By Bishal Rai,
October 21, 2020- The presidential election of the United States is slated to be held on Tuesday, November 3, 2020. Every four years, the Americans decide whether a Democrat or a Republican gets the lead in the White House, which is the most powerful political office on the planet. With just two weeks to go before the election day , more than 41 million Americans already have voted due to early voting system ; people are rushing to cast their ballots at an unprecedented pace which may result in a record turnout of about 150 million ,65% of eligible voters, the highest rate since 1908.
If you want to know the procedure of presidential election, you have to take a closer look at the entire election year. It starts with the primary in which Democrats and Republicans, each choose the one who is going to be the presidential nominee. The primary election commences in February which leads to a selection of delegates who will represent the people at the upcoming conventions in July/August. The main focus will be on the results from Super Tuesday which can usually determine the final presidential nominee for respective party.
In 2020 election president Trump apparently secured the republican nomination without any serious opposition alongside incumbent VP Mike Pence. On the other hand, former VP Joe Biden surpassed the democratic nomination over his closest rival, self proclaimed socialist senator Bernie Sanders. Biden chose senator Kamala Devi Harris as a running mate who made history as the first African-American and Asian-American woman for the post.
Besides two major parties , there are some other fringe parties and independent candidates too but chances of winning the presidency is just close to zero. However Libertarian Party has announced Jo Jorgensen as president along with her running mate Spike Cohen, Green Party’s ticket has gotten by Howie Hawkins and Angela Walker. Socialism and liberation, Alliance and American Solidarity party are also on the ballot but there presences make no significant different for election outcome .
As the matter of fact, the major issues in questions for this election are the COVID19, China, economy, healthcare, voting fraud ,racial justice,supreme court vacancy, foreign interferences,etc.So far we have first debate between Donald Trump and Joe Biden and vice presidential debate between Mike Pence and kamala Harris. According to the poll, Joe Biden and Kamala Harris emerged victorious in the first debate as they literally outshined their rivals with their impeccable , irrefutable, and unequivocal logics and facts. the first debate. However, unfortunately, second presidential face-off has has been pushed back, for Trump campaign declined to participate for a virtual debate which was scheduled to be conducted since Trump has been diagnosed with COVID19. However, a final presidential debate is likely to take place on Thursday, Oct 22.
To be precise, the discourse on immigration has always been one of key issues in the United States since the 1950s as diaspora communities emerge as the part of politics in every presidential election.And intriguingly, Nepalese diaspora also follows suit and jumps on the bandwagon.The proportion of immigrants from Nepal to America used to be way low i.e. below 100 per year through 1992 which qualified Nepal for diversity visa(DV) recipient country. According to the 1990 U.S. census, there were only 2,616 Nepalese Americans. Nonetheless, the Nepalese nationals began emigrating into US in large number only in the last two and half decades after DV program was first launched in 1995 to diversify American citizens pool. The bill was signed into law into law in 1990 by the then Republican president George HW Bush. Diversity Immigration Visa is a gateway for 50,000 immigrants each year from all over the world (eligible countries). Despite a significant proportion of immigrant populations, now President Trump is one of the harshest critic of this program itself and immigrants . “Countries are sending their worst people to America through DV lottery”, he said. He has time and again attacked DV immigrants through his tweets and demonized the entire million plus people from all over the world.
Honestly speaking, Nepalese diaspora should always be thankful to DV program because of which we are becoming more influential political force now, and some of us are even calling the shots. A perfect example of this is Harry HB Bandar who became the first Nepalese American house of delegate of district 8, Maryland state from democratic party in 2018. He had entered US through DV in 2005 and in a very short span of time , he achieved what other Nepalese immigrants just dream about. Since he is inspiring and energetic , his future looks more promising . Madalasa Gurung is another Nepalese American who has been running for the member of house of delegate of district 24, New Hampshire on behalf of Democratic party since 2016. She said, ”As a State Rep, I will fight for minimum wage increase, affordable health care, and protection of human rights. I will treat climate change as an existential threat, help grow small businesses, support lowering tax burden on granite-state-workers, and many more.” She is asking for contributions to her campaign with what you can share this link in social media.FB Page-https://secure.actblue.com/donate/madalasa-gurung-for-state-rep-1?fbclid=IwAR2kwNrAocrb30dZw7x4MZ4tXD3QLiPSb_D_Vs3cKqq4mhADV9RP_hLCVUs. There are many more Nepalese Americans have been also running for offices in local elections in various cities,municipalities and counties.
