By Prakash Narayan–
(Prakash Narayan is chief technology officer at 3K Technologies)
In 2020, I wrote a column on my perspectives on the upcoming elections. While I cannot be sure if that opinion – which was based on data (and not hype or innuendo) helped sway any undecided votes, what we witnessed was four years of:
- Economy: The US Economy Returning to Pre-Pandemic Growth Path
- COVID-19. In January 2021, the day after he was inaugurated, President Biden released a national strategy for beating COVID-19. This 200-page document was a pandemic exit blueprint that the Trump administration had not articulated before it. When assumed office, cases and deaths were hitting record highs and the newly launched vaccines were in short supply. Biden pledged to restore public trust, vaccinate the country, minimize COVID-19 spread, reopen society, and resume America’s global leadership. All these goals were accomplished.
- Russia. We are all, by now, well aware of Trump’s statement at a recent rally in Conway, South Carolina where he told an unidentified NATO member that he would withhold U.S. help and encourage Russia to as it wishes with allies that do not contribute enough to military spending. The NATO secretary general shot back a strong statement saying that Trump was threatening the security of the entire trans-Atlantic alliance. Biden, on the other hand, strengthened U.S. sanctions against financial facilitators of Russia’s war machine.
- Immigration. Despite the rhetoric by the Trump campaign on Biden’s immigration record, since Biden took office in January 2021, his administration has acted on several fronts regarding immigration to the U.S. These include:
- Plans to boost refugee admissions – allowing the resettling of 125,000 refugees (including Central Americans fleeing violence, LGBTQ refugees, Afghans who worked for U.S.-based organizations, at-risk Uyghurs, Hong Kong dissidents, and refugees from Burma, including members of the persecuted Rohingya Muslim minority. This represents the spirit of America, as penned by Emma Lazarus in 1883 (and inscribed on a tablet at the base of the Statue of Liberty), “Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free”.
- Preserving deportation relief for unauthorized immigrants who came to the U.S. as children. This new ruling modified DACA (Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals Program) to preserve and fortify it against future legal challenges
- Not enforcing the public charge rule that denies green cards to immigrants who might use public benefits like Medicaid or food stamps. Doing so restored our nation’s values
So far, I have rationalized the article (from 4 years ago) with data to demonstrate that the recommendation to elect Joe Biden as the 46th President was the right one.
I will now make the case for the Democratic nominee in the 2024 race, Kamala Harris, as the 47th President – once again based on data.
The detractors of Kamala Harris have non-substantive (that is, not backed by data) things to say, “Have you seen the way she laughs”. “She just happened to turn Black”.
There are non-substantive statements that the detractors of Donald Trump say too, “He is an unhinged, self-centered misogynist, and a narcissistic felon. He lies regularly to the American people. He has defrauded people, is a convicted sexual predator, leveraged his businesses for political favors, and will put pardoned felons back in places of leadership. He advocated the hanging of his own Vice President.”
I will now present a substantive, data-backed analysis on four fronts to make the case for Kamala Harris as the next President. I should add that while I researched in these areas, I did not get influenced either by left leaning media or right leaning media. That is, provide information based purely on data from reputed, centrist and non-political organizations.
- Healthcare Policies
- Environmental Policies
- Economic Policies
- National Security
- Healthcare Policies. Reproductive health rites are likely to take center stage in the upcoming election. A Pew Research Center poll said that 63% of adults said that abortion should be legal in all or most cases. Kamala Harris has taken a vocal role in supporting reproductive rights and restoring federal protections under Roe v Wade. While serving as California’s Attorney General, Kamala Harris strongly opposed healthcare consolidation and prosecuted numerous industry players for alleged fraud and antitrust violations. She was among the first state attorney generals to oppose Boise, Idaho-based St. Luke’s Health System’s acquisition of Saltzer Medical Group as it violated antitrust laws. She joined a federal lawsuit blocking Anthem and Cigna’s merger in 2017. She cast the tie-breaking vote (in the Senate) for the Inflation Reduction Act which requires the government to negotiate prices for Medicare-covered drugs.
