina-01, New Mexico-02, Nevada-03, Michigan-08, and Oregon-06.
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Among the districts being targeted and the candidates being supported are Asian Americans in districts the Democrats hope to flip from red to blue- Democrat Derek Tran is running against incumbent Michelle Steele (R-Westminster) in district 45 where Lin says Asian Americans of voting age represent 38% of the voting population.
In District 47, the party hopes Dave Min (D) can retain the seat previously held by Katie Porter who lost her bid to run for U.S. Senate. Min is running against Scott Baugh (R) for the open seat.
Both parties have been criticized for their lack of outreach to Asian American and Pacific Islander voters.
Researcher Karthick Ramakrishnan who just joined the Asian American Research Center this summer at UC Berkeley has been among those critics.
“The important thing will be to figure out how much of that money will not only be spent in advertising, but also door knocking and voter education. How much is advertising through ethnic media? How much is showing up at events? The headline sounds impressive. The importance is in the details,” he said to AsAmNews.
Democratic consultant Trip Yang of Trip Yang Strategies encourages the party to build genuine relationships with the AAPI community.
“Whether it’s for President in states like Nevada, Georgia, Pennsylvania, or for control the House, which is the case in New York, Southern California, Nevada, New Jersey, API voters really, really matter. We’re not asking Democrats to reach out to Asian American voters because it feels good. It’s about winning as well,” he told AsAmNews.
Lin doesn’t disagree that her party has to engage these voters and address what’s important to them.
“We’ve been very excited throughout the cycle to speak to these voters to make sure that they are receiving culturally specific communication from the committee. So that they can be mobilized so that they we can continue to ensure that they know that the AANHPI electorate is a key part of our ability to take back the house.”
In California, the Democrats are targeting Congressional districts 13, 22, 27, 45 and 47. In New York, it’s districts 3,4, and 17. Ohio Democrats are focused on District 9 and 13 and in Virginia its 2 and 7.
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