India Currents

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In Election 2024, fundamental tenets about democracy in the most powerful nation on earth will be tested like no time since the Civil War. Today, Americans will choose either Trump or Harris to serve as the next president. It’s the final chapter in one of the most bewildering, unpredictable, and consequential sagas in political history. For once, the word “unprecedented” has not been overused. The United States has never elected a president who has been convicted of a crime. Trump survived not one but two assassination attempts. Biden dropped out in the middle of an election year and Harris could become the first female president. By Chris Megerian for the Associated Press. Read full report -

While poll predictions, analyses, and surveys predict a neck-to-neck fight between the two, what was on the minds of Indian Americans as they headed to the polls? The Indian American Attitudes Survey (IAAS) 2024, published by the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace gauged voting patterns and behavior of Indian- Americans and found that roughly 47 percent of Indian Americans identified as Democrats, down from 56 percent in the 2020 survey. According to the Pew Research Center, “68% majority of Indian American registered voters identify with or lean toward the Democratic Party, and 29% identify with or lean toward the Republican Party.” Find out more -

Thank you to the API Alliance for capturing the highlights from our Voter Information Night with CalMatters in #Sunnyvale on October 24! Just 24 hours to go, if you haven't already, please VOTE! Because #everyvotecounts #bayarea #votereducation #IndianAmerican

National security officials warn that U.S. adversaries may incite violent protests after Election Day. These developments — all revealed in the past week — show how Russia, China and Iran have increased the pace of efforts to meddle in American politics ahead of next month’s election, just as intelligence officials and security analysts had predicted. At the same time, officials, tech companies and private researchers have adopted a more aggressive defense by swiftly exposing foreign election threats, highlighting the lessons learned from past election cycles that revealed America’s vulnerability to disinformation and cyberespionage. Story by David Klepper & Eric Tucker for the Associated Press. Read more -

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In the run-up to Election Day, Ethnic Media Services organized a special briefing with the Chair of the Senate Intelligence Committee Senator Mark Warner of Virginia, and ethnic media outlets on October 22. Senator Warner spoke at length about the threat of interference and disinformation from the United States’ foreign adversaries like Russia, China, Iran, and North Korea. Propagated online through social media platforms, the intention is to influence voters towards one candidate or another, and to undermine people’s trust in the American election process, and hence, democracy. Learn more -

At a 23rd October Ethnic Media Services panel speakers discussed the issue, “Diversity- Are We Moving Forward or Backward?” They gave an overview of how recent efforts to overturn affirmative action in higher education are affecting the admission process for minority students. Niyati Shah, Director of Litigation at Asian Americans Advancing Justice explained how two recent landmark cases, SFFA v Harvard and SFFA v University of North Carolina, have changed the legal landscape of affirmative action. In Shah’s view “this concept is based on a very faulty premise” because it doesn’t account for variations in the applicant pool from year to year. Find out more -

“The racist, anti-immigrant rhetoric at the Trump campaign’s NYC event actively endangers AAPIs, immigrants, and people of color.” Stop AAPI Hate, a U.S.-based coalition dedicated to ending racism and discrimination against Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders (AAs & PIs), issued a statement condemning the racist statements made by keynote speakers at the rally held at Madison Square Garde. At the Trump campaign rally in New York City this weekend, numerous speakers gave remarks entrenched in hate, racism, sexism, and xenophobia. During the event, which has drawn comparisons to a 1939 Nazi rally at the same venue, speakers falsely stated that Kamala Harris is Samoan and Malaysian, spread hate-fueled disinformation about immigrants, and disparaged communities of color, including Puerto Ricans and Latinos. Read more -

"Now, as her visibility has soared and the stakes have climbed, the conversation about Kamala’s heritage of race, ethnicity, class, and gender has also amped up, pervasive and loud. Regardless of Trump, this (I think) was bound to happen!" writes Dr. Anuradha Luther Maitra. Kamala seems to have negotiated her multiple identities/intersectionality by focusing on the idea that bias and stereotyping of anyone is bad, she says. Read full opinion -