GOP and Asian Americans

Why does the GOP have a tough time appealing to Asian Americans?  At The Daily Beast, Lloyd Green points to the party's perceived hostility to science and modernity.

According to the Pew Research Center, a majority of Asian immigrants hold at least a college degree—compared with less than one in three members of the overall adult population. At Cal Tech—where race, ethnicity, and legacy status are excluded from admissions criteria—Asian-Americans comprise nearly 40 percent of the student body. At MIT, which professes a commitment to diversity, Asian-Americans comprise more than a quarter of students.

What’s more, Asian-American students tend to concentrate in the STEM jobs—sciences, technology, mathematics, and engineering—that are crucial to our economy. Thus, in a sense, Asian-Americans are not just another ethnic group waiting for a politician to march in a parade, eat some exotic food, and then announce a community grant or shill for votes. Rather, they are also a subset of high-tech America, and one thing is clear: high-tech America is not in love with the Republican Party.

In Santa Clara County, California—the heart of Silicon Valley—Obama beat Romney by a 42-point margin. As Nate Silver documented, Obama received approximately $720,000 in contributions from Google employees, while Romney received a paltry $25,000. At Apple, the story was almost the same. Its employees gave more than nine out of every 10 campaign dollars they contributed to the president.

And it is not just a matter of votes or money. It is also a matter of campaign skills. High-tech America’s aversion to the Republican Party is wreaking havoc with mechanics of national Republican campaigns. A recent Sunday New York Times Magazine cover story highlighted the Republicans’ huge campaign-technology deficit and described at length how the party’s inability to connect with tech-savvy graduates is damaging its competitiveness. In that context, the Election Day epic failure of Romney’s ORCA operation is just another symptom of what is ailing the GOP.