A New Congress, A New Challenge for India-US Ties?

0:00Welcome to all things policy, a daily podcast by the Taksashila institution. We are a bunch of policymakers based in Bengaluru and we like bringing fresh perspectives to Indian affairs and Indian perspectives to global affairs. So grab a cup of coffee, sit back and join us for today's chat. Greetings and welcome to all things policy podcast of the Taksashila institution. I am Aditi Palo, a research analyst with the Biology Program and today I am joined by Abhishek Adela, a research analyst with the Geo Strategy Program studying the US domestic politics specializing in US Congress. Today we will be discussing the early trends in the upcoming US midterms and what it means for India. Welcome Abhishek. It's a pleasure to have you with us today. Thank you. It's all a pleasure.

1:00So let us start by discussing your assessment on the emerging shift in the composition of Congress. Given the rise of ideological hardliners and both the democratic and public insights and the relative decline of moderates, what is your take on the shift? How different could the next Congress look like from the Congress that India has engaged with so far? So if we just directly jump into the main arguments that have been made here about the US Congress side, the current US Congress engagement which began and has its roots since the early 90s, when we had a new wave of diaspora going in and India also opened up to US after the fall of the Soviet Union, that was primarily centered around the leaderships of the committees of the time and also forming of caucuses that was becoming a new trend back then and we ended up making the first country dedicated caucuses first in the US, in US house and the

2:08Senate. And most of these focused on selecting highly influential targets like committee leaderships, like party leaderships and some of the senior members that were likely to become leadership were the primary targets and this meant that by the nature of the targeting itself, these members were often moderates of the parties because throughout the 90s and through 2000s, members who could bring together different factions of the parties eventually sustained in the party for long by the broader logic of it and thereby emerged as moderates who had moderates views and were also willing to engage at a bipartisan level with other parties. But this kind of nature within the Congress gradually shifted after Obama's election in 2008 and only got worsened with Trump's elections by the NIRs and the current Trump administration. As and as Congress gets more and more polarized, the leadership space is also in that sense

3:15being impacted. And that is the fundamental problem with today's India's national engagement, right? That it targets really senior members, it targets really niche points like, you know, committee leaderships and party leaderships. But in today's Congress and especially in the context of 2026 elections, a lot of these senior retiring going forward. And similarly, the moderates on which India had additionally engaged in and depended on, they are also moving away from the focus of the party as more and more hard line elements from both sides. We eat the MAGA faction from the Trump and the public inside or say the progressive Democrats within the Democratic Party, them taking a center stage, them being and attracting the popular vote is something that means that the influence that moderates had in policy

4:17making, in decision making and within the Congress in particular will be declining going forward. Okay. There was an interesting layout of how things were and how things are right now. So let's shift our focus to India. If the next Congress is going to be more ideologically divided, less predictable, what does this mean for India? And could this create new sources of uncertainty in the India US ties? And if that is the case, in which domains will this effect be more pronounced? So the broader logic behind congressional engagement, enough itself as you very rightly pointed out is the sense of predictability. And this predictability comes from the fact that while the administration is likely to change once every 10 or 5 years, the members of Congress are more longer lasting because members don't have any term limits so they can go ahead and take up multiple terms.

5:18And with each term, their experience accumulates and accumulative advantage is what translates into influence on the hill. And that's why if you engage with one particular congressional member, for example, at a early stage in their career, it used to be at least very likely that these members continue to exert that kind of influence going forward. And that is what translated into eventual stability in the relationship. But in today's Congress, which is rather unpredictable, it is unpredictable in the sense that US and India always had differences. And Congress was also active in speaking about these differences. But the nuance here was, they always kept the differences in their relationship away from the broader rhetoric about India-US relations. They also kept it siloed away from, you know, broader India-US cooperation spaces. And this meant that despite there being major differences, it was primarily there areas

6:24of partnerships that were highlighted both in public, in policy, in practice as well. And areas of their differences were often something they resolved behind closed doors within you know, more bilateral forums or even at times, doing leader-to-leader engagements, right? But increasingly, today we see that, you know, with hardliners, you know, taking more of a center stage, these areas of siloed differences, they are coming more and more into mainstream. More and more members are willing to come out and talk about these things, especially say for example, the entire discussion about Russia tariffs rate, about how India imports oil from Russia and is thereby funding the war in Ukraine as claimed by, you know, members of the US administration. And this kind of rhetoric was very blunt back when, you know, especially Biden administration

