Bobby Jindal presidential campaign, 2016

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Bobby Jindal for President.
Jindal 2016 (Vertical).png
Campaign U.S. presidential election, 2016
Candidate Bobby Jindal
Governor of Louisiana (2008-present)
Affiliation Republican Party
Status Announced on
June 24, 2015
Headquarters P.O. Box 5101
New Orleans, Louisiana
Key people Timmy Teepell (campaign manager)
Wes Anderson (chief pollster)
Receipts US$1,158,196 (2015-09-30[1])
Slogan Tanned, Rested, Ready
Website
www.BobbyJindal.com

The 2016 presidential campaign of Bobby Jindal, the 55th Governor of Louisiana, was announced on June 24, 2015.[2] His candidacy for the Republican nomination for President of the United States in the 2016 election came after several years of speculation following the 2012 election. Jindal is the first Indian American and third Asian American to run for president of the United States.[3]

Background[edit]

Governor Bobby Jindal speaking at the 2015 Conservative Political Action Conference in March 2015.

Jindal came to national prominence during the 2003 election for Louisiana governor.

In what Louisianans call an open primary (but is technically a nonpartisan blanket primary), Jindal finished first with 33 percent of the vote. He received endorsements from the largest newspaper in Louisiana, the New Orleans Times-Picayune; the newly elected Democratic mayor of New Orleans, Ray Nagin; and the outgoing Republican governor, Mike Foster. In the general election, Jindal faced the outgoing lieutenant governor, Kathleen Babineaux Blanco of Lafayette, a Democrat. Despite winning in Blanco's hometown, he lost many normally conservative parishes in northern Louisiana, and Blanco prevailed with 52 percent of the popular vote.

Political analysts suggested two explanations for his loss. Some blamed Jindal for his refusal to answer questions about his religion and ethnic background brought up in several Democratic advertisements,[4][5] which the Jindal campaign called "negative attack ads." Others[who?] noted that a significant number of conservative Louisianans remain more comfortable voting for a conservative Democrat than for a Republican[citation needed]. Despite losing the election, Jindal became a well-known figure on the state's political scene and a rising star within the Republican Party as a result of his campaign.

In 2004, Jindal ran for the House seat in Louisiana's First Congressional District, winning with 78 percent of the vote. He was re-elected in 2006.

In early 2007, Jindal announced his candidacy for governor of Louisiana and became an early front-runner on the Republican side. In Louisiana's blanket primary, he faced 11 opponents and received 54 percent of the vote. Because he received a majority of votes in the primary, no runoff was necessary. He was re-elected in a similar fashion in 2011, with 66 percent of the vote.

When he took office in January 2008, at age 36, Jindal became the first Indian American governor and the youngest sitting governor in the United States.

Campaign[edit]

Jindal officially launched his campaign for the 2016 Republican presidential nomination on June 24, 2015, with an announcement via Twitter,[6] ahead of a formal announcement in the New Orleans suburb of Kenner later that day.[2]

Aside from being the first Indian American to run for President of the United States, Jindal is the first Asian American to mount a nationwide campaign for president. Fellow Republican Hiram Fong of Hawaii ran as a favorite son candidate in the 1964 election, and Democrat Patsy Mink, also of Hawaii, stood in several primaries of the 1972 election.[citation needed]

Jindal's campaign slogan is "Tanned. Rested. Ready." The slogan, according to an email sent to his supporters, was meant to quell criticism he had received from the media for distancing himself from his Indian-American heritage. The email referred to those making the claims as "the liberal media." The Nixon Foundation tweeted a message "pointing out" that the slogan had originated from that of a satirical T-shirt featuring Richard Nixon, initially made popular at the Republican National Conference in 1988.[7]

