What Republicans Said

Dino Teppara, Legislative Assistant, Rep. Joe Wilson (R-SC)

Dino Teppara I think it is going to be a continuation of the very positive upswing we’ve seen from his first administration. I don’t have any information on where the F-16 sale issue is, but I think you will see a continued improvement in the military relationship and we have already seen that with the successful completion of phase one of the Next Steps in the Strategic Partnership (NSSP) we entered into. The main thing many Indian Americans were concerned about was Kerry’s non-proliferation position which is a typical Democratic platform position. What it does is equate India with other irresponsible nations and what President Bush did differently is he very clearly defined the Axis of Evil and removed the sanctions on India. I think many Indian Americans saw the double standard in the Clinton administration with his policies for possession of nuclear weapons. India felt it had legitimate security needs that were essentially ignored by the previous administration. On the domestic front, there will be an increase in the number of Indian Americans serving in his administration. He has more Asian Americans and women appointees in his administration. As part of the American political landscape, Indian Americans are going to benefit from his position on tort reform, small business owners like convenience stories, restaurants, hotels and motels, from the tax cut, his general strength and leadership on the war on terrorism. I think there’s been a lot of emotional rhetoric on the Patriot Act and I think the President has done everything to ensure our civil rights are protected and to secure our country from anyone trying to come in to do us harm.

Dr. Sampat Shivangi, Vice Chair, Indian American Republican Council

Dr. Sampat Shivangi For Indian Americans, the Bush victory is a good opportunity to cash in on the hard work, time, and resources that we invested. Of course, we are looking for some high appointments in the administration. We have gone as high as undersecretary and assistant secretary, and it is a challenge to get even higher appointments in coming years. On outsourcing, as you know President is very much for outsourcing, and the stock market has gone up quite a bit. President Bush favors economic ties with India and will continue to support outsourcing. He has promised and assured all the Indians who have supported him all these four years that he will make it a priority to visit India in the first year of the second term. We need to make sure he does it. On issues of H1-B visas and IT technology, we want to see that the number of H1-B visas which were curtailed in 2004 to 65,000, now that the Congress and Senate is a comfortable Republican majority, we want to revert back to 180,000 H1-B visas, because a significant proportion of these go to Indians from India. As a physician, I am interested in putting into place tort reform. The U.S. House has already passed it. Now the Senate has to do so and since Republicans have a bigger majority there now, it will make the President’s plan more possible to pass. And he has promised to make it a priority. That’s another advantage. The Democratic Party and John Edwards would not have been expected to do this if they were elected. We Indian Americans make up 8 percent of the physicians in this country and that change would be a great help.

What Democrats Said

Kumar Barve, Majority Leader, Maryland House of Delegates

Kumar Barve What a Kerry defeat means in short is that they did a good job of getting evangelical Christians to the polls than we did. Some other things to look out for: Nothing’s going to happen on tort reform because really it is a state issue. In Maryland, I am leading the fight on tort reform. Asking the Federal government to do something on tort reform is like asking the state government to do something about Indo-Pakistani relations. The Patriot Act –– We are going to have to wait for four years for it to change. He has said he likes it the way it is and the way it is implemented. President Bush received approximately a 2 percent point popular vote victory. It’s not a significant margin. The first time I ran for office I got 53 percent. Last time Al Gore won by a millimeter and this time Bush wins by a centimeter. Indian Americans were very active in Kerry campaign and several were active in the Bush campaign. It means that those people on Kerry’s side are not going to get appointments in the executive but I hope those that supported President Bush will be rewarded. And that’s one of the things Bobby Jindal is going to be able to do and I think he will be quite effective on that. Last weekend I was campaigning in Michigan and Ohio –– I went to some Hindu temples and encourage many Indians to vote. I told them the victory would be decided in Ohio. It would be interesting to get the figures on how many Indian Americans actually voted in Ohio. Because there may be 75,000 or so but how many voted. In my district for instance here in Maryland, there are even Indian-American physicians registered who don’t come out to vote. How unfortunate is that?

Dr. Ramesh Kapur, Chairman, Indo-American Leadership Council, DNC

Dr. Ramesh Kapur The India-U.S. relationship will continue. The only difference would have been that the depth of the relationship would have become stronger with Kerry. Just the basic concept that Democrats are more a mosaic of cultures and ethnic groups which fits more with the way India is. I am sure the Bush administration will also make sure to strengthen relationship and bring it to a higher level. How Indian Americans will fare in a second Bush administration –– it depends on how hard they have worked on the Republican side and what kind of representation they will get. On the Democratic side, we have had people at the highest level. This community has a long relationship with John Kerry. It will be important for Indian Republicans to push our issues and to push for the India-U.S. relationship. Of course, I am disappointed with our candidate’s loss. I spent 80 percent of my time in the past year campaigning. We were so close and this was the first opportunity I had to make a difference for our community. We would have made a bigger difference if Kerry had won. Over the years we have always progressed but this time it would have been at the Oval Office level. I think this time the community came together, we had a lot of people participating on both sides. We raised about $4 million for the Democratic Party and for Kerry, which has not been done before. We had more Indians in the campaign, in the policymaking levels of the campaign. I think Indians gave it their all at least on the Democratic side. I don’t know about the other side.