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Texas has the U.S.'s second-largest Indian American community. Politicians are starting to take notice

Politicians and political groups in Texas are reaching out to the fast-growing demographic for really the first time.

WASHINGTON — Texas' fast-growing Indian American community is poised to play a decisive role in the 2020 election, reflecting a profound demographic shift that’s playing out in the emerging political battlegrounds of suburban Dallas and Houston.

The state is now home to the second-largest Indian American population in the U.S. — a development, to be clear, that didn’t happen overnight.

But politicians and political groups are engaging South Asian American voters in Texas in a deliberate and sustained way for the first time, as both Democrats and Republicans recognize the importance of connecting with a community that numbers there in the hundreds of thousands.

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Some candidates are contacting voters in Hindi and other languages native to the subcontinent. Events like iftars — the breaking of the fast during Ramadan — have become part of the political calendar. Voter registration drives are being conducted at Hindu temples and Muslim mosques.

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“Texas is the big dosa,” said Varun Nikore, president of the AAPI Victory Fund, making reference to an Indian delicacy that he likened to an enchilada. AAPI is a progressive super PAC devoting $1 million toward mobilizing Asian American and Pacific Islander voters in Texas.

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The implications could reverberate through the White House race between President Donald Trump and former Vice President Joe Biden — and beyond.

Indian Americans, even more than other Asian American groups, tend to support Democratic causes and candidates, per polling by California-based AAPI Data, making it even more notable that Biden selected Sen. Kamala Harris, whose mother was born in India, as his running mate.

Republicans, though, have made some headway over the past four years, AAPI Data found. Some of that shift almost certainly reflects Trump’s embrace of Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, with whom he appeared last year at a blockbuster event in Houston.

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The dynamics underscore the reality that South Asian Americans, like any other demographic group, aren’t some monolithic bloc — with factors like age, religion and, significantly, a voter’s proximity to them or their family immigrating to the U.S. playing a big role.

What’s clear across partisan lines is that not only are Indian Americans in Texas receiving unprecedented political attention this cycle, they are responding in kind. That could make a real difference on the margins during an election year in which every vote really could matter.

“Indian Americans are on the phones calling everybody they can think of and saying, ‘Vote,’” said Jayant Sheth, president of the Indian American Coalition of Texas, a nonpartisan civic engagement group that has helped organize voter registration efforts.

Texas' South Asian American community, in many ways, represents a suburban story. (While South Asian American and Indian American are sometimes used interchangeably, the broader denomination also includes those with ties to countries such as Bangladesh and Pakistan.)

Consider that of the 10 congressional districts in the U.S. with the largest Indian American populations, three are in Texas — all on the outskirts of Dallas and Houston.

One is the Collin County district represented by Rep. Van Taylor, R-Plano. One is the North Texas district being vacated by Rep. Kenny Marchant, R-Coppell. The other is the Houston-area district that’s been left open by retiring Rep. Pete Olson, R-Sugar Land.

How exactly did these communities take root, deep in America’s heartland?

“The weather,” Sanjay Ramabhadran, a Houston-based engineer who served as past president of the Texas Lyceum, said with a laugh.

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Texas' scorching-hot summers are reminiscent of India’s tropical climate, he and several others explained. But perhaps even more important are Texas' business-friendly environs, affordable neighborhoods and, especially in places like Collin County, a stellar education system, they said.

Settling in still took time.

Chanda Parbhoo runs a progressive group called SAAVETX, or South Asian Americans for Voter Education + Engagement + Empowerment. She moved to North Texas as a youngster with her family in the 1970s, after being born in South Africa during apartheid and living for a time in Canada.

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In that era, the Dallas area could be a lonely place for a family like hers.

The school district she attended had only one other Indian American family. She recalls having things thrown at her while she shopped at NorthPark Center. The only place to buy specialty foods to cook at home was an “itty-bitty” grocery attached to one of the region’s few Indian restaurants.

“That was all there was,” Parbhoo said.

Now the school district she grew up is home to some 200 South Asian American families, she said. Entire shopping centers in Collin County are now devoted to different kinds of Indian stores. While discrimination has far from disappeared, there is now a strong support system in place.

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Such a sense of community in Texas has also grown to include political involvement, which many hail as a significant milestone.

“Any time you see both politicians engaging with communities and then those communities engaging back, it’s a reflection of the fact that that community is making America home,” said Neel Gonuguntla, director of the Texas chapter of South Asians for Biden.

