Poll analysts predict smaller voting blocs like Bangladeshi-Americans could make a significant impact on the outcome of US Presidential elections in battleground states with tight races this year, but many in the community say they are yet to see an aggressive outreach from political parties.
A large number of Bangladeshi-Americans reside in states like New York where the election results are a given, but they do have a significant presence in places like Michigan and Pennsylvania as well where the races were tight and decided with a narrow margin in 2016.
Mohammed Hassan, an elected Democrat member in Michigan’s Hamtramck council, says his community has a serious chance to tilt the election in Democratic candidate Joe Biden’s favour but there is barely any enthusiasm at this stage.
“I am very disappointed,” says Hassan, who has been campaigning for Joe Biden on his own. He says nobody from the party’s top leadership has approached him so far.
The scenario looks no different from 2016 when a post-election National Asian American Survey found out that less than 31% of Bangladeshi-Americans had any election related contact with either of the parties.
Michigan is a crucial battleground state in this election and as per rough estimates, there are more than 20,000 registered Bangladeshi-American voters in the state with a majority of them in the Hamtramck area. Donald Trump won the state in 2016 by a margin of just about 12,000 votes.
Analysts believe if smaller voting blocs like Bangladeshi-Americans turnout in full strength that could overcome the winning margin.
The community overwhelmingly supported Hillary Clinton in 2016, but Democratic strategists have been hoping for a much higher turnout this year.
Hassan says he has also noticed something unusual in the Bangladeshi community this year.
“There are many who are thinking of voting for Trump because of the unemployment benefits they got for Coronavirus,” says Hassan.
He says for many of them, the unemployment benefits were more than what they earned each month before coronavirus struck, and they are hoping they might get the same again if Donald Trump wins.
M Osman Siddique, the first Bangladeshi-American and the first Muslim-American to be appointed as an Ambassador from the United States anywhere, hopes that the experience of four years under Trump will motivate the community to come out in large numbers.
“We are making the community aware that their vote matters,” says Siddique, who is involved in Democratic Party’s political outreach efforts.
He feels the younger generation of Bangladesh-Americans is highly motivated and they will be instrumental in ensuring their parents cast their votes, either in person or through postal ballots.
Fatema Haque, the vice-president of Rising Voices of Asian American Families, a non-profit active in Michigan, has been phone banking and organising online events to boost Bangladeshi-American voter turnout.
She says the campaign is really missing the door-to-door contact because of coronavirus, and language and technology are proving to be barriers for the older generation.
“I speak Bangla so phone calls work for them, but they are not able to connect to bigger voter awareness events on Zoom and so on,” says Haque.
She is expecting a high turnout among older men and women but finds a strong gender divide in the younger generation.
“Women in their 20s are more likely to vote than men,” she says.
A young Bangladesh-American doctor who has already cast her vote in early voting, says many of her friends who supported Bernie Sanders in the primary elections do not seem enthused by Biden.
“In fact, many of them say that Trump will win anyway so what’s the point in going out to vote,” she says. The doctor chose not to be named because of professional restrictions.
Council member Hassan believes that if Democrats are serious about turning out Bangladeshi voters, they will need an aggressive door-knocking campaign.
“If people are going out for shopping and dining, I see no reason why we shouldn’t be going street to street,” he says.
“I am a three-time elected official, and I know that the Bengali community works on personal contact, not on phone calls,” he adds.
