SAJAforum

2008 ELECTION: South Asians voted overwhelmingly for Obama

AALDEF, the Asian American Legal Defense and Education Fund, has finally started releasing its analysis of exit polls from the presidential election, last November. Its breakdown for Michigan and Pennsylvania indicate that South Asians almost unanimously voted for Barack Obama, beating even the extremely pro-Democratic projections that we posted here, prior to the election. Here's the info for Michigan:

AALDEF surveyed a total of 1,621 Asian and Arab American voters in Ann Arbor, Canton, Dearborn, Detroit, Hamtramck, Novi, and Troy.  The five largest ethnic groups surveyed were Asian Indian (25%), Arab (24%), Chinese (23%), Bangladeshi (15%), and Korean (5%).  Seventy-two percent (72%) of voters were foreign-born naturalized U.S. citizens, and 8% had no formal U.S. education.  Forty-three percent (43%) were first-time voters.

The majority of Asian and Arab Americans voted for Democratic candidate Barack Obama for President. Nearly nine out of ten (88%) Asian and Arab Americans supported Democratic candidate Barack Obama for President.  Ten percent (10%) voted for Republican candidate John McCain, and 2% voted for other candidates.  Arab and South Asian American voters gave Obama the most support, with 97% and 94% of those polled, respectively, voting for the Democratic candidate.  Chinese American voters also supported Obama, but at lower rates, with 76% of those polled voting for the Democratic candidate, and 22% for McCain.

And here's the AALDEF exit poll info for Pennsylvania:

AALDEF surveyed a total of 518 Asian American voters in Philadelphia, Montgomery, Delaware, and Bucks Counties.  The five largest ethnic groups surveyed were Chinese (47%), Asian Indian (19%), Vietnamese (10%), Korean (8%), and Cambodian (5%).  Seventy percent (70%) of voters were foreign-born naturalized U.S. citizens, and 24% had no formal U.S. education.  Thirty-two percent (32%) were first-time voters.
 
The majority of Asian Americans voted for Democratic candidate Barack Obama for President.  Nearly four out of five (79%) Asian Americans polled in Pennsylvania supported Democratic candidate Barack Obama for President.  Twenty percent (20%) voted for Republican candidate John McCain, and 1% voted for other candidates.  Among Asian ethnic groups, South Asians gave Obama the most support, with 92% of those polled voting for the Democratic candidate.  Chinese Americans also supported the Democratic candidate, with 87% of those polled voting for Obama, and 12% for McCain.  Southeast Asians were evenly divided between the candidates, with 50% of those polled voting for Obama, and 50% for McCain.

JINDAL: "60 Minutes" profiles Bobby Jindal

[See SAJAforum's extensive collection of Bobby Jindal posts, including a special one-hour webcast ABOUT Jindal on the first anniversary of his taking office]

After Gov. Bobby Jindal's widely-panned speech after President Obama's appearance on Tuesday, the last thing I would have expected was a profile of him on the top-rated CBS newsmagazine "60 Minutes." But that's exactly what's happening tonight, 7-8 pm:

He's been called the Republican Obama and some think he may run for the presidency some day. But his opposition speech after the president's address to Congress this week caused some to say he's too young and inexperienced. Morley Safer profiles the governor of Louisiana. Deirdre Naphin and Katy Textor are the producers.

UPDATE: Here's video of the piece (transcript below):

Watch CBS Videos Online

After seeing the segment, please post your comments below.

We asked Mike Sager, writer of the most extensive magazine profile ever done on Jindal ("Bobby Jindal, All-American" - as part of Esquire picking the governor as among the six most influential people in the world) and author of "Wounded Warriors: Those for Whom the War Never Ends," to comment on this week's Jindal news. He told SAJAforum:

OBAMA INAUGURATION: Five questions for South Asians for Obama

In 1993, the last time I was in Washington to attend a presidential inauguration, Representatives Robert Matsui and Norman Mineta cohosted the first significant Asian American reception in connection with any U.S. presidential inauguration. While some attendees had mixed feelings, since by then it had become clear that President Clinton’s initial round of cabinet nominees would not include any Asian Americans, there was nevertheless a sense that the Asian American community had marked an important political milestone.

Fast forward sixteen years: The president-elect is a biracial, second generation American who grew up in Hawaii and considers himself desi. South Asians and other Asian Americans feature prominently in both the transition and the new administration’s significant appointees. And in contrast to that one Capitol Hill reception in 1993, Washington is chock full of Asian American events in connection with the inaugural celebration, including several South Asian-oriented gatherings.

South Asians for Obama got a jump on the festivities on Saturday evening, hosting an informal happy hour which drew over 300 attendees. One of the group's cofounders, Hrishi Karthikeyan, took some time out of his inaugural week schedule to answer a few questions.

OBAMA: Sonal Shah joins the White House transition team, and gets smeared

[Update: Please scroll down to the comments section to see Vijay Prashad's responses, as well as those of both supporters and critics of his piece. You can also read a letter in defense of Sonal Shah, by some prominent academics and others]

The history of the Indian-American community is so brief - roughly the four decades since doctors, engineers and others started arriving in this country in large numbers - that the passage of even a few years seems like a long time. The community grows that much larger (and wealthier), its youth climb to higher posts in a greater variety of fields, and the barometers by which we measure our collective success are re-calibrated: what we thought of as a big deal, not too long ago, now seems just normal.

