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The cabin crew was professional as usual. The white passengers happily gave permission to go to the toilet. As I stepped off the plane, the crowd walking toward the immigration counters was as diverse as ever – whites, blacks, Latinos, South Asians, Orientals, all clutching passports and wallets, rushing to cross the queues, seeking their He was busy searching without any hesitation. Care or danger to those around you.
My cab driver in Kennedy was a Pakistani-American immigrant. They unquestioningly voted for Trump in hopes of an economic miracle. When I said “Congratulations, your man won”, he smiled and said, “Yeah, good, but let’s see.” His enthusiasm, although evident, was a little low. I was somewhat surprised.
Later that evening, I met a school friend who was visiting town from San Francisco. Now this guy is a quintessential “desi” tech millionaire. He has built and sold a few quant companies, including a third start-up, What Else Than Artificial Intelligence. I thought he would be disappointed by Kamala Harris’s defeat, especially since she is a fellow Tamil, liberal immigrant to the West Coast, and lifelong Democrat. But he surprised me with his answer.
“I voted for Trump”.
“Why?”, I screamed almost in pain.
“Because these Democrats became too aware. Imagine their focus on building transgender toilets when millions of other important policies were failing.”
“No, how can you do that? These people spread hatred, they want to drive out immigrants, they even deny global warming, which is devastating. how could you!”.
Just like my Pakistani-American cabbie, he shrugged his shoulders and said, “I don’t know, let’s see.”
And white Americans?
They were also muted – I hardly heard any mention of Donald Trump or heated political conversations – there was no trace of triumphalism. If anything, he displayed a quiet sense of liberation, as if a quiet, almost unspeakable task had been accomplished. As if this work was two-sided, which had to be done to re-establish a certain kind of nationalism, but at the same time it was also dangerous because it could go out of control and cause irreparable damage, so being alert and cautious is the most important thing. It was good, not something to celebrate.
