 "Why Kamala Harris-Donald Trump debate won’t decide presidential election")
The first dramatic face-off between Kamala Harris and Donald Trump was a 90-minute stormy saga of fluster, bluster, scowls, smirks, scorn and derision—without any substantive and specific policies for Americans.
Both nominees dodged specific answers to questions on top election issues, like the economy, asked by ABC News moderators David Muir and Linsey Davis during their first presidential debate.
The first duel between the 45th POTUS and the first female, African-American and Indian-American vice-president was more of a personal bout with Harris baiting Trump, putting him on the defensive and triggering anger and frustration.
Trump had ample chances to jab Harris over her changed stance on fracking and immigration, but he squandered them as she baited him to veer off the course. He also had a great opportunity to corner her on Joe Biden’s disastrous Afghanistan withdrawal, but she cleverly moved the debate to Trump’s negotiations with the Taliban.
If Trump scowled and lost cool several times, Harris wasn’t great on the specifics either. For example, on inflation and the economy, she turned the debate into Trump’s proposed across-the-board tariffs by terming them “Trump sales tax”.
Harris dominated the debate only by trapping Trump. According to a snap CNN poll of voters who watched the debate, she performed better. As former New Jersey governor and 2016 and 2024 presidential candidate Chris Christie aptly said, “She was exquisitely well prepared. She laid traps, and he chased every rabbit down every hole instead of talking about the things that he should have been talking about.”
However, presidential debates don’t decide elections.
In 2004, John Kerry beat George W Bush in the debates but lost. In 2016, the story was repeated in the Hillary Clinton-Trump contest.
Impact Shorts
View AllThe media frenzy about the Harris-Trump debate was understandable, especially after Biden dropped out following his debate with Trump.
However, with a little more than 50 days left to Election Day, voters have already decided their nominees. Even undecided voters don’t get influenced by presidential debates.
A 2019 survey of 94,000 respondents about 56 TV debates on 31 elections with two months left in the US, the UK, Germany, Canada and three other countries found that neither undecided voters nor ones who had already decided were impacted. An analyses of presidential election polls between 1952 and 2012 found the same results.
Pew Research Center post-election surveys from 1988 through 2016 found that only 10 per cent of voters had definitively made up their minds “during or just after” the debates. On the other hand, 11 per cent decided in the days or weeks before or on Election Day, 22 per cent during or just after the party conventions and 42 per cent before the conventions.
Indian-Americans and their contribution
Similarly, Indian-Americans have already decided for whom they will vote. The crucial voting bloc is being pursued by both Democrats and Republicans.
On August 29, a video clip of Trump declaring his support for Indian-Americans, especially Hindus, stormed X.
“I am a big fan of Hindu (sic) and big fan of India … If I am elected President, the Indian and Hindu community will have a true friend in the White House. That I can guarantee you,” he says at an event amid cheers and claps.
I am a Big Fan of Hindu and Big Fan of India. If I am elected President, the Hindu community and India will have a true friend in White House. We cannot prosper without security and India has always supported fight against Radical Islamic Terrorism: Donald Trump pic.twitter.com/EkZdqYHk7W
— Megh Updates 🚨™ (@MeghUpdates) August 29, 2024
The clip, purportedly showing Trump speaking during the 2024 election campaign, was actually from a benefit put on by the Coalition at a convention centre in Edison, New Jersey, on October 16, 2016.
Posting old videos by political parties showing them as new is common during elections. What’s uncommon was the particular part of Trump’s speech highlighting the importance of Indian-Americans, particularly Hindus, in the US and asking for their votes.
In the 2024 presidential election too, Indian-Americans will play a crucial role in deciding between Trump and Harris.
There were around 4.8 million Indian-Americans as of 2022, accounting for 20 per cent of America’s Asian-American population, according to 2020 US Census Bureau data.
About 48 per cent of Indian-Americans identify as Hindu and around 66 per cent of Indian-Americans say that they are either Hindu or identify with another religion but feel closely connected to Hinduism for other reasons, such as family background or culture, a Pew Research Centre survey in 2022 and 2023 showed.
The Indian-American population increased from 387,000 in 1980 to 4.4 million in 2020—270,000 more residents than Chinese-Americans—with the group becoming the largest single-origin Asian group in the US in 2020, figures of AAPI Data, a leading research and policy organisation, show.
The Indian-American population grew by 68 per cent nationally and more than doubled in size in nine states between 2010 and 2020. The Asian-Indian-alone population increased by 54.7 per cent to 4,397,737 between 2010 and 2020 to become the most populous Asian-alone group in the nation, per AAPI (Asian American and Pacific Islanders).
The top five states with the highest number of Indian-Americans are California 902,621, Texas 507,479, New Jersey 432,883, New York 431,368 and Illinois 276,519.
The increasing number of Indians in the US isn’t just about their population but also their contribution to the nation. As Trump says in the clip, “Generations of Indian and Hindu Americans have strengthened our country.”
Despite being just 1.5 per cent of the population, Indian-Americans have contributed to science, academia, government, public service and global policy. Several Indians lead large business enterprises and have founded new companies which employ millions of Americans.
