Asian Americans nationwide support President Barack Obama over GOP challenger Mitt Romney

Asian Americans nationwide support President Barack Obama over GOP challenger Mitt Romney by an even greater margin than this summer, according to an update of the National Asian American Survey released this week.

The survey is directed by Karthick Ramakrishnan, an associate professor of political science at UC Riverside.

The survey’s first set of interviews were conducted between July 30 and Sept. 20. Asian American likely voters then supported Obama over Romney by a 43 to 24 percent margin, with 32 percent of voters undecided.

The survey’s update on voting intentions was based upon interviews conducted between Sept. 21 and Oct. 13. Asian American likely voters backed Obama 50 to 19 percent, with 30 percent undecided. The increase in support for Obama was just within the margin of error.

Obama gave what was generally viewed as a lackluster performance in the first presidential debate, on Oct. 3 – in the middle of the updated interviews – and his poll numbers began dropping afterward.

But the survey found almost no difference between support for Obama among Asian Americans interviewed before and after the debate.

Researchers warned that the smaller sample sizes for the pre- and post-debate interviewees led to larger margins of error.

The updated interviews were of 1,031 adult Asian American citizens nationwide, of which 483 are likely voters.

More interviews are taking place this month.