According to the statistics, over 300,000 Nepalese currently dwell in the United States, with the largest populations in Texas, followed by New York and California, which is home to nearly 25,000 individuals from Nepal, according to community organizers . There are more than 100,000 Nepali-speaking Bhutanese settled in US in the past 20 years with the largest populations residing in Texas, New York, Indiana,Ohio,Michigan, North Carolina, and Georgia. One main characteristic of Nepalese people is always have a strong community built up which is very useful for conveyance of political messages. Living in Texas, Michigan,North Carolina,Ohio always capture more attention from either political party as they are considered the swing states or battle grounds where even few votes make significant difference. It is estimated that up to 30,000 Bhutanese-Nepali individuals have settled in Ohio. No Republican has ever won the presidency without winning Ohio, and since the advent of the modern two-party system, only two Democrats have ever won the presidency without winning Ohio: Grover Cleveland in 1884/1892 and John F. Kennedy in 1960.
Intriguingly, for upcoming ballot, Nepalese and Nepali-Bhutanese Americans are fired up like never before. More 2/3rd of them seems to be sided in favor of Biden as they are campaigning through FB page, zoom meetings and physical gatherings too. Dr. Prakash Shrestha (infectious disease specialist) Texas, said Trump failed to handle the corona pandemic crisis by conveying conflicting messages which made the situation worse resulting the most cases and deaths in the world. Trump continues his irresponsible behavior regarding handling of COVID-19 which may lead to 400,000 death through January 2021. Dr. Shyam Karki says,” Trump destroyed the infra structure set up in China by Obama admin for pandemic that exacerbated the situation here at home.” In one of zoom meeting ’Nepali Bhutan For Biden National Council(NBB-NC)’ , Dr. Sangita Basnet (Pediatric) showed clear contrast between Biden’s and Trump’s healthcare plan through powerpoint presentation. Biden Plan will obviously cover more Americans with affordable price and expand medicare while Trump’s plan excludes pre-existing conditions and tax-credits . Under Trump health care plan less and less people get coverage and it would be pricey too .
Another important fact is 9000 Nepalese are currently living in America under a humanitarian US government program called Temporary Protection Status(TPS) . Obama administration granted to Nepalese when a massive magnitude 7.8 earthquake struck Nepal , killing 9000 people, injuring more than 20,000 and wrecking over 750,000 homes in April , 2015.The Trump administration already tried to terminate this but a federal district judge in California temporary postponed and now it is going to be expired on 4th of January , 2021. The TPS holders start panicking for uncertainty and they are very fearful of being deported.
In America, people say Republican presidency is good for economy and salvages the situation but the fact shows a different picture. For instance, if we see the recent records of Bill Clinton and George W Bush , Clinton created more jobs and good economy while Bush thrust the economy into the worst recession since 1929. Obama rescued the US economy from the depression and reduced the deficit by 1/3rd too . Trump inherited the booming economy from Obama and now the economy is being hit by the biggest economic contraction ever recorded , the highest unemployment and the federal budget deficit is more than $3 trillion. The US national debt is $26.9 trillion and growing which has already exceeded the GDP($20.54 trillion).
Trump does’t believe in science but it seems he is pretty good at hatching the conspiracy theories that somewhat help him go viral on internet and he makes it viral by tweeting or saying in public like Obama’s birth, climate hoax,Chinese virus,QAnon, BinLaden-raid , etc. If he paid proper heed to the scientists during COVID19 pandemic,he could have saved more Americans.Thats why Scientific American endorsed Joe Biden.Scientific American has never endorsed a presidential candidate in its 175-year history.They said,”The evidence and the science show that Donald Trump has badly damaged the U.S. and its people-because he rejects evidence and science.He was warned many times in January and February about the onrushing disease,yet he did not develop a national strategy.”