7:25was in power. And they were the one who were ramping up, you know, supporting Ukraine and ramping up the war, or prolong the war in certain degrees. Border argument there and agreement was that if India doesn't buy Russian oil, that will lead to, you know, broader instability in energy prices. And which was very rightfully so. And that is primarily the reason why, you know, this rhetoric was kept down. Secondly, border logic here was also about, you know, India, Russia, their relationships being used against China and the broader logic for that for US, right? So considering these two main points, although India, Russia relationship were a cause of concern for beat members of Congress or within the administration, they never made it a point of, you know, direct bilateral negotiation or the public discourse and the public debate about India's relations. But for the first time ever since the tariffs were imposed in 2025, we saw how this rather

8:28siloed, you know, element of their difference, which was not as publicly discussed or criticized was openly being criticized by members of the administration and even if we see currently with the passage of, you know, Lindsey Graham, Raksha and the Ransan Shensville. Even members of Congress, especially people don't send it, you know, how they discuss India has, has drastically changed in this context. So this adds to that unpredictability, right? Because it will bring more and more of these siloed issues out into the open. Another recent example can also be the discussion about FCRA, right? We know how, you know, religious tolerance and disillated discussions have always been part of India's discourse. But recently this discourse is becoming more and more public and more and more targeted at whatever is happening within India, especially from the actions of the governments, right? Like the kind of backlash that's FCRA received, especially from members of the US Congress, was very important thing to notice because although like specific members coming from specific

9:33backgrounds and specific constituencies used to raise this, but broadly members of Congress, you know, accumulatively raising this issue is something that has been a trend only since the last half a decade or so. And that should be a cause of concern for a country like India, especially, right? So going forward, these are the kind of issues we've seen. And since you asked me to identify and highlight sectors or areas where, you know, these new unpredictability would emerge and, you know, new silos that will be opened up. First among that is obviously the concept of religion, right? Because moderate Democrats, although they had a strong opinion about religious rights and things like that, they took, you know, a measure stands, especially when discussing about partners or countries that might be a beneficient of US interests. But with the rise of progressive, progressives have demonstrated, especially with the case of Israel, that they are not exactly worried about, you know, offending an ally while discussing

10:40what they will perceive as, you know, religious rights and religious freedoms, right? So progressives have clearly shown that kind of appetite. And in case of India, that only becomes worse because we already have members like Premil Ajayapal, who very openly have very strong views on the Kashmir issue and treatment of, you know, religious minorities in India and other things like that. And this will only be amplified as more and more progressives are likely to get elected or if and when they get elected into the strongest, right? Additionally, we also have the elements within the Republican Party, right? The Christian block. The Christian block has only grown stronger. It already had a very strong influence in the Republican Party ever since the beginning. But its influence has only gotten stronger as with the arrival of the Trump administration and appointment of, you know, members like KD Vance, who is the current vice president. The influence has grown and that influence will also show up in Congress in a way that both

11:45the hardliners of both the parties will have a uniting point to, you know, criticize India on this particular part. So religion is one such issue. Second is, you know, India's open markets and lack thereof. That is another important area where India has traditionally, you know, taken criticism, right? Third important element is also something like the H1V visa, which again, united certain members of the moderates, all the progressives broadly support immigration. H1V visa also focuses on immigration at a higher, you know, wage level. So and the allegations of visa fraud and things like that has also become a factor where even a lot of Democrats have been interested in taking action against H1V visa. The only thing that has been preventing them from taking this kind of action are the J1 visas or the universities and their lobbies opposing this, right? So that is also very likely to become a issue that currently began with the current administration,

12:47but is likely to, you know, also have a congressional element in it going forward. As we had seen with a few bills, you know, which a few members have tried to introduce in the past and have been pigeonholed in relation to H1V visa, right? Then broadly, another important, you know, fault line in terms of, you know, siloed approach can also be say a issue as, you know, the role of India, Israel relations and, you know, the broader foreign influence kind of angle that it might bring in right? Because India, Israel relations was the foundations on which India, US relations initially expanded around 1990s under P. Vinayar Samharo as very rightfully pointed by Yuenas Hitapathy in his book, The Half Line, right? And that initially laid foundations not only for India, US relationship, but also a relationship between the lobbies of, you know, Israel in US and India, right?

