Indians in US politics
This is a collection of articles archived for the excellence of their content. |
Contents |
The position in 2016
The Indian vote
See graphic.
The Times of India
Nov. 2016: 5 PIOs, all Democrats elected to US Congress
All Of Them Democrats, 2 Are Women
Indian-Americans, and indeed New Delhi, will be chuffed by the victo ry of at least five candi dates of Indian origin in the US election -the largest contingent of PIO legislators ever to go to Capitol Hill.
California's attorney general Kamala Harris, a Democrat, won a Senate seat from California as was widely expected, making her the first senator of Indian origin.
Chidanand Rajghatta, 5 PIOs Climb Capitol Hill, Set A Record, Nov 10 2016 : The Times of India
Pramila Jayapal, Kamala Harris, Ro Khanna
The Times of India
Ami Bera, Raja Krishnamoorthi won.
Lathika Mary Thomas, Peter Jacob and Anil Kumar did India proud by putting up a good fight.
The Times of India
Also making it to the Congress is Ro Khanna, whose campaign claimed victory from California's 17th district even though votes were yet to be fully counted and certified. The most striking thing about a Khanna win is that he will represent the heart of Silicon Valley.
Another landmark for the community comes in the form of a win for Pramila Jayapal, 51, who cantered to victory from a Washington state seat in and around Seattle, another white-collar entrepot with some of the most highly educated constituents in the country . She will be the first Indian-American Congresswoman. Joining Khanna and Jayapal will be Dr Ami Bera, also from a California district around Sacramento. He is coming up with a surprisingly easy third-term win.
Rounding up the win is Raja Krishnamoorthi, who bagged the 8th congressional district in Illinois, President Obama's home state, defeating Republican Peter DiCianni. All five Indian-Americans are Democrats.
The position in 2017
Indians 1%, get 1% representation
A new analysis by the Pew Research Center on the religious affiliation of American lawmakers has concluded that the “US Congress is about as Christian today as it was in the early 1960s... although the share of US adults who describe themselves as Christians has been declining for decades.“
The study says among members of the new, 115th Congress that was sworn in in January 2017, 91% describe themselves as Christians.This is nearly the same percentage as in the 87th Congress (1961 to 1962, the earliest years for which comparable data are available), when 95% of members were Christian.
Among the 293 Republicans elected to serve in the new Congress, all but two identify as Christians; the only exceptions are two Jewish Republicans -Lee Zeldin of New York and David Kustoff of Tennessee. Democrats in Congress also are overwhelmingly Christian (80%), but there is more religious diversity on this side of the aisle. The 242 Democrats in Congress include 28 Jews, three Buddhists, three Hindus, two Muslims and one Unitarian Universalist -as well as the only member of Congress to describe herself as religiously unaffiliated.
According to the poll, the number of Hindus in Congress rose from one to three, as Ro Khanna (D-Calif), and Raja Krishnamoorthi (D-Illinois) joined Tulsi Gabbard (D-Hawaii) who was first elected to the 113th Congress (2013 to 2014) and has been re-elected twice, among those who identified themselves as Hindus.
It is not clear why the sur vey did not count Washington state lawmaker Pramila Jayapal, who also lists her religious affiliation as Hindu. Another Indian-American lawmaker, California's Ami Bera calls himself a “Unitarian Universalist“, while the religious affiliation of Senator Kamala Harris is not known, although she campaigned heavily in Black and Methodist churches during the election.
The current US Congress has just two Muslim lawmakers constituting 0.37% representation for a community that is 1% of the US population. Jews, who make up 2% of the US adult population, hold 30 seats in the new Congress (6%), up from 28 seats in the 114th (5%).
Hindus, counting Jayapal, appear to be proportionally represented to their population, which according to a Pew Study is 2.23 million, or 0.7% of the population.
