A Nashville-based Indian American sales professional has thrown his hat into a challenging congressional race in Tennessee this year. 
  Vijay Kumar, a 54-year-old Indian immigrant, is seeking the Republican nomination in a primary race set for August with an unabashed conservative campaign platform that includes an all-out battle against what he calls “radical Islamic terrorism,” a strict immigration policy that brooks no concessions for undocumented workers, emphasizes assimilation of immigrants, and supports making English the official language.

  Kumar will face John "Gerard" Donovan, a business consultant, in the Republican primary Aug. 7. If he wins, he will run against Jim Cooper, the current Democratic incumbent, who is seeking a 10th term.

  In a phone interview with India-West, Kumar said the terror attacks in September 2001 changed him.

  “I was a bleeding heart liberal until Sept. 11,” he said. “Then I started questioning my own values. I believe in liberalism, you know, tolerance, openness to difference with my own opinions. But there are groups, individuals and nations that do not share such values.

  “I respected people of all colors, castes and nationalities. I have always had respect for pluralism, democracy and freedom. But after Sept. 11, I changed my own thinking, also the bombings in India and the problems of Kashmir (changed my views). I am a strong supporter of Kashmiri Pandits. Israel is being threatened. I believe we have to be much more cautious—we Americans—in dealing with universal terrorism.”

  Kumar’s campaign Web site flashes a quote from him: “On September 10, 2001, I thought of myself as an Indian-American. But on September 11, 2001, I became an American-American.”

  Kumar said he would welcome support from Indian Americans, but his focus was on garnering support for his views. “There are about 2-3 thousand Indians over here,” he said. “My voter base is essentially American. If Indians want to support me, I will not decline their support. If they share my views, I will be delighted to receive their help.

  “My opponent, Mr Cooper, he is a very talented man, and he has a lot of support of the Indians. I do not claim all Indians have to support me.”

  Kumar takes a stark, Manichaean view of geopolitics, echoing the controversial thesis of “clash of civilizations” between Islam and the West promoted by Johns Hopkins political scientist Samuel Huntington.

  Kumar thinks that opposition to Shari’a-based governments should be a moral imperative, just as opposition to communist governments was the backbone of U.S. strategy of alliances during the Cold War. Kumar also wants to limit immigration from countries whose laws are based on Sharia and work to assimilate the immigrants from those countries.

  According to his Web site: “America’s foreign policy in the Middle East and its support of Israel has not caused terrorism . . . The cause, instead, is 1,400 years of jihad. Statistics bear this out. In many non-western countries such as India, Thailand, and Nigeria, there are very few Jews and Americans.” When asked whether fundamentalism was present in other faiths, Kumar told India-West: “There is Jewish, Christian and Hindu fundamentalism, I grant you that. Mind you, they are all the by-products of Islamic fundamentalism. They are the reactionary response to Islamic fundamentalism. Evangelical Christianity, notwithstanding the fundamentalist attitude they take, you can safely, peacefully coexist with them in this country.”

  Coming from a multicultural society in India, where many languages are spoken, Kumar sees this as detrimental to cultural cohesion and societal health. He backs the call for English as the official language of the United States and for full assimilation to be the ultimate goal of immigrants.

  Kumar was for many years a Democrat. “I worked for the Gore-Lieberman campaign in Nashville in 2000,” he said. He even worked for the campaign of Rep. Jim Cooper, D-Tenn., whom he is trying to unseat in November.

  Kumar may well face an uphill task. According to the non-partisan National Journal’s Campaign Tracker 2008, Tennessee’s fifth congressional district, Kumar’s constituency, “is reliably Democratic in statewide elections. It elects rather liberal Democrats to Congress.” In 2006, the current incumbent, Jim Cooper, beat his Republican opponent Thomas Kovach 69-28 percent.

  “Numbers don't translate into serious competition for incumbents, regardless of party affiliation,” reported The Tennessean newspaper. “The only candidate Republican leaders consider a serious challenger to a Democratic incumbent is Monty Lankford, of Franklin, who is challenging Rep. Lincoln Davis, D-Pall Mall.”

  Campaign funds are also an issue. “In Middle Tennessee, the five incumbents had nearly $3.5 million in their campaign committees at the beginning of the year. So far, the challengers have reported raising nothing, according to the Federal Election Commission Web site. None has filed federal statements of candidacy, according to the FEC site,” to The Tennessean reported.

  Kumar acknowledged that his path to Congress was not going to be easy.

  “It’s a very big challenge,” he told India-West. “I have never been in a political race. But we will face it. But I believe I have better ideas and I am going to market them and we will see how it goes. I do not have all the answers but I have very strong support of fellow organizations right in Nashville.”

:By Indiawest