From casting a ballot to writing a check to running for office, Indian American political leaders explain what actually builds real influence.

In 2024, Narender Reddy, a longtime Republican political activist, adviser, and fundraiser, ran for Georgia House District 50, a suburban Atlanta district that includes the cities of Johns Creek and Alpharetta and has a substantial Indian American population. He lost. “Particularly with me having so much recognition in the community for a long time, I thought I could really bring them to the polls, but it didn’t happen,” Reddy says. What may seem like a personal disappointment points to a larger issue worth considering before any conversation about political power: Recognition within a community and political capital are not the same thing. One does not automatically translate into the other. This article explores what does.

Before diving into the how-to, it is also worth remembering that the civic power we enjoy—built through votes, donations, volunteer hours, and community standing—is not something everyone in the world gets to exercise. Many people live without a true democracy, whether under outright authoritarianism or dictatorship. In some countries, sham elections are decided before ballots are counted, and organizing something as basic as a phone bank can land a person in jail.

That is especially worth pondering for Indian Americans, so we do not squander the rising political potential of a community whose numbers, wealth, and representation have climbed steadily over the past two decades.

Despite their relatively small share of the population, South Asians can help move the needle in crucial swing states. According to Asian Americans Advancing Justice-Atlanta, a nonprofit legal advocacy organization, in 2020 Asian Americans were the fastest-growing voting group in Georgia, and their turnout increased by 91% compared to the 2016 election. That surge helped make the state’s Asian American and Pacific Islander (AAPI) electorate an important bloc in a razor-thin presidential contest and two closely watched U.S. Senate runoffs.

“We’ve already proven that there’s real energy and a place for South Asian Americans, a significant bloc of Asian American voters, who were a key part of the margin that delivered the Senate victories for Democrats in Georgia in the two runoff elections in 2021,” says Chintan Patel, executive director of Indian American Impact, a national organization focused on policy advocacy, voter mobilization, and candidate endorsements. The number of South Asian elected officials nationwide, from the local to the federal level, has grown from about 50 in 2016 to more than 300, Patel notes.

The broader numbers behind that shift will be familiar to longtime Khabar readers: The Asian Indian population in the United States reached 4.9 million in 2022, making it the nation’s second-largest Asian American subgroup, after Chinese Americans.

And yet, as a relatively new immigrant community still learning the ropes of American politics, Indian Americans talk less often about what that growth actually buys politically, and how to spend it. Between casting a ballot, knocking on doors, writing checks, and becoming the person a candidate calls before a controversial vote, what actually gives Indian Americans influence over decisions that affect their communities?

Nearly everyone interviewed for this piece agreed on one thing: Showing up once does not count. Showing up consistently does.

Voting: Where Power Starts

For citizens, the activity that costs nothing and has the biggest payoff in politics is voting. That influence can hardly be overstated: the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee recently named two Indian Americans — Pia Dandiya in Florida and Amish Shah in Arizona — to its “Red to Blue” list of competitive House races. Dandiya has since won her Democratic primary in Florida’s 22nd Congressional District, one of the DCCC’s top flip targets nationally, and would become the first South Asian American to represent Florida in Congress if she wins in November. That’s as good a sign as any that candidates and voters from the community could help shape who controls Congress.

While each person has the right to sit out an election or vote for a third-party candidate, those interviewed for this story agreed that either choice diminishes a voter’s influence on the outcome. Sitting out or casting a third-party vote is “absolutely not” worth it, according to Reddy. If voters dislike both major-party choices, he says, they should consider which candidate is the “least worst.”

Sanjeev Joshipura, executive director of Indiaspora, encourages voters considering a third-party or write-in candidate to “study the history” of third-party success. He argues that because America’s presidential system differs from parliamentary democracies, and because the two major parties have made it difficult for third parties to gain traction, the better option is to pay closer attention to primary elections. “The battle of which part of the party’s ideology you subscribe to gets dictated in the primary system,” Joshipura says. “So I would encourage more people to vote in the primaries.”

Niraj Antani, former Ohio state senator, agrees that there is little reason to sit out simply because a voter is dissatisfied with the choices, unless that voter has not taken the time to understand the candidates. Patel’s advice is to look beyond the party binary altogether. “There are a lot of ways to engage in the civic town square that aren’t driven by the Democratic Party or the Republican Party or the Green Party,” he says. “Don’t be disheartened by what you read in a WhatsApp group thread. Take a beat and realize that if you participate in this process and make a difference, it might take more than just one election, but we can keep at it.”

Where the Seeds Are Sown

Before spending a dollar or an hour, Joshipura advises newcomers to civic life to learn how the political process works, understand the decision-making power of different offices, and study campaign finance if they want to follow the money. Donors should also understand that giving to a party or political action committee does not always fund a specific candidate; it may support a cause, an issue, or the infrastructure needed to build a bench of future candidates, which is part of Indian American Impact’s model.

“Some of our greatest success stories are candidates who we supported running for school board or city council. Maybe they weren’t successful the first time, but they were the second time,” Patel says. He points to U.S. Rep. Suhas Subramanyam as an example: Indian American Impact backed him early—first for the Virginia House of Delegates, then for the state Senate, and finally for Congress in 2024. It was a bench built one office at a time.

