EMBARGOED FOR RELEASE UNTIL 10AM PST THURSDAY MAY 7, 2009

California Statewide Survey of Asian American

Voters and the Environment
To: Interested Parties
From: Ben Tulchin, Mike Bocian and Julie Lein

In order to gauge environmental attitudes among Asian American voters,

Greenberg Quinlan Rosner Research conducted a California statewide survey on behalf
of the California League of Conservation Voters Education Fund. This ground-breaking
research explored Asian American voter opinions on the environment, the first-ever
environmental survey to extensively solicit the views of this growing population. The
survey captured sentiments of the Asian American community, with interviews
conducted among six nationalities—Chinese, Filipino, Korean, Vietnamese, Japanese,
and Asian Indian. The results provide encouraging insights about engaging the Asian
community on environmental issues, with Asian American voters indicating even
stronger environmental attitudes than voters statewide.

Key Findings

Key highlights from the survey include:

• Protecting our air, land, and water is an important value for Asian American
voters. This held true across different nationalities and ethnicities within the
Asian American community. In fact, Asian American voters call themselves
“environmentalists” by a far greater margin than California voters statewide.

• Asian Americans believe strongly that government should take an active role in
protecting our air, land, and water, and these voters support environmental
regulations and laws to protect natural resources.

• The poll found that Asian Americans are concerned about a wide range of
environmental issues, with global warming topping the list.

• Asian American voters in California are willing to walk the walk, not just talk the
talk when it comes to taking political action to protect the environment. Most
Asian voters express a willingness to vote for a ballot measure or a candidate
that protects our air, land, and water and is committed to tackling global warming.

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Environmental survey among Asian American voters 2

Asian Americans Care about the Environment

Asian American voters in California view the environment as an important issue,

and are even more likely to consider themselves environmentalists than voters
statewide.

• Nearly three in four Asian American voters (74%) say that environmental issues
are extremely or very important to them personally. In comparison, two in three
voters (67%) statewide indicate environmental issues are extremely or very
personally important.

• More than four in five Asian Americans (83%) describe themselves as

environmentalists, outnumbering voters statewide by a three-to-two margin.
Specifically, a narrow majority (52%) of all California voters consider themselves
environmentalists.

Asian Americans in CA are more likely to call themselves environmentalists

Do you consider yourself an environmentalist? (IF YES) Is that somewhat or strongly?

Asian
100 American 100

voters California
83 statewide
80 Yes, somewhat 80
voters*
Yes, strongly No

60 60
52

40 40 45

20 26 20
21
17
0 0
Yes No Yes No
* From an April 2009 California statewide survey
conducted by Tulchin Research among 564
Page
registered 5|
voters

Asian Americans Want an Active Government Role in Protecting Air, Land,

and Water

In order to protect the environment, Asian American voters see the need for
government to take an active role in protecting our air, land, and water. Overall, Asian
American voters feel that environmental regulations provide an important benefit to
society (71%), with only 12% saying they do more harm than good.

 2009 Greenberg Quinlan Rosner, All Rights Reserved. May 2009

Environmental survey among Asian American voters 3

Asian American voters see value in environmental regulations

Please tell me which of the following statements comes closest to your own view of government regulations of the environment:

Environmental regulations provide an important

benefit to society and help protect our health, 71
air and water.

Environmental regulations do more harm than

good. They hurt businesses and lead to job 12
losses.

Both/ Neither/ Don't know 18

0 20 40 60 80

Global Warming Stands Out as an Environmental Issue

While Asian Americans are very concerned about environmental issues

generally, global warming, in particular, stands out as a top priority. Over one in three
Asian American voters (36%) identified global warming as an extremely serious concern,
with nearly seven out of ten (69%) describing global warming as an extremely or very
serious issue.

Top environmental issues: Global warming tops the list

Now I’m going to read you a list of specific environmental issues facing California. For each issue, please tell me whether you
think it is an extremely serious problem, a very serious problem, a somewhat serious problem, or not too serious a problem.

Extremely serious Very serious

Global warming 36 69
Having enough water to meet future needs 33 70
Dependence on foreign oil 32 68
Traffic/ congestion 27 64
Air pollution 26 60
Toxic chemicals 25 55
Water pollution 24 58
0 20 40 60 80

 2009 Greenberg Quinlan Rosner, All Rights Reserved. May 2009

Environmental survey among Asian American voters 4

Asian Voters Willing to Take Action to Protect the Environment

Given the perceived importance of environmental issues, Asian American voters

in California are inclined to take political action to protect our air, land, and water.
Specifically, four in five Asian American voters (80%) are very or somewhat willing to
vote for a candidate with a strong environmental record. An even stronger majority—85
percent—indicate a likelihood of voting for a ballot measure to protect the environment.

Asian American voters willing to take action to protect the environment

How likely would you be to take the following actions to protect the environment? For each action, please tell me
whether you would be very likely, somewhat likely, a little likely or not at all likely to take it in order to protect the
environment. Please be as honest with me as possible.

Very likely Somewhat likely

Vote for a ballot measure to

protect the environment
55 85

Vote for a candidate that has a

strong environmental record
47 80

0 20 40 60 80 100

 2009 Greenberg Quinlan Rosner, All Rights Reserved. May 2009

Environmental survey among Asian American voters 5

***
Research Methodology

From February 19 – March 9, 2009, Greenberg Quinlan Rosner Research conducted a

survey of 1002 Asian American voters in California, including:

96 Asian Indian voters

298 Chinese voters

279 Filipino voters

88 Japanese voters

105 Korean voters

136 Vietnamese voters

Interviews were conducted in English, Korean, Chinese, and Vietnamese. Of each

nationality, the language breakdowns included 76% of Chinese interviews conducted in
Cantonese, 74% of Korean interviews conducted in-language, and 84% of Vietnamese
interviews conducted in-language. The margin of error is +/- 3.1 percentage points.

 2009 Greenberg Quinlan Rosner, All Rights Reserved. May 2009