According to a report by US-based nonprofit group Indiaspora, which details the contributions of Indian-Americans to the US, Indian-origin CEOs head 16 Fortune 500 companies, including Microsoft’s Satya Nadella. These leaders employ 2.7 million Americans and generate nearly $1 trillion in revenue.
The report, titled ‘Small Community, Big Contributions, Boundless Horizons’ and authored in partnership with the Boston Consulting Group, shows that Indian-Americans co-founded 72 out of 648 US unicorns operating in 2024. These companies, like Cambridge Mobile Telematics and Solugen, employ more than 55,000 people and are worth $195 billion. Indian-Americans also own around 60 per cent of all US hotels.
“Whether through numbers or personal tales, their stories reveal the significant impact they have had on the American narrative. The community’s perseverance and accomplishments illustrate their vital role in American society, driving progress and unity,” the report states.
Indian-American voters in swing states
There are more than 2.1 million Indian-American voters. The top states for eligible Indian-American voters are California 416,397, Texas 227,718, New Jersey 203,940, New York 200,246 and Illinois 125,895.
The number of Indian-Americans in the battleground states are Georgia 172,000, Pennsylvania 160,500, Michigan 128,200, North Carolina 119,600, Arizona 71,100, Wisconsin 38,400 and Nevada 20,200, according to data from the US Census Bureau and American Community Survey.
In the swing states, Indian-Americans are the largest group of AAPI voters at 21 per cent and play a key role. For example, the group had the highest voter turnout among Asian-Americans in 2020 at 71 per cent, a 9 percentage point increase over 2016. About 1.3 million Indian-Americans voted in Arizona, Florida, Georgia, Michigan, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Texas and Wisconsin.
In 2016, Trump won Pennsylvania by only about 44,000 votes, less than 1 per cent of the 6.2 million votes cast. In 2020, Biden won the state with a margin of around 80,000 votes, about 1 per cent of the 6.9 million cast.
Indian-Americans and 2024 election
The group’s importance in presidential elections is highlighted by the fact that around 46 per cent (2.2 million) were eligible to vote in 2022, according to the US Census Bureau. Per AAPI, 91 per cent of Indian-Americans are planning to vote this year as against 97 per cent in 2020.
Indian-Americans have traditionally voted Democrat. A 68 per cent majority of Indian-American registered voters identify as Democrats or lean towards the party. Only 29 per cent identify with or lean towards the GOP, a Pew survey shows.
A YouGov/Carnegie Endowment for International Peace study, the Indian-American Attitudes Survey, conducted between September 1 and September 20, 2020, found that 72 per cent of registered Indian-American voters backed Biden in 2020, 77 per cent Hillary Clinton in 2016 and 84 per cent Barack Obama in 2012.
The group’s main reason for not backing the Republican Party is due, in part, to a perception that the GOP “is intolerant of minorities and overly influenced by Christian evangelicalism”. “Those who identify as Republicans are primarily moved to do so because of economic policy differences with the Democrats—with particularly marked differences regarding healthcare.”
However, there has been a change in the support of Indian-Americans for Democrats since 2020.
According to AAPI, 55 per cent of Indian-American voters identify as Democrat or lean Democrat compared to 59 per cent in 2020. On the other hand, the group’s support for the GOP, though not much, has increased from 21 per cent to 26 per cent in the last four years.
Moreover, there’s only a 2 percentage point difference between Indian-Americans who identify themselves as a strong Democrat or Republican, 59 to 57 per cent.
Before Biden dropped out, 46 per cent of Indian-Americans indicated that they would vote for him against 65 per cent in 2020—a decrease of 19 percentage points.
Among the key issues that are extremely important to Indian-Americans, jobs and economy are at number one at 58 per cent, followed by healthcare and inflation at 51 per cent each, gun control 50 per cent, crime 47 per cent, cost of housing 44 per cent, social security and Medicare 42 per cent, immigration 37 per cent and abortion 32 per cent, according to the 2024 Asian-American Voter Survey.
The bright spot for Harris is that Indian-Americans trust the Democratic Party more than the Republican Party in handling these issues.
On jobs and economy, 36 per cent of Indian-Americans think Dems are doing a better job compared to 28 per cent who think that the GOP is better, healthcare 46-16 per cent, inflation 34-28 per cent, gun control 44-20 per cent, crime 34-28 per cent, cost of housing 34-24 per cent, social security and Medicare 42-17 per cent and abortion 50-15 per cent.
On immigration, 33 per cent of Indian-American voters think Republicans doing a better compared to 29 per cent who think Dems are performing better.
Harris and Indian-American voters
Harris’s sudden arrival has galvanised both the party and her Indian-American supporters.
The Indian-American Impact Fund (IAIF), founded in 2016 and dedicated to promoting and elevating the voices of Indian and South Asian Americans in the political and civic life of the US, endorsed Harris the day Biden dropped out of the race and started a campaign called ‘Kamala ke saath: Electing the first Desi president’.
“Harris possesses an extraordinary ability to unite our nation at a time when the stakes have never been higher. We are ready to leverage our extensive network of resources to mobilise South Asian voters, confident that they will be instrumental in delivering the White House to Kamala Harris in November,” IAIF co-founder and board chair Deepak Raj said in a statement.