And so, when I read Vijay Prashad's recent attack piece, "The Many Faces of Sonal Shah," I had something of a flashback. Prashad's column, in Counterpunch (along with numerous other pieces in the South Asian press), raises questions as to whether Sonal--one of 15 members of the Obama-Biden transition team--is in fact a closet Hindu fascist. And suggests that her silence on anti-Muslim violence in India is consistent with others on the Obama transition team: "many of them have similar commitments to the far Right in Israel or in other parts of the world."

Vijay raised the exact same issues about Sonal in 2005. At the time, I was with India Abroad, and writing a longish piece on desi summer camps like Youth Solidarity Summer, where activists can learn about social justice issues. I noticed that desis on the political left were having heavy online discussions about Indicorps, the group Sonal started with her brother Anand in 2002. Indicorps is a little like Peace Corps, in that it arranges for young Indian-Americans to work with development projects on the ground in India. Sonal had also worked at the Treasury department, which sent her to Bosnia, Kosovo and Southeast Asia, but it was her creation of Indicorps that earned her India Abroad's Person of the Year Award in 2003 (which I also covered).

On one hand, the prize sort of canonized her--here was a new kind of Indian-American youth, who combined Beltway success with entrepreneurial, homeland activism--but on the left, some people were unhappy with her and Indicorps, and the accolades they received. They felt she and the group were secretly aligned with the Hindu right. For those on the left, operating in a post-Godhra environment, this was an Indian-American culture war, in which one could not be involved in any way with a Hindu group without being fully implicated in its worst acts.

In his Counterpunch piece Vijay writes about Sonal's family:

The Shahs remain active in Houston’s Indian community, not only in the ecumenical Gujarati Samaj (a society for people from Gujarat), but also in the far more cruel organizations of the Hindu Right, such as the Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP), the Overseas Friends of the BJP (the main political party of the Hindu Right) and the Ekal Vidyalaya. Shah’s parents, Ramesh and Kokila, not only work as volunteers for these outfits, but they also held positions of authority in them. Their daughter was not far behind. She was an active member of the VHPA, the U. S. branch of the most virulently fascistic outfit within India. The VHP’s head, Ashok Singhal, believes that his organization should “inculcate a fear psychosis among [India’s] Muslim community.” This was Shah’s boss. Till 2001, Shah was the National Coordinator of the VHPA.

Vijay aims for guilt by association until that last part, when he names Sonal the VHPA's National Coordinator. However, that title appears to be incorrect: Sonal headed U.S. relief efforts for the VHP in 2001, when the Gujarat earthquake struck (see her statement below). So what exactly is the issue? Here I quote from the article I wrote for India Abroad, more than 3 years ago:

OBAMA ADMIN: Getting tix/press passes to the inauguration

[NEW CATEGORY ALERT: "Obama Admin" - items dealing with the Obama-Biden administration]

Here's a request we got late last night:

I am hoping that u can tell me how to get press creds. I am being invited to the Inauguration, but need to get this. Please help!!

Sudeep Reddy of WSJ's DC bureau took a moment out of his busy schedule to respond:

You need to have Washington press credentials through the Senate press galleries.  General public can get tickets through their lawmakers.  Check out the Joint Inaugural Committee for more: http://inaugural.senate.gov/media/

If you have anything to add or update, please post below.

PREZ RACE: A desi doc sings for a President Obama - in 2005

Dr. Krupali K. Tejura (read about her from a 2007 story in the Corona, California, Press-Enterprise) is passionate - and prescient. See this appearance on the "Oprah Winfrey Show" on Feb. 22, 2005:

Photo Sharing - Video Sharing - Photo Printing - Photo Books
From a note she sent us today:

so thrilled, i'm still smiling with a dopey grin on my face....(he probably won because i wasn't the official jingle writer ;))

This has got to be the earliest widely-public endorsement of Obama by a South Asian (saying to yourself, "gee, he could be president" after his 2004 DNC speech doesn't count).

Krupali's e-mail: krupali[at]krupali.com

Post your comments below.

PREZ RACE: Kal Penn sightings

On Wednesday night, actor Kal Penn could be seen in his weekly portrayal of a young doctor on the hit Fox show "House." But the day before, on Election Day, he was playing a very different role.

Without pomp and presentation, the "Harold and Kumar" and "The Namesake" star was handing out precinct fliers at our University of Florida campus all day Tuesday and urging students to vote for Barack Obama. People walked by him thinking he was just another student unless they looked closer.

Why did he spend the big day at UF? Maybe because we were a vital swing state, or maybe because Florida sports tolerable November weather. 

Penn was was making his second visit in the past few months after speaking for the Obama campaign this summer. He was followed this year by Michelle Obama and Joe Biden, both of whom made visits to Gainesville in the last month. The Alachua county voting polls had recording breaking numbers of students this election. 

