A poll of American Indians has found that 66% of respondents favor Democrat Joe Biden for the November presidential election, while President Donald Trump falls behind with 28%.
But Trump has come a long way, from 16% in 2016, according to the Indiaspora-AAPI Data poll released Tuesday.
The poll also affirmed the growing influence of the 1.8 million registered voters of the American Indian community: 56% of them reported being contacted by Democrats and 48% by Republicans, compared to just 31% reached by any match in 2016.
As the highest-income community, Indian Americans are also “showing their financial muscle,” as the survey put it. A quarter of those surveyed said they made donations to a candidate, political party, or some other campaign body this year; $ 3 million anecdotally, with double-digit aspirations.
The majority of Indian-Americans, 54%, identified themselves as Democrats, while the second largest group of 24% identified as Independents and only 16% called themselves Republicans, compared with 45% , 35% and 19% respectively in 2016.
The most significant change, or the beginning of it, was reflected in the numbers for the White House race. While American Indian support for Biden was overwhelming at 66%, it was far lower than the 77% support for Hillary Clinton, then a Democratic nominee, in 2016, and the brutal 84% for President Barak Obama in 2016. the 2012 elections.
Trump, on the other hand, has risen from 12% in 2016 to 28%, and could rise to 30% if he and Biden split the 6% of undecided respondents proportionally to their current scores.
That should worry Democrats. “The Biden campaign has to be especially vigilant” and must carry out vigorous outreach to the community, said Congressman Raja Krishnamoorthi. Over time, he added, these voters will “go home” to the Democratic Party because of their concerns about other issues, especially Covid-19.
Neeraj Antani, a Republican member of the Ohio state legislature, attributed Trump’s growing support among Native Americans to the president’s outreach to the community, his visit to India in February, and his support for Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his neutrality. on issues such as the Citizenship Amendment Act and the repeal of section 370 on Jammu and Kashmir’s special status, in opposition to Biden’s opposition to those issues.
The Biden campaign’s position on Article 370 and the CAA has, in fact, antagonized a portion of Indian-Americans and led to talk that a Biden administration will be less friendly to India.
The former vice president has tried to address those concerns and assured the community that relations with India will be a “high priority” for his administration if elected. He promised that his administration will also prevent China from acting with “impunity” and showing no tolerance for cross-border terrorism, putting Pakistan on notice. He also implemented an expansive plan for Indian Americans, which focuses on hate crimes and immigration.
As part of its outreach to the community, the Trump campaign has released a video clip of the Howdy Modi and Namaste Trump events the president attended with Prime Minister Narendra Modi in the US and India respectively. , highlighting their relationship and the support of the cheering crowds.
The community is being aggressively courted by both parties, as the survey results showed: 56% reported being contacted by Democrats and 58% by Republicans compared to just 31% from either party in 2016, well below the 44% for white voters and 42%. for white voters.
Pretty simple reasons. Trump won the 2016 election with narrow margins of victory in key states on the battlefield, which he can hold on to with the support of Indian-Americans, or lose them if Democrats can persuade the community to vote for Biden. , and in greater numbers.
Indian Americans have the numbers that both Biden and Trump would want in these states. “Indian Americans are positioned to make a difference in several swing states that may be close in this election, such as Florida (87,000), Pennsylvania (61,000), Georgia (57,000), Michigan (45,000) and North Carolina (36,000). ), and maybe even Texas, which has 160,000 Indian-American voters, “said Karthick Ramakrishnan, professor of public policy and political science at UC Riverside and founder of AAPI Data.
He added that a high turnout fueled by Senator Kamala Harris’s “historic vice presidential nomination” and the “highly publicized” demonstrations in Houston and Ahmedabad that Trump and Modi held together “could make a big difference in this election.”
MR Rangaswami, founder of Indiaspora, said: “Given the growing political importance of the Indian diaspora in the US, it is no wonder they are being courted from both sides of the aisle.”
He added: “It’s great that the two major political parties have started to realize how important it is to reach out to Native Americans – our impact will only increase over time.
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