Rising minorities find political clout elusive

In this story: 'Firsts' for Asian-Americans Hispanics may be under-represented The citizenship factor Confronting misconceptions Some gains, some paradoxes RELATED STORIES, SITES

From Yvonne Lee
CNN Washington Bureau

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Census 2000 numbers show a dramatic rise in the number of Hispanics and Asians in the United States, but scholars and political observers say it remains unclear whether these increases have translated into increased political power.

ALSO Census: Non-Hispanic whites now a minority in California   MESSAGE BOARD The state of race relations

Hispanics now outnumber blacks as the nation's largest minority, 35,305,818 compared to 34,658,190 African-Americans. The number of Asian-Americans grew 48.3 percent from 6,908,638 to 10,242,998 in the 1990s.

California's Hispanic and Asian populations grew so rapidly in the 1990s that the state no longer has a majority of any group, including whites, who now comprise 47 percent of the total, down from 57 percent in 1990. Hispanics comprise 32.4 percent, Asians 10.8 percent, and blacks 6.4 percent. In New York, Asian-Americans are now the fastest-growing minority, increasing 56 percent in the 1990s.

How the Census 2000 is interpreted may have an impact on minority political power. Commerce Secretary Don Evans announced March 6 that adjusted numbers will not be used for redistricting. He said he could not conclude that the adjusted data would be more accurate.

Several minority lawmakers and groups are still urging the Commerce Department to release adjusted numbers for use in federal funding.

"We know millions of people were missed, we know where they live, and for the most part we know they are disproportionately minority," said Gilbert F. Casellas, the presidentially appointed co-chair of the U.S. Census Monitoring Board, an independent body established by Congress.

Disallowing adjusted data reduces the likelihood that more districts favoring minorities will be created as the state legislatures redistrict themselves and their congressional delegations over the next year. The same may be true for other political units such as city councils and county commissions.

The monitoring board says states with high undercounts include California (529,782), Texas (356,296), Florida (208,867) and New York (290,938). The board says 65 percent of New York's undercount occurred in New York City.

"These numbers are consistent with our findings that the census has problems counting Asian-Americans, immigrants and non-English speakers," said Glenn Magpantay, attorney for the Asian American Legal Defense Fund.

"Part of the problem is how the lines are drawn," Magpantay said. "The city council district [in New York] for Chinatown represents all of Chinatown, but also goes into heavily white, economically affluent neighborhoods. So, Asian voters are overwhelmed by non-Asian voters. The lines have to be redrawn. The question is whether the lines will be drawn to give Asians meaningful representation."

New York has the second largest Asian-American population in the country, according to Magpantay, but none has ever been elected to city council, to the state legislature or to Congress.

James Lai, a political science professor at California's Santa Clara University, said it is still unclear whether Asian-Americans are fulfilling their political potential.

Asian-Americans, nearly 70 percent of whom were foreign-born as of 1990, historically have relied on "politics by other means," Lai said. That is, "participation that excluded traditional forms of political behavior, such as running for elected office." Instead, they remain politically active mostly by making campaign contributions, he said.

Trends over the past decade, Lai said, indicate this group is beginning to show signs of greater political incorporation. He said Asian-Americans have achieved a great deal of "firsts" in the past decade.

"In 1996, Gary Locke [in Washington] became the first Asian-American mainland governor," Lai said. "In 1994, Tony Lam became the first Vietnamese-American elected official in the United States when he was elected to [the city council of] Westminster, California. In 1998, Chanrithy Uong, a Cambodian-American, and Joe Bee Xiong, a Hmong-American, became the first elected officials from their communities to be elected to Lowell, Massachusetts, and Eau Clair, Wisconsin, respectively."

Hispanics also won more political offices in the 1990s. They gained three congressional seats in 2000, all in the House of Representatives, climbing from 18 members to 21.

Hispanic shoppers stroll along Broadway in downtown Los Angeles. The Hispanic population in California increased 43 percent over the past decade.

The most dramatic change came at the state level. There were 129 Latinos in the state legislatures in 1990; as of January 2001 that number had increased to 197.

"Although some of the growth is in states with large Latino populations, like California and Florida, some of the growth is also occurring in places that people don't see as having large Latino populations," said Rosalind Gold, director of policy research at the National Association of Latino Elected Officials.

"Wisconsin, for example, elected its first Latino state legislator. Michigan elected two during the decade. In the '90s, three Latinos were added in Massachusetts," Gold said.

In California, one out of every four of the state's assembly members is Latino. Census 2000 figures released Thursday show Hispanics now make up 32.4 percent of the 33,871,648 people counted.

The question of whether "one out of four" constitutes adequate representation will likely be an issue in upcoming redistricting battles, with the undercount a point of contention.

The U.S. Census Monitoring Board estimates that 529,782 people were missed in the California count, many of them probably members of a minority, as was typically the case in 1990.

As the figures from the 2000 Census are reported, it is clear that previous estimates for minorities have been low in general, indicating the under-representation may be greater than the numbers show. So far, census figures show that previous estimates have been off in major metropolitan areas such as New York and some Southeastern states.

According to Dwight Johnson, public information officer for the U.S. Census Bureau, "in fast-growing areas the likelihood of errors in census estimates increases."

In New York, census estimates for 1999 showed 2.6 million Hispanics living in the state. The actual count was closer to 2.8 million, according to recently released figures. In Georgia and Tennessee the estimates were 50 percent lower in the Hispanic population than the number of people actually counted.

Regardless of possible errors, elected officials such as Ana Gutierrez -- a member of the Race and Ethnic Advisory Committee to the Census -- said there is already a disproportionate representation of Hispanics in government.

When Gutierrez was elected to the Montgomery County school board, she became the first Hispanic elected to public office in Maryland and the first El Salvadorian elected to office in the United States. According to the 2000 Census, Hispanics of voting age make up 10 percent of the population in Montgomery County.

