The victory of Trump over trust deficient rival like Hillary creating doubts in many minds in the US over his future policies. Once Abraham Lincoln fought the racial issue tooth and nail to unite the US. When Trump gave slogan ‘To Make Great America Again’, the real question is, ‘will he continue the policies of Land of Opportunities or create new divisions’
Dilip Chaware from US
Donald J Trump has fought and won, proving everyone wrong. He disregarded all the self- proclaimed party bosses, political analysts, un-invited consultants as well as business, industry and corporate
honchos. He went all alone. This is his single-handed victory. Nobody can claim to have helped him, but for his loyal band of back-office staff. Trump
is the only candidate who faced Opposition from the Democrats and the Republicans alike. The most unnerving aspect of this election is that almost the entire media was pitted against him.
Trump’s victory appeared imminent when critical battleground states started supporting him: first Ohio, then North Carolina, Florida, Georgia, and Pennsylvania. Accordingly, the electoral votes started to add up. The confirmation came in the early hours of November 9, 2016 when Hillary Clinton congratulated Trump to concede the defeat.
| US Presidential Election: All you need to know Election for President of the US occurs every four years on Election Day, held the first Tuesday after the first Monday in November. The 2016 Presidential election was held on November 8, 2016.
|
For Bharat, a novel development was that many Bharatiyas now settled in the US stood openly for Trump. This electoral shift, from Democrats to Republicans, has taken place for the first time. In all previous elections, Bharatiyas overwhelmingly voted for Democratic candidates. Outgoing President Barack Obama had captured almost 90 per cent of the votes of Bharatiyas.
| Indian-Americans set to be elected to Senate Kamala Harris, 51 Pramila Jayapal, 51 Raja Krishnamoorthi, 51 Rohit “Ro” Khanna, 39 Ami Bera, 51 |
I reached the US on May 20, 2016. The election scene was just hotting up at that time. Both, Trump and Hillary Clinton, were declared to be their respective party candidates though their National Conventions were a couple of months away. I started liaising with
voters, especially Bharatiyas. They almost unanimously declared their support for Trump. When I sent a couple of pieces for the Organiser, based on these conversations, an impression was created that it was supporting Trump. I tried to balance my coverage but the sentiment persisted that Trump was going to make history.
What World Leaders said on Trump WinWe look forward to working with you closely to take India-US bilateral ties to a new height. Many Congratulations to him. Russia is ready to restore fully fledged Britain and the US have enduring and special relationship. We are, and will reamin, strong and close partners on trade, security and defence. Trump is a true friend of the state of Israel, and I look forward to working with him to advance security, stability and peace in our region. |
I interviewed Prof Amar Dev Amar, a Chandigarh-based academic who migrated to the US over 40 years ago at the beginning of the campaigning. He is a US citizen and an active Republican. He led a group of Bharatiyas who set up the ‘Indian-Americans for Trump 2016,’ a Political Action Committee (PAC) in January 2016. It is registered with the Federal Election Commission (FEC).
The PAC comprises prominent
Bharatiya-American professionals and community activists and its sole objective was to help the election of Donald J Trump. The PAC members were
somewhat uneasy in June-July when Trump began making his outrageous statements and his questionable deals started tumbling out of the closet one after the other. The media had a field day in denouncing him and it painted a
ghastly scenario in case of his election. But Trump decided to ignore everybody except his inner voice. His close circle finally decided “Let Trump be Trump” since he did not relent on anything he did or said. Trump appealed directly to the voters and went straight to them. He has now proved to be a political superman since all – President Obama, the Democrats, the Republicans, the media, the big money and the establishment — were against him.
Factors that have resulted in Trump’s victory
Islamic Terrorism: The most
prominent factor is his ardent
opposition of Islamic Terrorism. The mainstream media condemned Trump time and again, day in and day out, for speaking against terrorists. Barack Obama mentioned this terrorism only after Trump pointed out that the President had not said a word against the heinous massacre of innocents in Orlando and elsewhere. Not just the Democrats but even many Republicans shied away from openly using the term Islamic Terrorism. This sent a wave of resentment among the voters. Maybe or maybe not, Trump caught this tacit
feeling and went all out against it. The media missed this facet completely, as is established now.
The exposure of so-called financial shenanigans of Trump did not make any impact on the voters since Hillary Clinton was no saint, either. The Clinton Foundation was allegedly involved in largescale financial deals which needed a lot of explaining. Moreover, the
handling of emails on the official server was another setback for her. Trump’s repeated assertions that ‘crooked’ Hillary could not be trusted created a cloud of suspicion around her. The Democrats were unable to dispel this.
The slogan ‘Make America Great Again’: ‘Make America Great Again’ was the slogan popularised by Trump. He hardly ever explained how he would achieve this but went on
blustering that he would be able to do so. This slogan is a smart emulation of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s
electoral promise ‘Achche Din Ayenge’ or ‘Make in India.’ In addition, Trump’s candid admiration for Modi went a long way in winning over a voter segment which was never behind the Republicans.
Anti-incumbency Feeling: Another major factor in Trump’s win was the anti-incumbency feeling. The eight years of Barack Obama have not shown any remarkable employment achievements although official statistics has been saying that
the rate and incidence of
unemployment in the US is going down. But the voters did not gulp this claim. Trump’s charge that
at least 60,000 factories in the US have closed down, its exports have been dwindling and imports
rising could not be effectively rebutted by the Democrats. The working White American
population stood behind Trump, as primary analysis indicated.
Soft Corner for Bharat: Trump has a soft corner for Bharat and Hindus. He has not made a secret of this fact. He is a fan of Narendra Modi. It now remains to be seen how his Presidency changes global calculations. Bharat will be a major
beneficiary of Trump’s election since both the countries are the prime targets of Islamic
terrorism and will have to go hand in hand to annihilate this danger.
Given Trump’s open endorsement of Russian leader Vladimir Putin and the recent positive developments in Bharat-Russia relations, it will not be out of place to anticipate a future Bharat-US-Russia
partnership to defeat Islamic
terrorism and to contain Chinese domination of the world
economy. Of course, this
prediction is quite premature and may seem preposterous to many at this point of time. However, given the world trend, these two imperatives will be difficult to overlook for any self-respecting nation. Trump’s election is thus a welcome development for Bharat.
Leave a Comment