United States 2024: Where do Indian Americans fall on the political spectrum?

Indian Americans, like Indians, are a diverse group. Their voting behaviour depends on a range of political and social realities relevant to the state they live in, their profession, when they moved to the US, and increasingly, what they think about Narendra Modi. Indian Americans are typically clubbed with Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders in the political spectrum, and there are many facets on which there are ways in which their voting patterns overlap¹. 

First, the other major or racial ethnic blocks in the elections tend to be African Americans, Hispanic Americans, and Native Americans. Unlike these three groups, which tend to be economically and socially marginalised and are consequently seen as a vote block for Democrats, Asian Americans have, especially in the last three decades, have been seen through ‘model minority’ tropes wherein they have social values better aligned with Democrats, but in many cases, economic interests which fall on the side of Republican talking points.

Within Asian Americans, Indian Americans have historically been the most Democrat leaning in the last several elections, and even now, more Indian Americans lean Democrat overall than any other Asian American group². Indian-Americans are the wealthiest community among all the Asian Americans, with a median income at almost twice, second only to Jewish Americans, and a poverty rate that is less than half the United States household average. Indian Americans also are 2.5 times more likely than the average American to have a college degree, in fact the highest proportion among any ethnic group. At the same time, Indian Americans also have the highest numbers from any single country in terms of migrants entering the US illegally. 

Less than a third of the Indian Americans in the United States are born in the US, and the total number of foreign born Indian Americans eligible to vote in this election fewer are born in the US than abroad. The Indian diaspora in the US is in some ways fairly distinct from other diaspora populations. In some regions such as Malaysia or the Caribbean, there is a history of colonial-era labour migration, whereas the same period saw trade-driven migration to East and Southern Africa. The United Kingdom saw a mix of working class and professional migration over the years. 

With the exception of a small population of largely Punjabi farm workers who had moved prior to racial exclusion laws, migration to the United States has been a comparatively recent phenomenon following the opening up of US immigration laws, which allowed for highly skilled professionals to move to the US post 1965³. 

As a result of both the post 1965 opening up, and the tech industry-related waves of migration following the late 1990s, a much higher share of the Indians in the US are descended from skilled professionals and the family members they sponsored to move, which helps explain both the educational and wealth characteristics of the community. Despite being an ethnic minority, Indian Americans are not what one would traditionally refer to as blue collar in the United States. Indian Americans have a far higher representation in the senior-most positions in the US government than their share in the population.

Consequently, Indian Americans are harder to pin down as a vote block. They share common ground with other ethnic minorities on opposing White nationalism, they share common ground with liberals broadly on social policy (except perhaps affirmative action), but also often with conservatives on economics and taxation. 

Recent research by AAPI shows that social issues, Indians generally align heavily on Democrat positions on healthcare, reproductive rights, education, gun control, the environment, and racism in society broadly⁴. But at the same time, they departed from the liberal position when caste discrimination bills were introduced. Hindus among Indian Americans are overwhelmingly drawn from upper-castes, and some studies show they are even more caste conscious than their counterparts back in India. Indian Americans are also more likely to prefer Republicans over Democrats in approaching the Israel-Palestine conflict⁵.

One of the major drivers of politicisation in Indian Americans is through local politics, particularly school boards. There is much discussion about the ways Indian Americans gravitate towards highly rated school districts (which, in turn, are more expensive homes), and the data show that as a community, they are the most likely to show up at a school board meeting⁶. In the US, school board members are elected during local elections, and wield a great deal of power over issues relating to educational policies, approving budgets, evaluating the school superintendent, and in some states, over curricular issues. School boards are also a low-level election which can serve as a stepping stone to elections into higher public office, and in recent years, Indian Americans have been successful at school board elections throughout the country.

This also means that school boards in the US are not apolitical – candidates declare parties during school board elections, but because these elections are relatively small in scale, a typical school board member will get an in-depth understanding of party politics on the ground. Given that a lot of the foreign-born Indian Americans moved to the US as young professionals and then went on to have families, this is becoming a means for immigrants to enter mainstream politics. Foreign-born Indians seem to deviate more from the traditional liberal-conservative spectrum than their US-born counterparts.  Foreign-born Indian Americans have higher rates of income and household ownership than US-born Indian Americans, and also have stronger ties to the homeland. 

A 2021 study by Badrinathan and colleagues showed ways in which homeland politics are reflected in political positions in the US as well. For instance, affiliating as a ‘liberal’ in the US does not align with espousing liberal values in the motherland. Indian-Americans approved of Narendra Modi at a rate of over 63 percent more than those that disapproved, and they were almost three times more likely to prefer the BJP over other parties. 

As mentioned before, the caste community in the US is overwhelmingly drawn from upper castes, estimated at about 90 percent of all Indian Americans identifying as Hindu⁷. This is also a population that saw its most significant growth in the United States in the post-Mandal era, often seeing itself as recipients of the free market opportunities in their adopted nation that they were undermined from seeking by reservations in India.

The discourse of meritocracy is deeply interwoven into the Indian American ethos, and with it comes a certain disdain for welfarism. Indian Americans have a complicated relationship with ethnic minorities. While they have been at the receiving end of White racism, they have not necessarily aligned with excluded minorities in the US. Studies show that Indians who have migrated have more negative attitudes towards Black Americans than second-generation Indian Americans. 

While this may explain some of the more Republican-leaning attitudes of Indian Americans, the relationship of first generation migrants with the homeland is equally important in the rightward move towards Trump. Research has shown a high intersection between approval of Trump and approval of Modi among Indian Americans, and even though Indians are much more likely to be registered Democrats than Republicans that number has fallen in the Modi years, with Indians registering as Republican growing by over 23 percent.

All said and done, it is likely Indian Americans will overwhelmingly vote for Kamala Harris in the 2024 elections. But the longer-term future of voting behaviour has many unresolved issues. Harris significantly outperforms Trump among the college-educated and among non-rural voters – Indian Americans are overwhelmingly part of both these identities. It is also hard to say how much of Trump’s divisiveness as a figure will undermine issue-based voting and push voters to Harris, irrespective of how they land on the self-interest. 

One thing is clear, had the battle been between Nikki Haley, the ethnic Indian who converted to Christianity, and Kamala Harris, the biracial Indian, it would offer a far more interesting set of moral quandaries for the Indian American voter. Because irrespective of where they land on the political spectrum, the faultlines of authenticity and legitimacy are an unerring constant for anyone negotiating what it means to be Indian in America. 

Citations

1. The typical understanding of “Asian” in the United States is “East Asian” as opposed to the United Kingdom, where “Asian” refers to people of South Asian descent.

2. In general, White Americans are the only racial group among these that leans Republican. African Americans are most solidly Democrat leaning, followed by Hispanic Americans and Asian Americans.

3. So while the timeline of Indian diaspora growth in the US has been similar to that in the Persian Gulf region following the oil boom, the latter has largely been a working class population, while the US-based Indians are a largely wealthy and white-collar.

4. On the intersection of race and education, Indian Americans are slightly more socially conservative than other Asian Americans, with 38% agreeing that school boards should ban books on racism in American history -- from q13q13b on the AAPI survey.

5. q12lb in the AAPI survey

6. q12lb in the AAPI survey

7. Sanjoy Chakravorty, Devesh Kapur, Nirvikar Singh (2016) The Other One Percent: Indians in America. Oxford University Press. p 68