Bay Area Democrat draws inspiration from family history to mobilize youth vote
A young Democratic Party organizer in the Bay Area said she found inspiration from her family history and is now trying to get teenagers involved in the political process.
Uma Krishnan has been involved in politics for several years, first working on the presidential campaigns for Hillary Clinton in 2016, then Joe Biden, and now Kamala Harris.
As a member of the Young Democrats of America, she co-founded the San Mateo Asian American Pacific Islander Alliance, serves on the Young Peninsula Democrats, and has taken a lead role for the South Asians for Harris.
"I realized I have a voice. I am intelligent and thought I need to use it," said Krishnan.
Her passion for politics is generational, stretching back to her native India in the early 1940s.
"My grandfather grew up under British Imperialism and he got involved with Gandhi's freedom-fighting movement," she said. "When he was 15 years old, he was arrested for freedom fighting."
Her grandfather, who passed away when she was 7 years old, remains a major influence on her life.
"I think this kind of revolutionary spirit is just nothing but inspiring," said Krishnan.
Today, she is trying to inspire the next generation in the Democratic Party, a generation that found new excitement after Harris became the presidential nominee.
"I think we are seeing a huge resurgence in young voters," said Krishnan. "I think a lot of the youth were not particularly energized to vote for Biden."
This past weekend, she worked with young volunteers to set up text and phone banks in the battleground states.
"Three of them are high school kids. One of them is a college student and they are all far more articulate than I recall teenagers ever being," she said.
Abigail De Kosnik, an associate professor at Berkeley Center for New Media, said when Harris became the nominee she noticed a wave of interest from young voters on social media. The posts included viral videos from the "Coconut Tree" memes and a tweet by British pop star Charli XCS declaring "Kamala IS brat."
"'Kamala is brat' means that she is fun and funny and a little messy and not all buttoned up and also deeply authentic and real, and completely herself and owning every part of herself, even if she makes the mistakes, even if it, isn't perfect all the time," said De Kosnik. "And so that's the brat girl, and that's Kamala Harris."
Then an endorsement from the biggest pop star in the world, Taylor Swift, only added to the youth wave.
"That was a hugely important endorsement for the Harris-Walz campaign," said De Kosnik.
According to a Harvard Youth poll, there is more enthusiasm among young Democrats than Republicans with 74% of young Democrats saying they will "definitely" vote compared to 60% of young Republicans.
Social media is playing a role in the election with 53% of young adults seeing memes about Harris last month, and 34% saying it positively influenced their opinion. Conversely, 56% have seen memes about former President Donald Trump, with 26% reporting it had a negative impact on their perception.
While Krishnan has seen a rise in young voters, either with volunteering or donating money in the Democratic Party, she remains cautiously optimistic.
"Because I do know that a lot of the youth don't turn out," said Krishnan. "It is my hope that they will, but I really think we won't know until, say, Nov. 5."