Prop 50 would give Asians and Latinos in Placer County more voting power. Here are their top issues

If Proposition 50 passes next week, Placer County — which is currently a part of Congressional District 3, represented by Republican Kevin Kiley — could be split into three districts.

This change could reshape how communities of color influence future congressional elections, and how candidates pay attention to their concerns. 

Today, Latinos make up about 15% of the district’s population, while Asian residents account for around 8%. In most cases, those numbers would rise considerably in the new Districts 3, 4 and 6.

Roseville and Rocklin — the county’s largest cities and home to its biggest Latino and Asian populations — would move into District 6, where both groups’ political power would grow significantly. 

If Prop 50 passes, Placer County could become a new testing ground for how diverse communities shape congressional races. And as its Latino and Asian populations continue to grow, candidates might need to take their issues — and their votes — more seriously. 

Young voters’ worries

On an early October Thursday morning, 18-year-old  David Lumaa reflects on growing up in Roseville while walking through Royer Park.

“One of my best friends — I volunteered with him for the Special Olympics here,” he said. “They were practicing over here and there’s just great memories helping the kids and just having fun.”

Lumaa, who’s Mongolian American, has lived in Placer County his whole life. He’s president of Sierra College’s Political Science Club, and he says debates over the constitutionality of redistricting have recently dominated their online forum. 

“We have a large spectrum — people from right, left, middle, centrists,” he said. “And we kind of reached a conclusion where gerrymandering is very fundamentally anti-democratic if not put in the hands of the people.”

Lumaa sits on a bench Friday, Oct. 24, 2025, at Royer Park.(Gerardo Zavala/CapRadio)

He says his group sees California’s decision to put Prop. 50 on the ballot — which would let lawmakers redraw district lines — as a valid response to Texas, where redistricting could add five Republican seats to Congress. 

Still, Lumaa says debates like these — along with ideological fights over issues like abortion — often distract from the issues that really worry him and his generation.

“It is a little infuriating that these politicians are more focused on this power grab, attention grab, voter grab instead of trying to help fix and bolster our economies,” he emphasized. 

He said the affordability and housing crisis should be politicians’ main priorities if they want to mobilize young voters like him.

“We have this kind of joke hanging around social media like our parents got a house for $5, we’re going to have to pay hundreds of millions of dollars for it with inflation and how bad the economy’s going,” he said. “So that’s definitely the biggest worry of my generation and my age group.” 

Those concerns are similar to those of the region’s growing Latino and Asian American population. 

According to Census data, nearly 80% of the county’s population was white in 2010. In 2020, they made up less than 70%. A big reason for that is the influx of minority groups, particularly Latinos and Asian Americans, moving into the area. Together, these groups make up roughly a quarter of the county’s population. 

Changing county demographics 

At Sierra College in Rocklin, employee Tanya Zito says she’s watched the student body — and the county — slowly grow more diverse over the years.

She walks through the school’s Learning Resource Center, pointing out the quiet study spaces and writing center tables that are usually bustling with activity. It’s midterm break and a rainy day, so it’s unusually empty.

“There are usually students standing outside waiting to get it in the morning,” she said while walking through the library. “It’s usually packed on the second floor [where] we have a writing center, research help, DVD collections, textbook help.” 

Administrative Assistant Tanya Zito Tuesday, Oct. 14, 2025, in the Sierra College Library and Learning Resource Center at 5100 Rocklin Rd in Rocklin.(Gerardo Zavala/CapRadio)

Zito, who’s half Latina and half Asian, moved to Rocklin 25 years ago from South San Francisco so her kids had access to better education. She remembers when cultural diversity here was rare.

“Before, you would never find a Korean restaurant anywhere,” she said. “Now, they’re popping up.” 

As an administrative assistant at the college’s Learning Resource Center, she said she’s seen that diversity reflected in her students — 23 percent of Sierra College students are Hispanic or Latino. But she’s worried that cuts to discretionary grant programs aimed at helping minority groups, and rising fears of immigration enforcement could change that.

“I personally think we will lose students and we probably have already with just the fear from the Hispanic community and undocumented students,” she stressed. “They’re just not showing up… even though we are saying they are safe on this campus. We can’t guarantee that safety.”