From the UF newspaper The Independent Florida Alligator:

Penn, an Independent, said he met a student–volunteer in Minnesota who returned from Iraq after being hit by an explosive, leaving him in a wheelchair.

“He said he’s volunteering every day for the Obama campaign because, as he put it, ‘I don’t want anyone else to go through what I went through,’” Penn said. “They want a better solution for the direction of our country. It’s the most moving thing I’ve ever seen in my life.”

Although an Obama–Biden victory would be nice, he said, students should keep the same attitude after the elections.

“So many college students have gotten involved in a campaign of their choice,” he said. “It would be a shame after today, no matter who wins, if we didn’t continue to participate in the political process.”

Earlier Kal Penn appearances on SAJAforum:

• Kal Penn & Barack Obama
• Spotting Kal Penn at the DNC

Post your comments below.

OBAMA: Congratulations, in sand

Sand sculptor Sudarshan Patnaik's latest work, on the shores of Puri, Orissa in India. More here. And...

PREZ RACE: Obama wins, SAFO responds

[ Reminder: SAJA is hosting an all-star panel webcast on Wednesday night, 10 pm-midnight; Thursday morning in Asia: http://www.sajaforum.org/2008/11/webcast-saja-briefing-politics.html ]

Within 40 minutes of Obama's victory, SAFO - South Asians for Obama - had already sent out a press release. It began:

For the past 21 months, South Asians for Obama (SAFO) has spearheaded a movement to rally the South Asian American community behind Senator Obama.  SAFO's efforts to organize this increasingly politically active constituency not only helped secure Obama's groundbreaking victory, but also engaged a new generation of South Asians in the political process.  SAFO's organization, which consisted of thousands of activated volunteers located in chapters across the country, worked to educate and register voters, raise contributions and engage in get-out-the vote efforts that contributed to unprecedented voter turnout, particularly in the key battleground states of Virginia, Pennsylvania, Ohio, and Florida, which were critical to Obama's victory.

Read the rest below. Post your comments below.

WEBCAST: Looking Ahead - What the US Election Results Mean

>>> PLEASE SUPPORT SAJA: Help us meet our new $15,000 challenge
grant: http://saja.org/articles/saja-group-receives-prestigious-challenge-grant <<<

[See SAJAforum's extensive coverage, sources and resources about the 2008 presidential race]

Looking Ahead: What the US Election Results Mean for South Asia and South Asians in America
Wednesday, Nov. 5, 2008 (Thursday in Asia and Europe)
SAJA BRIEFING: A distinguished panel of experts and journalists react to the results the day after the elections. What's the future of South Asia-US relations? How will South Asians in America be affected? Which South Asians might get appointed to senior positions in the government? We will also be briefed on how the various South Asian American candidates did at the state and local levels. 

Listen live or to a recording: 

Here was the timeline of who and what you can hear during the 2.5-hour webcast. You can forward to the parts you want.

00-33: Introductions + The Day After + The Big Picture of US-South Asia relations
in order of appearance

• Toby Chaudhuri, Democratic strategist and deputy press secretary, 2000 Gore campaign
  
• Kishan Putta, founder, Indians for McCain (has worked with the Senator since 1999)
• Stephen Cohen, one of the first Americans to study Indian and Pakistani security policy, is a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution
• Prof. Phil Oldenburg, research scholar, Columbia's Southern Asian Institute and co-editor, "India Briefing" series

33-71: How the Various South Asian Candidates Did + What the Elections Mean for South Asian Americans

• Kathy Kulkarni, president, IALI, Indian-American Leadership Initiative, a network of progressives and Democrats
• Deepa Iyer, executive director, South Asian American Leading Together (SAALT) and representing the National Coalition of South Asian Organizations
• Asif Alam, president, Association of Pakistani Professionals
• Sanjay Puri, executive director, USINPAC, a bipartisan political action committee representing the Indian American community on Capitol Hill and the White House

71-158: The View from the Subcontinent and Europe + Which South Asians Might Get Appointments + A Melange of Topics

• S. Mitra Kalita, national editor and columnist at Mint, a New Delhi-based business daily and is author of "Suburban Sahibs: Three immigrant families and their passage from India to America." In January, she will be moving back to NYC to become deputy global economics editor of The Wall Street Journal and former SAJA president (calling from Delhi)
• Aparisim "Bobby" Ghosh, world editor and former Baghdad bureau chief, Time
• Aziz Haniffa, Washington correspondent and editor, India Abroad/Rediff
• Mira Kamdar, a senior fellow at the World Policy Institute and the author of "Planet India: The Turbulent Rise of the Largest Democracy and the Future of Our World" - calling from Paris
• Aneesh Chopra, secretary of technology for the state of Virginia and a cabinet member for Virginia governor Tim Kaine

MODERATORS: Arun Venugopal, SAJAforum editor and WNYC Radio and Sree Sreenivasan, SAJA co-founder and professor, Columbia Journalism School

As always, you are welcome to quote from anything said during the FREE, WORLDWIDE webcasts (30+) at http://www.blogtalkradio.com/saja

See SAJAforum's extensive collection of posts, sources and resources for the 2008 elections at http://www.sajaforum.org/2008race.html