As of early September 2015, Jindal was polling about 1 percent of the Republican primary electorate. That month, Jindal criticized Republican front-runner Donald Trump as having no substance and accused him of being a "narcissist." He also released two videos online mocking Trump. Trump responded by saying that he had never met Jindal, that he did not believe Jindal had a chance of securing the Republican nomination, and that he would "only respond to people that register more than 1 percent in the polls."[8] Previously, Jindal had called Trump "a unserious carnival act," placing Jindal among a field of other Republican presidential candidates—such as Jeb Bush, Rick Perry, and Rand Paul—who had targeted Trump but had not surpassed him in any polls.[9] Jindal spoke positively at that time about his campaign in Iowa, stating that it was building a movement there and was present in every county. He also insisted that despite his low polling, he would not be the next candidate to drop out after Scott Walker did so.[10]

During the second Republican presidential debate, hosted by CNN, Jindal criticized Republicans in Congress for not having "half the fight in them the Senate Democrats did," and claimed—in an attempt to appeal to anti-abortion conservatives—that he had defunded Planned Parenthood in Louisiana as governor.[11]

Jindal spoke out against the criteria for inclusion in the third Republican presidential debate, arguing that participants were being chosen by name recognition rather than statewide polling. He accused the sponsor of the debate, CNBC, of "attempting to winnow the field long before the voters in Iowa and New Hampshire get to cast their ballots by restricting access to debates.”[12][13]

Jindal was speculated to be ending his campaign after having only $260,000 to spend at the end of the previous month and spending significantly more than that of the third quarter's fundraising, his amount raised noted as being lower than that of some of his competitors and putting him in position to suspend his campaign similarly to Rick Perry and Scott Walker once their fundraising was unable to suffice.[14]

Endorsements[edit]

References[edit]

  1. ^ "Candidate (P60008398) Summary Reports – 2016 Cycle". Federal Election Commission. Retrieved October 16, 2015. 
  2. ^ a b Fahrenthold, David A.; Hohmann, James (June 24, 2015). "Bobby Jindal announces entry into 2016 presidential race". The Washington Post. Retrieved June 24, 2015. 
  3. ^ "Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal Becomes First Asian-Indian to Run for President". Fox News. Retrieved 25 June 2015. 
  4. ^ Moller, Jan (August 16, 2007). "Jindal counters Demo attacks; Rapid response to ads reflects shift in tactics". The Times-Picayune (New Orleans, LA). Archived from the original on September 30, 2007. 
  5. ^ "News Features". Catholic Culture. August 22, 2007. Retrieved August 7, 2012. 
  6. ^ https://twitter.com/BobbyJindal/status/613745877639802881
  7. ^ Kim, Eun Kyung (July 6, 2015). "'Tanned. Rested. Ready': Why Bobby Jindal's campaign slogan is stirring up a storm". TODAY.com. 
  8. ^ Rafferty, Andrew (September 10, 2015). "Bobby Jindal Calls Trump An Unstable Narcissist". NBC News. 
  9. ^ "Jindal camp vows to ‘brawl’ with Trump". MSNBC. September 10, 2015. 
  10. ^ Lucas, Fred. "Bobby Jindal: Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell Should be Next to Go". TheBlaze.com. 
  11. ^ Litten, Kevin (September 16, 2015). "Bobby Jindal attacks Republicans, Trump in second presidential debate". NOLA.com. 
  12. ^ "BOBBY JINDAL: NETWORKS INFLUENCING GOP PRIMARY WITH FAULTY DEBATE CRITERIA". Breitbart. October 14, 2015. 
  13. ^ "Bobby Jindal’s campaign cries foul over ‘delusional’ CNBC debate criteria". Washington Times. October 13, 2015. 
  14. ^ Berman, Russell (October 2015). "So Long Bobby Jindal?". The Atlantic. 
  15. ^ Ta, Linh (August 17, 2015). "Windschitl endorses Jindal". The Des Moines Register. Retrieved August 20, 2015. 
  16. ^ a b Katie Glueck (24 June 2015). "Bobby Jindal 2016 campaign staff: The power players - POLITICO". POLITICO. 
  17. ^ "Celebrity endorsements for 2016". The Hill. April 25, 2015. Retrieved June 24, 2015. 
  18. ^ Hillary Clinton is winning the Hollywood primary