The county’s Asian population is dealing with this and other safety concerns, especially after the rise in hate crimes following the COVID-19 pandemic.; 

Safety and belonging 

Cam Mahon helped create AAPI Placer County in 2023 in response to harassment some Asian youth groups reported during the COVID-19 pandemic. 

“We had heard that one of the local Asian Youth Leader Association groups at one of the high schools was really struggling,” she said. “They were getting bullied online. It was just really nasty messages that were being left. So we knew that as a group we needed to step in and be that safe space for them.”

Mahon, who has lived in Placer County since 2016, said that sense of fear still lingers for many in the Asian community, including herself. 

“Just being in the grocery store, shopping at night during the pandemic, being afraid to sneeze, something as simple as that, but just this heightened awareness around your safety was very different,” she recounted. “And also just having conversations with your parents about them being safe. There were some stories, like in South Sac, of elderly Asian people being targeted and things like that.”  

Mahon said while anti-Asian hostility has faded somewhat since then, she’s noticed similar attitudes directed toward other marginalized groups, particularly immigrants and LGBTQ+ individuals.

She’s also concerned about the quality of K-12 education — a big reason she moved to the region in 2016 — and access to mental health services. Mahon said her organization has partnered with the Placer County Health and Human Services agency, which found that they’ve seen a big jump in AAPI youth penetrating the healthcare system and needing mental health services.

Still, she said the AAPI community’s top concerns can vary widely from affordability and housing to moral and religious values. 

Faith and politics 

While Mahon’s group works to create a sense of inclusion, other parts of the county’s Asian community are rooted deeply in traditional, faith-based values. 

On a Saturday afternoon, a local chapter of a Catholic prayer group gathered outside the Martha Riley Community Library in Roseville. 

A Filipino Catholic group meets for a public rosary Saturday, Oct. 11, 2025, outside of the Martha Riley Community Library at 1501 Pleasant Grove Blvd in Roseville.(Gerardo Zavala/CapRadio)

Rosario Mangligot, who immigrated to the U.S. from the Philippines in 2009, is the rosary captain. She says they get together to pray for the country’s biggest issues, which she says include things like mental illness and homelessness — but also some that are more ideological. 

“For the end of abortion, pornography and same sex marriage, and all offenses against the law of god,” she said.  

For herself, Mangligot says she’s most concerned about the lack of middle-income housing and the growing fear of deportations among immigrants. 

Mangligot’s views reflect the complex mix of concerns minority groups typically have that don’t fit neatly into the political narratives about diversity and representation. She said she doesn’t see her issues addressed by politicians and feels like elected officials don’t care about their issues. 

“Sometimes, if I cannot fix the issues, I just lift my hands and say, ‘Lord, I’m not the president,’” she said. “And sometimes if you cannot do anything about it, just leave it to God.” 

Growing political power? 

Sara Sadhwani, a politics professor at Pomona College and a member of the California Citizens Redistricting Commission, studies how Asian American and Latino voters engage in elections. 

She said the growing diversity in places like Placer County doesn’t necessarily translate into political power, especially when parties and candidates fail to reach out. 

“We have nearly 20 years of polling data that shows Asian Americans and, in many regards, Latinos as well will report that no political party reached out to them,” she said. “That candidates didn’t reach out in their languages of preference or that they simply didn’t get a lot of the information.”

Sadhwani added that when people don’t feel represented, they’re less likely to vote. 

“Oftentimes it’s whether or not you feel like your vote actually matters, and that’s a personal belief that voters will carry with them,” she highlighted. “They don’t always realize what the stake of their vote actually might be.” 

Sadhwani said both groups have low voter turnout except during presidential elections and have traditionally leaned Democratic, but the 2024 election has shown growing frustration with the party. 

According to the Pew Research Center, nearly half of all Hispanic voters voted for Trump in 2024 — a big jump from 2020, when Joe Biden won Hispanic voters by 25 points. Trump also received 40% of Asian voters, up from 30% in 2020. 

Sadhwani said that a big reason for that is the issues they decided to focus on.

“My best guess, looking at a lot of these polls, is that in the election, the president really focused on kitchen table issues,” she said. “On the impact of inflation and the economy in a way that Democrats failed to get through to ordinary voters.”