"I got elected in spite of being Hispanic," Gutierrez said. "My election cannot be a typical one. We need to be electing more Hispanics that are represented by Hispanic districts. I have not seen that there's going to be a huge move to redistrict in a way that reflects the growth in population."

The actual number of Asians, blacks and Hispanics may not affect minority political power as much as voter eligibility.

One reason Hispanics may not hold as many political offices as African-Americans is because not as many of them are citizens, and therefore ineligible to vote.

According to a 1998 census report, Hispanics of voting age numbered about 20 million in the United States, compared to 22.6 million for blacks. But of those Hispanics who are 18 and over, only 61 percent are citizens, compared to 96 percent of blacks. The 2000 voting survey will not be released until late this summer.

The issue of citizenship is a problem in the Asian-American population as well. Sociologists and academics say immigration has fueled the increase of Hispanics and Asians into the United States. But it takes an immigrant between five to six years to become eligible for citizenship.

And even if they do become citizens, said Dan Ichinose of the Asian Pacific American Legal Center, they tend to be unaffiliated with any political party until they are more familiar with the system. APALC is a group that provides Asians and Pacific Islanders with legal services and civil advocacy.

"You have a phenomenon where Asian-Americans may be 8 or 9 percent of the city, but only half will be eligible to vote," said Karen K. Narasaki, executive director of the National Asian Pacific American Legal Consortium, a group that works to advance the legal and civil rights of Asian-Americans.

"And Asian-Americans tend to be registered independent," Narasaki said. "In many areas, in order to vote in the primary election, which determines the runoff, you have to register with a party."

One Asian-American elected official, Dr. Judy Chu, said she ran for office to fight an "English only" movement in the 1980s. She is on the city council in Monterey Park, California, a city where the majority of the population is Asian-American. Still, she said, her position was won with the support of Asians as well as Latinos and whites.

Pei-te Lien, a political science professor at the University of Utah, says that in Monterey Park the population is 60 percent Asian but only half are citizens, and even fewer are registered to vote.

According to a survey by Lien, among Asian-Americans who are registered nationwide, 80 percent come out to vote. "One problem is that concrete numbers are difficult to get because we don't have a good recording system," Lien said.

Chu has been elected to her post four times, but she says Asians are still under-represented at the state and federal levels.

"In my first race, there were so many stereotypes, a kind of fear," she said. "Now, I would say the population in Monterey Park accepts the fact that an Asian-American can be a good leader for the city."

The number of Asians and Pacific Islanders voting in congressional elections increased by more than 366,000 to 1.4 million voters between 1994 and 1998, according to a report by the Census Bureau last year.

"While the number of voters nationwide dropped by 2.6 million, the number of Asian and Pacific Islanders going to the polls went up significantly between the 1994 and 1998 elections," said Jennifer Day, co-author of a U.S. Census Bureau report, "Voting and Registration in the Election of November 1998."

Despite comprising 12 percent of the population in California, Asian-Americans make up only 2 percent of the state assembly. And in the race for mayor of Los Angeles, a city with large Asian-American and Hispanic populations, the front runner is Jim Hahn, who is white.

Lien said Asian-Americans have a problem winning support because they cannot count on their base. Adding to the problem, Guiterrez said, is a resistance to embracing a population that is not mainstream.

"Asians are still considered more foreign than [American]," Lien said. "Our senatorial candidate [in California], Matt Fong, was confronted with a loyalty question. He was asked if China invades America, which side would he side with. He's a third or fourth generation Chinese-American."

Lien said Asians have a disadvantage compared to Latinos, who are strong Democratic Party supporters and enjoy the support of unions. They also share the same language, and often, the same religion.

"Asian-Americans," she said, "don't speak the same language and don't necessarily identify with the Democratic Party. That's cutting into our bloc-vote potential. And the bloc vote is behind the assumption that redistricting is necessary."

The census reported last year that the number of Hispanics who voted in the 1998 congressional elections increased by more than 500,000 from 1994, even as the overall number of voters nationwide dropped 2.6 million, to 45 million.

"We're pleased by the amount of progress that's been made in terms of numbers of elected officials and Latinos participating in the process," said Rosalind Gold, of the National Association of Latino Elected Officials.

"We made tremendous political gain in the last decade," Gold said, "not just in political office, but with both parties recognizing that Latinos are crucial to winning an election."

NALEO is a nonprofit organization that tries to get Latinos involved in the political process. It also keeps track of Latinos elected to office nationwide.

The reasons for the increases in voting are as varied as the populations themselves. Experts attribute some of it to outreach efforts stressing the importance of registration and participation. Litigation has become a tool as well.

The Asian American Legal Defense Fund challenged the congressional redistricting in one Asian community in New York City. In Diaz vs. Silver, the AALDF argued that two Asian communities in one New York City district constituted one community because the people had the same ethnicity, spoke the same language and were all poor or working class. A panel of three federal judges in New York ordered the district redrawn to include both communities, and the U.S. Supreme Court affirmed the decision.

Hispanic and Asian-American voters do have some characteristics in common. Those who are not as well educated, who have lower incomes, and who are younger do not participate as much as older, wealthier and better-educated community members.

According to Gold, the reverse was true with immigrants in recent elections. In 1996 and 1998, voter turnout rates among Latino immigrants were higher than those of Latinos who were native-born.

Gold said she believes an "anti-immigrant" atmosphere in the United States mobilized Latino immigrants to participate.

Census notes shifting U.S. populations
March 16, 2001
Census Bureau: U.S. poverty rate lowest in 20 years
September 26, 2000
Census figures show dramatic growth in Asian, Hispanic populations
August 30, 2000

U.S. Census Bureau

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