The political awakening garnered perhaps its biggest spotlight last year, when Trump joined the Indian prime minister in Houston for a raucous “Howdy Modi” event at NRG Stadium.

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“That changed the equation completely,” said Amit Warkad, co-founder of US IMPACT, an Indian American group based in North Texas whose PAC supports Trump and other conservative causes. “It put the entire Indian American community on the U.S. political map.”

The joint appearance enthralled many Indian Americans, including some of those more recent immigrants who may put a greater emphasis on America’s foreign policy toward India.

Both Trump and Modi govern with a nationalist bent, and the U.S. over the past four years has stayed out of some of India’s more contentious domestic affairs. That includes Modi’s decision to remove the semi-autonomous status of Kashmir, a territory that’s the source of tension between India and Pakistan.

“President Trump has been kind enough to not interfere,” said Badri Singh, another US IMPACT co-founder, who also praised the president’s law-and-order focus in the U.S.

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Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and President Donald Trump spoke during a bilateral...
Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and President Donald Trump spoke during a bilateral meeting in Biarritz, France, at the annual G7 Summit in August 2019. Trump later joined Modi at a massive gathering of Indian Americans in Houston.(Nicholas Kamm / Agence France-Presse)

But that enthusiasm is not universal among Indian American Texans — nor does it necessarily reflect a whole-hearted embrace of Trump. Ramabhadran, echoing others, said that many of those who attended “Howdy Modi” came for the “visiting dignitary — and not the one from D.C.”

Whatever may be Trump’s diplomacy toward India, many Indian Americans are repelled by Trump’s disparaging comments toward immigrant communities and his efforts to curtail even legal immigration, such as the H-1B visa program that’s often used by Indians coming to the U.S.

“We know what that means when somebody at the top of the ticket is putting out anti-immigrant rhetoric,” Parbhoo said.

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Engagement with Texas' South Asian American community this cycle has gone far beyond any one rally, anyway, highlighting the group’s multifaceted political identity.

Indian Americans tend to be stalwart Democratic supporters. The Democratic congressional slate in Texas includes South Asian American candidates like Sri Preston Kulkarni near Houston. Biden tapped Harris, who remains in touch with her family in India, to be his running mate.

“It definitely excited second-generation Indian Americans — very significantly,” Gonuguntla, the Texas director for South Asians for Biden, said of Harris earning a spot on Biden’s ticket. “They look at Kamala Harris as someone having a story not too different from their own.”

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But Indian Americans in Texas also tend to live in suburban areas that have been traditional GOP strongholds. Some of them align with conservatives on key economic issues like tax policy. Republican lawmakers are now also making a concerted effort to reach out to those voters.

“Republicans have gotten more aware and have shown up and engaged and asked for and received support from the Indian American community,” said Texas Sen. John Cornyn, a Republican who’s visited India several times and who in 2004 co-founded a U.S.-India caucus in the Senate.

The Senate race between Cornyn and Democrat MJ Hegar is one battleground.

The incumbent has sought to expand his support among Indian Americans, saying they and the GOP have “a lot in common” in terms of culture, the economy and an entrepreneurial spirit. Hegar, an Air Force veteran, is also pushing hard to make those voters part of her coalition.

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“Texas is home to a vibrant Indian and South Asian American community, who are a part of our winning Texas-sized grassroots operation,” Hegar spokesman Jake Lewis said, citing get-out-the-vote efforts like bilingual phone banks.

The White House contest in Texas, of course, is another closely watched race among the South Asian American community.

But Indian American voters may end up having their biggest impact down the ballot. Groups like the Texas Democratic Party are investing significant time and money on outreach, while individual campaigns on both sides of the aisle are likewise putting those efforts at the forefront.

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Take the Collin County district represented by Taylor, a Republican who’s facing Democrat Lulu Seikaly. If the tens of thousands of Indian Americans there turn out in force, it could prove to be consequential.

Seikaly, whose campaign didn’t respond to a request for comment, has made outreach to that community a priority. But so, too, has Taylor — citing, among other efforts, his recent work with the Asian American Hotel Owners Association in helping craft pandemic relief legislation,

“I’m proud to call many members of the South Asian community my constituents, neighbors and friends,” Taylor said, saying the community “continues to enrich North Texas.”