What do Indian Americans think about Kamala Harris’s historic candidacy?

In the space of two weeks, Kamala Harris’s historic presidential candidacy has galvanized Lexington’s Indian-American community – some 3,350 people, or about ten percent of the town’s population.

Nationally, Indians have displaced Chinese as the largest Asian immigrant group. They include truckers, taxi drivers, restaurant and motel workers, but also some of the wealthiest and most highly educated professionals in the US. In recent years, they have also become a growing force in American politics.

Politically, Indian Americans lean heavily Democratic. Though past presidential candidates Bobby Jindal, Nikki Haley and Vivek Ramaswamy are all Republicans, the five Indian Americans in Congress (Pramila Jayapal of Washington, Ami Bera and Ro Khanna of California, Shri Thanedar of Michigan and Raja Krishnamoorthi of Illinois — nicknamed the “Samosa Caucus”) are all Democrats, as are almost all of the nearly 50 state legislators. 

Like the majority of Lexingtonians, Indian residents tend to have advanced academic degrees, high incomes and progressive politics. But those politics are not uniform. LexObserver spoke to a wide range of Indian American residents about the prospect of the daughter of Indian and Jamaican immigrants becoming president of the United States, and while most were excited, some also expressed reservations. (We plan to talk to Black residents about Harris’s historic candidacy in an upcoming article).

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Long-time Lexingtonians and Town Meeting members Dinesh Patel, MD and Ravi Sakhuja, PhD are two of Lexington’s first wave of Indian immigrants who came to the US after American laws restricting immigration from Asia and Africa were changed in 1965. (Local residents Anjan Mukherjee and Narain Bhatia were also part of that first wave, Patel points out).

Though serving in town government was part of his commitment to being an American citizen, Dr. Patel, 88, MGH Emeritus Chief of Arthroscopic Surgery, says he didn’t expect to see an Indian-American candidate for president of the United States in his lifetime.

He and his wife Kokila have lived in Lexington for 50 years and yet, he writes, “I still follow the basics of my ancient scriptures, so my reflections on your questions may be different to those who just came.” Watching Kamala Harris run for president “makes me feel very proud,” he says. “The question in my mind would be: Who will bring infinite bliss? Who will search and act for equanimity and oneness?”

“Kamala Harris’s standing will bring more knowledge about women of color and Indian-American women especially,” he says. “She will inspire many more women across spectrums of color, race, religion, and heritage to come forward to serve. That is the greatest gift of her running for president of this great nation.” 

Ravi Sakhuja, 79, a retired mechanical engineer whose wife, Rohini, is a physician, points out that Indira Gandhi was Prime Minister of India long before other countries produced female leaders. 

“It makes about 15% difference to me that Kamala is Indian,” he says. “I’m interested in how she thinks. I want someone who puts America first in a real way.”

“Being of partial Indian descent, she can help India-US relations by increasing trade between India and the US,” he suggests. “India is almost the world’s 4th largest economic power and has the largest young, under-employed, but educated population, which could be a great help in considerable economic growth for both US and India. This could help the US by replacing China’s manufacturing role with manufacturing from a Democratic country and without the Chinese military threat to US.”

Sakhuja notes that he has previously voted for both Democratic and Republican candidates and that he’s speaking as the conservative in the family. “My wife is much more liberal than I am,” he says.

The Indian-American women I spoke with are young enough to be Patel or Sakhuja children or even grandchildren. While they describe themselves as “joyful” and “stoked” about Harris, their politics are more nuanced, and all had questions about Harris’s views on issues like immigration policy, taxes, public education and the war in Gaza.

Natasha Emmanuel, 39, was born in India, but spent most of her school years in Dubai. “My mom is from Chennai, and my goal in life is to be half as bad-assed as she is,” she says. “She was an accountant by training who, after my parents divorced, went to work in the UAE, and took my brother and me with her,” she explains.

“My mom gave me every opportunity my brother had — I ran track, hung out with friends, dated, traveled alone,” she recalls. But, she says her mom often reminded her that in the UAE, “Being gay is illegal. Doing drugs is illegal. Extramarital sex is illegal. If you get in trouble we could be deported.”

“I saw a lot of oppression of women in Dubai, many restrictions on what they could do. I also saw classism and racism. They needed construction workers so they brought in men from India, Pakistan and Afghanistan who were paid, housed and treated poorly. The Filipinos, also brown, were paid less than the Emiratis and Europeans. But the biggest difference I saw between Dubai and the US is having the right to speak your mind and to vote.”

Emmanuel arrived in the US as an 18-year-old undergrad at San Francisco State. She worked toward her PhD at Albert Einstein College of Medicine in New York while her then-fiancé Greg Emmanuel got his MD. His radiology residency brought them to Boston, where she found a job in biotech. They deliberately chose to live in Lexington so their two sons would have classmates who looked like them. Resemblance is one of the attractions of Harris’s presidential candidacy.

“I am super-stoked about Kamala — I just got wind of a Women of Southeast Asian origin zoom call and I’m going to try to get on it,” she says. “Kamala normalizes a person of color. We did it with Obama. We can do it again.”

American-born Saru Wade, 46, is vice president of marketing at a mid-size biotech company and has lived in Lexington for 13 years. She describes her reaction to Harris’s candidacy as “a bit of a rollercoaster:”

“I really like Kamala, but can she actually win? Maybe this is a bad idea, this country isn’t ready for a woman of color. Look at the way people are coming together to support her, maybe she CAN win! This is exciting!! Could you actually imagine a woman of color, a woman who looks like me, as President of the United States? That would be incredible.”