National elections command the most attention, but Rajiv Bhateja, co-founder of the South Asian political organization They See Blue, says school boards, county offices, and other local and state races are the entry points that most directly affect the communities where Indian Americans live. “That is where the seeds are sown for later involvement,” he says.

Reddy, who was appointed by Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp to the Georgia Transportation Efficiency Authority Board, argues that support for Indian American candidates should not stop at party lines. He says more Indian Americans should have backed Democrat Rahul Garabadu in the June primary runoff for Georgia Senate District 7, despite partisan differences. No community is a monolith, he says, but shared interests such as education, health care, immigrant families and the community’s wellbeing can matter more than agreement on every issue.

Garabadu, an attorney who specializes in election and voting law, points to another reason local and state races matter: redistricting.

“Redistricting is what sets the playing field before any votes are cast,” he says. Fair lines can give a community an equal shot at electing candidates of its choice; unfair ones can weaken its voice before a single vote is counted. Georgia drew new maps in 2021 and redrew them in 2023 after a federal court found that the original maps violated the Voting Rights Act. Litigation continued into the 2026 election cycle. When redistricting includes proper public hearings, Garabadu says, “it shows legislators that people are watching and that paying attention can go a really long way.”

Volunteering: Show Up Before You Ask

Volunteering is the most accessible way into a campaign—and the fastest way to learn how one actually operates. Lawful permanent residents and even voters from other districts can phone bank, write postcards, or canvass for a candidate or a cause outside their own district, subject to applicable campaign-finance rules.

Of these activities, Bhateja says door-to-door canvassing has the greatest impact because it creates an actual conversation. It is also the most demanding: It requires travel, often depends on the weather, and means showing up at a stranger’s door. But the interactions, he says, bring out the best in the community.

“People are extremely hospitable. They are constantly telling us to come in for chai, and we have to politely decline because we need to keep going,” he says, adding that he has been surprised by how warmly even right-leaning families welcome canvassers with whom they disagree. “They’re very appreciative of us coming by, whether or not they agree with our politics. I’ve gone to people’s homes who, I realized after visiting them, are Republican, but they’re still very polite. It’s just a hallmark of our community. We’re, by nature, a hospitable and polite community.”

Garabadu saw the same dynamic as a candidate during his state Senate run. “I had lots of Asian American uncles and aunties who were excited to volunteer for the first time. I would talk to them after that experience and say, ‘How did that go for you?’ And they said, ‘I never would have thought about doing this; it was actually really fun to have these conversations.’”

For those with the means to go further, donations offer another way to build political capital— and unlike a volunteer shift, they are scalable.

The $250 Question

If you have the means, Patel says, every dollar matters. But people who have run for office say larger donations are more likely to attract a campaign’s attention. Antani offers some sample figures: At the state House level, $250 gets you in the door, $500 is “really good,” and $1,000 makes you “best friends.” Those figures scale up at every level: the state Senate, the U.S. House, and the U.S. Senate. He notes that donors do not need to write one large check: “You can do this over a period of time. They’re going to do four events throughout a year, and you can do $250 at an event, and go to all four events, and then they’re going to know that you’ve done $1,000 throughout the year.” Under federal law, lawful permanent residents may make campaign contributions even though they cannot vote.

At the municipal level, the math is different. Patel says even $50 goes a long way because local campaign budgets are far smaller than federal ones. “Three thousand $50 contributions add up, and they show real momentum for campaigns,” he says. The clear message: No one should assume they cannot participate meaningfully simply because they cannot make the maximum federal contribution.

Joshipura frames it as a question of marginal impact: a nationally prominent candidate may already be raising millions, while a lesser-known local candidate may be running on a shoestring. The same contribution, therefore, may have a greater impact in the local race.

Reddy makes a similar point with harder numbers: Typical city council donations run from $25 to $125, he says, so a $500 check “will truly capture the candidate’s attention.” His advice for anyone donating at any level: do not simply write a check and disappear. “Go to their meeting. There, you get to interact with them. Then you make a donation.” For a larger contribution of $2,000 or more to a congressional candidate, he suggests spreading it across several events rather than giving it all at once: “You’re getting there more times, and also giving yourself the interaction.”

Be the Fire Extinguisher

Political capital does not have to come from a check or a vote. Joshipura cautions against equating influence exclusively with winning elections. A community can also build power through the nonprofit sector on issues such as reproductive rights, First Amendment rights, gun laws, and education. These organizations often become sounding boards for candidates seeking to build trust with a specific community. And unlike an officeholder bound to a single seat, they can work on an issue continuously, and across the country, for years. Antani describes an even more advanced version of this role: becoming a trusted resource, a bridge builder, or what he calls a “fire extinguisher” for an industry or community. When an elected official missteps or takes a posi- tion out of step with a community, the fire extinguisher is the one who works within that community to lower the temperature, defend the official and help rebuild the relationship.

“If you really want to ingratiate yourself, be the fire extinguisher. That is next-level development of political capital,” he says.

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Amritha Alladi Joseph is a customer success strategist at Salesforce and a freelance journalist. In addition to Khabar, her work has appeared in Gannett newspapers, The Hindu, CNN-IBN, Lonely Planet, Georgia Trend, Appen Media, and Atlanta magazine.

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At a Glance: Where to Put Your Effort