Likewise, Trump picked Amy Cony Barrett, a conservative justice for Supreme Court to replace an iconic liberal justice late Ruth Bader Ginsberg(RBG) just four weeks before the election which shows double standards of him and his party. In 2016 Obama announced his pick for supreme court justice Merrick Garland 8 months before the election but the GOP senator blocked saying it was inappropriate because of election year. Now they are rushing for confirmation hearings for Amy Coney Barrett like no other business . This is hypocrisy at its best. From this point onwards, our justice system would sway to the conservative approach in decades to come which may result deterioration of ACA, Row V. Wade, LGBTQ rights, immigrants’ right , civil rights and environmental protection measures. So liberals have to focus in every elections to command majority if they care about those issues.
Unlike 2016 polls, Biden has been leading every polls by double digits consistently . He is leading in senior, woman and suburban voters significantly. He is doing fine in the battle grounds too.Moreover he is drawing more enthusiasms of people than Trump .Biden proved more viewership in town-hall duel with Trump on October 15 at ABC and NBC News television. Trump has been hoping for ‘October surprise’ but it is not happening because Biden is well equipped against those kind of republican tactics this time.They already have tried with Biden’s son, Hunter Biden’s emails story but this is just backfiring .
In America people say, “When people vote democrats win and when people do not vote republicans win.” which sounds obvious. Even though Hillary Clinton garnered 2.9 million more votes , she lost the presidency. It happens because of its electoral colleges system , with the 40 million of people in California has 2 electoral colleges on the other hand with just less than a million people like Wyoming,Vermont,Alaska, North Dakota,South Dakota, Delaware also have 2 equivalent electoral colleges each. There are 538 electoral colleges , whoever takes 270 wins presidency. This system favors Republican candidates more than democrats since Republican have won the presidency twice in this century while losing the popular vote. The founding fathers had established this system for strong bonding of the states . Some people even say, ” we are United States of America not United People of America thats why we have to preserve it”. At a time Joe Biden is enjoying comfortable lead in both national and battleground states polls,it is time to remember the most fundamental lesson learned from the out comes of 2016 election .Biden could lose the electoral college even after winning the popular votes by more than 5 million . This shows how crucial for Biden for maximum voter turn out.
There are some Nepalese Americans who has been campaigning for Trump2020 too.It seems they are just fascinated by Trump’s ostentatious style rather than the policies.I just checked their FB campaign pages and discovered that they did’t have much to say but posted some unproven and unfounded stories, conspiracies and memes against Joe Biden from the right wing newspapers. Trump supporters are mostly white , conservative and jingoistic in nature.Therefore some of those Nepalese Americans have a fallacy of being more American by supporting Trump.Some of Biden supporters are also mocking at them as ‘the chicken voting for KFC’. One of his supporter was saying , “ He broke a peace deal (for which he was nominated for Nobel peace prize 2020) between Israel and UAE which will bring the peace in the middle east that benefits 1 million Nepalese workers in there.” But middle east situation would not change until Saudi Arabia, Iran and Israel reached a comprehensive peace deal. Otherwise I don’t see any genuine issues or policies which can compel us to vote for him.
Lastly, I would like to urge you to vote for Biden especially to those who live in swing states. He may not be perfect but he is compassionate, experienced and cool on the other hand Trump is incompetent, egoistical, narcissist , liar , so on and so forth. Trump administration is so unstable just like him that Bernie Sanders once called it ‘banana republic’. Haven’t we grown fed up with this president and his administration ? Hasn’t he shattered the ‘ American Dream’ which is the last hope of so many miserables around the world?
So November 3 is the day in four years when we can choose to hold Donald Trump accountable . Just get fired up and vote blue. THANKS.
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