Indian Americans Continue to Support Kamala Harris, Democrats in US Presidential Elections: Report

Indian Americans continue to support The Democratic Party before the presidential elections in the United States, where 61% of voters in this community say they plan to vote for Kamala Harris, a report by the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace showed on Monday.

Harris, Vice President of the United States, became a member of the Democratic Party presidential candidate in July, after President Joe Biden ended his campaign.

The presidential election poll will be held on November 5. Vote counting is scheduled to begin shortly after voting ends.

Report entitled Native Americans at the ballot boxis based on the 2024 Indian and American Attitudes Survey conducted by a Washington-based team of advisors together with the research and analytical company YouGov.

The survey found that while support for the Democratic Party among Indian-Americans has declined slightly – from 56% in 2020 to 47% today – the share of people identifying as Republicans has not increased.

A total of 32% of respondents said they intended to vote for Republican Party candidate Donald Trump. “There has been a slight change in community preferences – the percentage of respondents willing to vote for Trump has increased since the last election,” the report says.

Trump was president of the United States from 2017 to 2021.

The analysis is based on an online survey of 714 Indian citizens of Indian origin conducted by Carnegie and YouGov between September 18 and October 15.

According to the report, there are over 5.2 million people of Indian origin living in the US. Indian Americans are the second largest immigrant group in the country.

Division by gender

The voting preferences of the Indian-American community are divided by gender.

The report shows that 67% of women intend to vote for Harris. Among men, this percentage drops to 53%.

On the other hand, although 22% of women intend to vote for Trump, this number increases to 39% among men.

The report found that the gap appears to be wider among younger voters.

Among people over 40, more than 70% of women and 60% of men said they planned to vote for Harris. However, in the under 40 cohort, this dropped to 60% among women.

The report added that men under the age of 40 said they would vote for Harris and Trump in roughly equal proportions.

The report found that abortion and reproductive rights have become key political issues for Indian-Americans, especially among women and Democrats. This was the second most important political concern after price increases and is linked to concerns about the economy and jobs.

Indians, Americans and Republicans

Republicans’ lower favorability among Indian Americans was rooted in the party’s policy positions. When community Democrats were asked why they did not identify as Republicans, they cited the Grand Old Party’s stance on abortion and what they see as intolerance toward minorities and ties to evangelicalism, according to the report.

The community also has a cool view of prominent Indian-American Republicans. Respondents rated Nikki Haley, Vivek Ramaswamy and Usha Vance negatively, the think tank found.

Haley, a former South Carolina governor, withdrew from the GOP presidential race in March. RamaswamyThe millionaire former biotech executive also suspended his presidential campaign in January and has supported Trump since then. Usha Chilukuri Vance, a lawyer and daughter of Indian immigrants, is the wife of the Republican vice presidential candidate JD Vance.

The report also indicated that Indian-American voters who identified as Democrats rated prominent Republicans lower than Republicans rated prominent Democrats.

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