This week, a group of Indian-Americans launched a campaign called ‘ Indian Americans for Harris’ to gather support in swing states like North Carolina, Wisconsin, Michigan, Pennsylvania, Arizona and Georgia.
“We urge you to support Kamala Harris as she is the right choice for the right time. As the world grapples with inequities and disharmony, we need her to lead the US and the free world,” the campaign said.
The ‘ Chitthi Brigade’, a grassroots group of South Asian women that derives its name from a Tamil term for aunt, is fired up and rooting for Harris.
However, AAPI figures show that Harris’s support among Indian-Americans has decreased from 62 per cent in 2022 to 54 per cent, according to AAPI. Her unfavourability has also risen from 28 per cent to 38 per cent in the last two years.
Though only 29 per cent of Indian-American voters indicated they would vote for Trump compared to 28 per cent in 2020, it doesn’t help Harris. The AAPI survey found that 8 per cent haven’t heard of or don’t know about Harris and 15 per cent identify as independent. These independent voters could swing either way on Election Day.
Harris’s Indian heritage and race might have mobilised Indian-American voters but the economy, inflation and jobs will be their priorities like other voters on Election Day as the AAPI findings show.
Trump still leads Harris on the economy though by a much-reduced margin, according to a new _ Reuters_ /Ipsos poll. The three-day poll, conducted from August 23 to 25, Trump beating Harris by 43 to 40 per cent compared to an 11-point lead in late July.
“I think Indian Americans really look, and not just heritage because someone is on the ticket, but what has that person done? Do they espouse the same values?” according to Molly Ham, co-founder of Asians Make America Great Again (MAGA).
AsiansMAGA, formed by some grassroots Asian-American leaders, is an independent expenditure political action committee that mobilises Asian-American conservatives and moderates across Chinese, Indian, Korean, Vietnamese and Filipinos to help Trump win.
“What has Kamala Harris done for Indians and Asian Indians? What about education rights? She supported, I believe, Proposition 47 in California, and that was to support racial quotas for universities in California. That’s a big issue.” Ham said.
Like Indian Americans for Harris, AsiansMAGA is also eyeing battleground states like Wisconsin, Michigan, Pennsylvania, North Carolina, Nevada and Arizona. “We are targeting Asian-American voters in those states. Our website actually is being translated in multiple languages,” she added.
Harris Indian-American or African-American
The Indian Americans for Harris campaign is appealing to community voters to back Harris primarily because of her Indian heritage. “This is the first time we have someone whose mother is from India. She has got Indian heritage and culture. What she has learned, I felt that we Indian-Americans should support her beyond,” it says.
Harris’s May 10, 2023, viral remark “You think you just fell out of a coconut tree?”, a reference to her South Indian mother, was back in focus after Biden withdrew.
As VP Harris once said, “You exist in the context of all in which you live and what came before you.” Here’s the context of her viral “coconut tree” remarks, which have taken on a second life after Pres. Biden endorsed her for the Democratic nomination. https://t.co/VsUdJycSXA pic.twitter.com/TBKRlf57nn
— CBS News (@CBSNews) July 24, 2024
Similarly, Indian-American actor and producer Mindy Kaling recalled at the Democratic National Convention how she and Harris made masala dosa at her house in November 2019.
In case you haven’t watched it, here’s @mindykaling cooking dosas with @KamalaHarris.pic.twitter.com/kCa4rDfKIM
— Democrats (@TheDemocrats) August 22, 2024
However, it is well-known that Harris identifies herself more as African-American than Indian-American as her father was Jamaican. Even the media portrays her as the second Black woman senator rather than the first Indian or mentions her more as South Asian than Indian or Hindu.
Harris grew up in Oakland and Berkeley and attended predominantly Black churches. She was introduced to the Baptist Church by her father and identifies as a Baptist, not a practising Hindu.
Even her White House biography says she is “the first woman, the first Black American, and the first South Asian American” to be elected vice-president.
In her 2019 memoir, The Truths We Hold, Harris does mention that she and her younger sister “were raised with a strong awareness of and appreciation for Indian culture”. However, her mother “understood very well that she was raising two black daughters” and “was determined to make sure (they) would grow into confident, proud black women”.
In an interview with The Breakfast Club hosts DJ Envy and Charlamagne Tha God in March 2019, Harris, then a senator, said, “ I’m black, and I’m proud of being black. I was born black. I will die black.”
Harris’s Indian-American supporters are fired up because of her Indian heritage and race, but she has always advertised her black roots in public.
Besides, is Harris taking the Indian-American support for granted? In the Asian-American Voter Survey, only 11 per cent said that the Democratic Party has contacted them a great deal, some 20 per cent, a little 19 per cent and not at all 45 per cent.
If Harris wins, the US media will portray her as the first African-American and Asian-American woman US president, not Indian-American.
The writer is a freelance journalist with more than two decades of experience and comments primarily on foreign affairs. Views expressed in the above piece are personal and solely those of the writer. They do not necessarily reflect Firstpost’s views.
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