General
Why Chinese Americans Have Shifted Rightward
A growing number of Chinese Americans, especially naturalized immigrants, say Democrats have become too lenient on crime and homelessness.
For the three decades after she became an American citizen, Annie Tan tried to stay out of the fray. Politics, she thought, was for politicians, not for “regular people” like her, a 71-year-old Chinese American immigrant from Taiwan living in Southern California.
That all changed last year, when Ms. Tan was checking her bank statement and noticed something strange: two checks in her name that had been cashed for $949 each.
For Ms. Tan, a sales director at a local Chinese television station, the precise amounts were telling. In 2014, Californians voted to reduce penalties for some crimes, including forged checks where the amount did not exceed $950. This year, the law became a talking point for President-elect Donald J. Trump and other Republicans who argued that Democratic officials were out of touch with the electorate.
Ms. Tan was hardly a fan of Mr. Trump, who was accused of using racist rhetoric against Chinese Americans during the pandemic. But on crime, the Republican Party had a point, Ms. Tan thought. The same for transgender rights and affirmative action, she felt. The Democrats had gone too far.
So last month, for the first time in two decades, Ms. Tan cast a ballot for Republicans down the ticket.
“A lot of laws are not fair or good for us Chinese,” said Ms. Tan, who lives in Temple City, a suburb outside of Los Angeles with a predominantly Asian population.