On the other hand, Trump gave drug companies billions in tax breaks. They used their savings (from the profits made from the tax breaks) to invest billions more in stock buybacks for their shareholders. Meanwhile, thousands of drugs saw price increases during his administration. Expect Trump to weaken President Biden’s landmark legislation that allows Medicare to negotiate lower drug prices. The rate of uninsured increased during the Trump tenure from 7.9% in 2017 to 8.5% in 2018. More than one million children lost Medicaid coverage between 2017 and 2019.
- Environmental Policies. In a poll conducted by Data for Progress, nearly 7 of 10 voters say that the next President of the United States should continue investing in clean energy manufacturing (including half of Republicans, two-thirds of independents, and 71% of young voters between 18 and 34). 62% of voters say that she should continue investing in clean energy manufacturing to deliver cleaner, cheaper energy options and strengthen the climate actions taken. In other words, the data shows that voters overwhelmingly support Kamala Harris on her climate and clean energy policies.In data reported by the reputed, centrist, Brookings Institute, the Trump administration had taken 74 actions to weaken environmental protection. The regulatory rollbacks targeted the nation’s core environmental laws that assure clean air, and water and protect sensitive lands. We cannot get into many more details now due to editorial constraints. The Brooking Institute report concludes with, “The Trump administration’s regulatory agenda has strayed from that of past Republican administrations, abandoning the ‘industry-friendly’, states-centric approach to regulation in lieu of a more chaotic approach.”
- Economic Policies. In his talk at the Democratic National Convention (DNC), Bill Clinton provided a startling statistic (he stated that he triple-checked the data to ensure that it was correct) on the jobs created during various Presidential terms. Bill Clinton started counting from his term. I went back further (over the last 48 years). We have had 24 years under Republican Presidents and 24 years under Democratic Presidents. Here is the table:
So, in the last 48 years, 60.9m jobs were added under Democratic Presidents and $17.2m jobs were added during Republican Presidents. Of these $17.2m jobs, if we remove the $16.1m jobs added during the Reagan presidency, we are left with $1.1m jobs added during Republican Presidents!!Donald Trump is advocating a 10% baseline tariff on all imported goods and a 60% (or higher) tariff on goods from China. If these proposed tariffs are fully implemented, experts (from JP Morgan Chase) have opined that the U.S. gross domestic product (GDP) could be lowered by 0.3% to 0.5% in 2025. Also, businesses typically pass higher tariffs on their consumers, raising prices for consumers – which can lead to inflation. This, in turn, causes businesses to reduce production – which can slow down the economy as raw materials and labor become more expensive. - National Security. Kamala Harris gained expertise, while she was a Senator, as a member of the intelligence committee. In an increasingly complex world, National Security and Foreign Policy are intertwined with AI, cyber-security, and Space. As Vice President, Kamala Harris led from the front at events like the Global Summit on AI Safety. Speaking at the Munich Security Conference, she said: “Whether it is in America’s interest to fight for democracy or to accept the rise of dictators, to continue to work in lockstep with our allies and partners or go it alone, I believe it is in the fundamental interest of the American people for the U.S. to fulfill our longstanding role of global leadership”.
Donald Trump has repeatedly shown that he is willing to weaponize the U.S. government to protect himself and his cronies and punish his personal enemies. He has publicly disparaged our global partners and allies, especially those in NATO. It might be said that the ongoing federal criminal investigation against him (for the mishandling of classified documents at Mar-a-Lago) alone disqualifies him from being fit to hold the office of the U.S. President.
Finally, let me share a few words from Stephanie Grisham, a former Trump White House Press Secretary, at the DNC, “He has no empathy, no morals, and no fidelity to the truth.” She is worried that Trump would use another term in the office, “for revenge and retribution and probably really draconian policies that will affect our country for a very, very long time.”
In conclusion, I endorse Kamala Harris and support her election as President because I believe that returning former President Trump to office would threaten American democracy and undermine the rule of law in our country. As the Honorable Liz Cheney said, “…We can survive bad policies. We can’t survive a President who goes to war with the Constitution.”
