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Issue of reproductive justice important to Indian American women voters
Three quarters or more of Indian women who were polled said they support abortion access.
Representative image / Unsplash
Affordable health care for all, access to safe and legal abortion, and other reproductive health issues are high on the list of priorities for Indian American women voting in the upcoming Nov.5 elections according to a new poll.
Intersections of Our Lives released polling data that demonstrates the values impacting the vote of women of color in the 2024 election. Reproductive justice issues- such as securing well-paying jobs, accessing affordable healthcare including abortion and birth control, improving maternal health outcomes, lowering the cost of housing and addressing rising costs and prices emerged as important issues for this cohort of voters.
There are perceptions about certain ethnic groups in the AAPI community that are seen as anti-abortion or apolitical, according to Roshni Nedungadi, chief research officer of HIT Strategies, which conducted the poll alongside Lake Research Partners. She was speaking at a panel discussion hosted by Ethnic News Media on May.10
“We were able to reach people in the language that they were most comfortable in,” said Nedungadi “So while we don't have the segregated data for South Asian women, we do have data for Indian women and I'm sure it would not be a big surprise to those of you that are from the community or report in this community, that abortion access rose as a very, very high priority for Indian American women.”
The story of Purvi Patel, a 33-year-old Indian-American woman currently serving a 20-year sentence for fetal homicide in an Indiana prison is embedded in the Indian American woman’s collective memory. The prosecutor in Purvi's case argued that a woman can be found guilty of feticide in Indiana for trying to terminate a pregnancy regardless of whether the fetus lives or dies. An appeals court in Indiana reversed the conviction. If her conviction had not been overturned, she would have been the first woman in the United States to be charged, convicted, and sentenced on a feticide charge.
AAPI Women united on abortion issue
Three quarters or more of Chinese and Indian women who were polled said they support abortion access. Seven in ten Vietnamese and Korean women support abortion care, abortion and access to reproductive health care.
“That was surprising to me as a Korean, " said Sung Yeon Choimorrow, executive director, National Asian Pacific American Women's Forum. “I've always seen that data to be lower, but as you can see, you know, women in general are being more outspoken about their views on these things and six out of ten Filipino women also hold this view.“
“So it's safe to say in our data set that more than half of any of our communities, women support access to abortion and and a legal right to abortion. For Korean women, Korean American women, the top issue was women's rights, that includes both abortion as well as gender-based issues like wage gap and violence.
The panelists Nedungadi, Sung Yeon Choimorrow, Regina Davis Moss, Lupe M. Rodriguez, and Celinda Lake asserted that women of color are motivated to vote in the upcoming 2024 elections and feel they can participate and change the trajectory of the country. “Our polling underscores that AAPI, Black and Latin/x women voters are too powerful a force to be ignored during this election season.”
”We want to see our experiences reflected in politics and policy change.” Women of color are voting based on their values, said the panelists.
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