US Midterms Could Reveal Just How Divided Indian Americans Have Become

The reason for seeing Indian Americans narrowly as ‘Blue’ or ‘Red’ is because US has become deeply polarised.

Another challenge, which keeps Blue and Red America apart, is intensified gerrymandering.

(Photo: Vibhushita Singh/The Quint)

Are Indian Americans, too, heading for a divorce? No, this is not about Usha Vance. More accurately, this isn’t about Usha and JD Vance, whose marriage remains on solid ground as far as we can tell.

The marriage in question is the contentious alliance between Blue and Red America—or, to put it another way, between Democrats and Republicans. Are they heading for a divorce, and is the conflict tearing apart the Indian American community as well?

If Usha’s husband becomes President Vance, how will those Indian Americans who are bitterly opposed to him, and MAGA, view her elevation to First Lady status? 

Some call the Blue-Red division a civil war. However we may describe it, the psychological split seems irreparable.

Even a physical separation is believable if we pay attention to novels and movies, not to mention memes. A meme that referred to Blue America as the United States of Canada is newly relevant, thanks to Trump’s rancorous trade war with Canada. 

From Saund to Jindal: A Community United

This meme isn’t from 2024 or 2016; it dates back to 2004! That was the era of George W Bush, another Republican president who embarked on a reckless, costly military adventure in West Asia, though his war of choice was against Iraq, not Iran. Nevertheless, for decades, while Blue and Red America had an uneasy relationship, it wasn’t seen as unsustainable.

As for Indian Americans, the community remained united because it was small and had little political clout. There was a time when the election of an Asian American, let alone an Indian American, to the US Congress would have been so remarkable that the representative’s party affiliation wouldn’t have mattered. Their ethnicity would have drawn more attention.

Such was the case with Dalip Singh Saund, a Sikh immigrant who was elected to the House in 1956 and two more consecutive terms. Saund was a Democrat from California. Still, it wasn’t his party affiliation that stood out back then. During the 1950s, according to the Yearbook of Immigration Statistics, fewer than 2000 Indian immigrants became US permanent residents. 

After Saund suffered a stroke and lost his final bid for Congress, it took 45 years for another Indian American, Bobby Jindal, to be elected to the House. But even in 2009, when Jindal assumed office, it hardly mattered that he was a Republican. Like Saund, he was embraced by the entire Indian American community, and he became famous in India for his breakthrough.

Now, of course, it’s a different story. So, what has changed? 

MAGA and the Deepening Blue-Red Divide

For one thing, Indian Americans are no longer a novelty in Congress (six Indian American representatives, all Democrats, serve in the current House). And they have also made political inroads in states and cities, with Zohran Mamdani being the best-known example. 

But the biggest reason for seeing Indian Americans narrowly as ‘Blue’ or ‘Red’ is because the country, over the last decade, has become deeply polarised. Yes, there was partisanship in the Bush Jr and Obama eras, but Democrats and Republicans were rivals rather than enemies. 

Then came MAGA, breaking the nation. What started out as an uncivil battle during Trump 1.0 turned into a civil war when Trump 2.0 came along. Indian American Democrats who were grudgingly impressed by Bobby Jindal are now more likely to be angered and embarrassed by high-profile Trumpians like Kash Patel, Harmeet Dhillon, and Vivek Ramaswamy.

In Civil War, the dystopian film released in 2024, an actual war breaks out between the federal government and secessionist groups—one of which, Western Forces, is made up of Texas and California. It sounds strange, for no two large states in the union are more dissimilar. The movie, though, is an allegory and that alliance raises an important point. The US cannot be physically partitioned, given that the Blue-Red division is mostly between urban and rural America. 

The author Kurt Andersen tackles this challenge in his new novel, bluntly titled The Breakup. In a solution reminiscent of India’s messy partition, citizens are asked to choose between a smaller US—which is multiracial and multi-religious—and the Free American Republic (FAR), which is largely White and Christian. FAR could mean Far Right. The former is Blue America, and the latter (referred to, more crudely, as Jesusland in the 2004 meme) is Red America. No matter how imperfect the execution, this could be an acceptable way to break up a country.  

Fortunately, outside the realm of speculative fiction and films, we don’t have to worry about the physical division of America. But what about the psychological partition? Can it diminish?

After all, Trump’s approval rating is at a record low, and polling also shows increased support for the Democrats, giving them a lead in the polls. Independents and voters in the middle are not beholden to any party. The Republicans are currently at a disadvantage. 

Indian Americans at a Political Crossroads

These political swings, however, are temporary. Another challenge, which keeps Blue and Red America apart, is intensified gerrymandering. Most Americans already live in segregated congressional districts, where they tend to interact with people who think and vote like them.

Where we may see a more lasting shift is among non-Whites, who have been adversely affected by Trump 2.0’s policies. As long as MAGA remains potent, they are likely to stay away from the Republican Party. That’s happening among disillusioned Hispanic voters, and it’s being seen among Indian Americans, whose historic preference for the Democrats was tested in 2024 when some voters abandoned Harris. Now they are abandoning Trump.

A 2026 Carnegie Endowment attitudes survey found that 71 percent of Indian Americans disapproved of Trump’s performance. Only 29 percent approved, which is lower than the approval rating for Trump among all Americans. 

Moreover, according to this year’s Asian American Voter Survey, 66 percent of Indian Americans voters said they would support Democratic candidates in the House and Senate in November. That Indian American support for Republicans falls to 22 percent (House) and 18 percent (Senate). This trend is unsurprising because, as Red America has become more insular in the age of Trump and MAGA, Blue America is becoming more inclusive. 

(Murali Kamma is a writer and managing editor based in Atlanta, Georgia. This is an opinion piece, and the views expressed above are the author’s own. The Quint neither endorses nor is responsible for the same.)