She described see-sawing from despondency to engagement and setting up a weekly donation to Harris’s campaign.

“For me gender is more important than color,” she says. “I have experienced more sexism than I have racism. In our presidential elections, being a male person of color seemed more acceptable to a vast swath of the country than being a woman,” Wade says.

“Seeing a female leader as accomplished, strong, and smart as Kamala be recognized and rewarded for those traits and becoming POTUS — I can’t put the feeling into words but it would make a significant group of people in this country feel SEEN.”

Mona Roy, 53, attorney, activist, and mother of two, was born in Michigan and has lived in Lexington since 1999. Reflecting on her childhood, she recalls, “When I was a little girl, my Indian immigrant dad would always say that my sister and I were very lucky to be born on American soil because we could someday run for president. As a kid, I thought that was hilarious because the only people that ever ran for president were old white men. I regret that my dad is not alive today to see Kamala as the Democratic nominee.”

Yet, Roy says the gender of the candidate is not a major factor for her. “What matters more are their positions on gender and other significant equity issues,” she says. “For instance, I wouldn’t support Nikki Haley, despite her being a woman and Indian American, because she opposes a woman’s right to make decisions about her own body. It’s shocking to me that any woman would think the government should interfere in such personal choices. Joe Biden, despite being a practicing Catholic man, understands this.”

“Kamala’s unique heritage and journey makes her a strong Democratic nominee, and her candidacy signals progress for this country,” she says. “For me, she is the embodiment of the American dream, in that no matter where you come from or what your lineage, you can still credibly run for the highest office in the land. I’m grateful for the opportunity to support her.”

A 37-year old wife and mother I’ll call Lina,* voting for the first time after becoming an American citizen, says she’s pleased with Harris’s candidacy but less with what she sees as her progressive agenda.

“I was very happy when she became VP. It was truly a proud moment for me. But I’m not looking at her solely through that lens at all,” she says.

Lina thinks that the progressive wing of the party has pushed their “diversity agenda” too far. “In my workplace, people see me as a woman of color, but I never felt that way growing up in India or as a student at grad school. Today, in the office, I’m supposed to feel like a person of color but, for me nothing has changed: I believe in merit.”

Harris’s candidacy brings up a host of issues that Lina is reluctant to discuss with other moms or teachers in Lexington. “Democrats sometimes seem more concerned with not hurting someone’s feelings than the truth,” she says. “For example, I am closer to the Republican view that parents should know what’s being taught in school. Before we had a child, I didn’t think about it. But now that we do, things hit home. I’m fine with his learning about families that have two daddies or two mommies or one parent. But when my son was four, I picked up a book called ABC Pride at his daycare and saw ‘T is for Trans.’ Not T is for tree or train. What is the need to introduce these concepts at this young age? Why not wait until he asks? When we asked the pre-school if we could screen the books, it was not taken well. I don’t know where Kamala is on this but it seems to me that the progressive Democrats support it.”

She also wonders about Harris’s position on Gaza and the fate of the hostages held there. “What is her position on Palestine and Israel? In my view, not enough Democrats stand up to pro-Hamas demonstrators. When pro-Palestinian protests closed down the universities, the only ones who stood up to them were the Republicans.” 

Lina also says she could never vote for Trump because he lies. At the moment, she is not sure whether she will utilize her first opportunity to vote for president of the United States in November. 

For Jaya Subramaniam, a health care investor with over 25 years of experience in the biotech/pharmaceuticals industry, gender trumps everything else in this election. She grew up near Delhi, one of two daughters of Ram, a senior civil servant, and Kamala Subramaniam, a lawyer and a President of the National Council of Women in India. (Kamala — the name shared by her mother and the presidential candidate — means literally  “blooming in muddy waters” in Sanskrit as well as “lotus,” the national flower, Subramaniam explains. Subramaniam’s mother and Harris’s mother, Shyamala Gopalan, were close friends).

“Our parents brought us girls up in the 70s and 80s to be independent, with views and opinions drawn from our own experience and perspective — with no gender-based restrictions whatsoever,” she says.

Subramaniam recalls that growing up, Indira Gandhi was a huge influence. “Boy was she strong! I think America needs a woman like her,” she says. “There have been women leaders all over Europe. Why not a female American President?” 

Subramaniam left India for the Wharton School at age 25 to escape pressure to marry. “I did not feel any kind of bias there. But once I was in the corporate world, I was often the only woman in the room,” she says. “Big pharma and biotech is run by white men, and while I’ve rarely felt the race thing at all, I was often aware that as a woman, I was not supposed to be forthright, I was expected to counsel — not decide.”

Subramaniam says that she has some reservations about Democratic policies but would never vote for Trump. “I am extremely Republican when it comes to money. I come from a society that adopted the Nehruvian socialist way of development and it’s only in the last decades that India has adopted a free market economy. I’m also more of a Republican on some immigration issues,” she says. “And I am more of a Republican on taxes, too. Obviously my husband and I are philanthropic – we have a foundation! But I should have the choice of what to do with my money. Why should I give it to the government? I think government is too big.”

“But I will vote for any reasonable smart woman. Seeing a woman president is essential in America. It’s high time.”

*Lina did not want to use her real name due to the sensitivity of some of the issues she raises, which caused some tension in the community during the Serious Talks debate. While LexObserver prefers not to quote anonymous sources, we decided to include this because it was a perspective we heard several times that wasn’t otherwise represented.