13:52And which eventually translated into India's influence on the hill, right? And it was borrowed strategies, it was strategies that were observed and adopted and things like that that eventually led to, you know, something successful as the 2008 civil nuclear deal, right? So in that context, this relationship initially worked in India's favor, but increasingly Israel lobby and Israel, you know, as a whole is becoming unpopular on both sides of, you know, the aisle. India, Israel relationship might also be positioned in a way in, in, like, this future, like how, say India, Russia relationship might be positioned, right? And similarly, the lobbies influence as well, you know, already a lot of fringe PR elements of a hard line right wing in the US have been pointing out the growing influence of Indian lobby not only within the US Congress, but also at a party level engagement, an ideological

14:55level engagement. And that should be something that is only concerned because then progressives have also pointed out, you know, Hindutva lobbying efforts within US Congress and have been critical of those kind of things as well. So this can become another point or a sector where, you know, you will have that kind of, say, say a bipartisan coming together of, you know, sectoral criticism of India. Thank you for laying out, you know, the different sectors and the impacts on it given the current political development. So let me shift gears to another form of question. So we have seen that India, US ties, you know, they have experienced considerable uncertainty during Trump's era. So how is this uncertainty that could emerge from a fragmented Congress? How is that different from the uncertainty created by the executive branch right now? Right? So how would you compare those two in one form if I can ask if they're comparable, first

15:57of all, and how can these two firms of uncertainty interact with each other? And obviously the main question is what would the impact of this beyond India? Yeah. So that's a great question, Aditi, primarily because congressional engagement as we are discussed by nature is supposed to be long term and stable and all these kind of things, right? And I think explaining it through Russia sanctions after something we can do because it is, it is more contemporary and I'm sure the listeners would be more interested to learn it from that point of view as well, right? So Trump always had the authority to impose tariffs in general because that was given away by the US Congress in 1971 if I'm not wrong, at least in the 1970s under the Nixon era, right? And obviously the emergency provisions which Supreme Court struck down, but Trump responded using section 3 not 1 to tariff, continue the tariffs and things like that.

16:57But broadly Trump had that kind of, you know, say powers to tariff any country he wants. But they were not sustainable in the long term firstly because any other administration that would come would change it. Secondly, a lot of these provisions could also be tariff announcements could be struck down by Congress if they wanted to and some of them were also to be approved by the Congress after say 180 day mark or so, right? So he had powers but they were limited and they were short term, especially those limited to his own term. But when Congress is involved, Congress this time, you know, it has given statutory value to the tariff authority, right? That means that any president who comes from now can use, will be, you know, using this particular bill and will have the powers to impose 100% tariffs on India, given, you

18:01know, with the reason of India's national imports for next five years. Anyone who comes for next five years will have this, you know, authority and irrespect of the administration changing, irrespect of the Congress itself changing. It is very unlikely that this kind of a statue will be removed or, you know, that kind of thing. Unless Congress thinks explicitly targets, you know, this particular bill and passes a specific kind of exception for India or, you know, decides to dilute this bill and pass an amendment. That is a completely different scenario but that is also unlikely to happen given that this particular bill has, you know, been sort of a middle ground between what the Trump administration wants, that is, uh, heriteting post tariffs and what the Congress broadly wants, that is to curtail Russia in relation to Ukraine, right? So this is the kind of, you know, uh, long-term nature that Congress brings and, um, about the ideological divide and, you know, lesser predictability and, and its sources, right?

19:06Uh, yeah, uh, US Congress has always like traditionally, presidents have generally lost midterms. They have at least, uh, lost one, uh, of the two chambers or sometimes have a, especially unpopular cases like the ongoing current one. We have a situation where they lose both the chambers. Generally, presidents read in the Senate but lose the house. But in 2026, it is likely that increasingly polls are predicting that, uh, Republicans are set to lose the Senate as well, right? In that context, yeah, it can be said that Democrats will simply come back into power and this and that. But for a more nuanced kind of, uh, you know, discussion on the topic and an once kind of observation would be that, would be to look at the factions within the party, right? Because within the Republican Party, there are currently three broad factions. One is the traditional, uh, you know, establishment Republican Party, which will include members across who have been, you know, New York cons and who have been, uh, libertarians, uh,

20:10soft on economy, hard on law, those kind of, uh, traditional, uh, you know, Republicans from, uh, you know, especially from southern states and things like that. And rural pockets of the United States, right? That is one section of Republicans. Second section of Republicans are the MAGA faction, which are broadly Trump supporters and hardliners. These people are also, you know, increasingly being, uh, supported by the tech lobby in the US, the AI lobby in the US and things like that. Third broader faction is, uh, third, rather smaller faction, the smallest among all these, is the split other faction from the mother called the America first faction and America first faction. Uh, it includes the top, uh, you know, it includes very strong public figures who have been openly critical of Trump administration, but have the views similar to that of the mother, right? So MAGA is defined by their loyalty to the Trump administration. And if you look at the current trends, uh, you know, in the midterms, we are seeing how, you know, increasingly, uh, members of, uh, you know, the MAGA faction are winning, uh,

21:17across, you know, the political spectrum. And, uh, initially when the current 119 Congress, we have 30 out of about 218 house members, from the Republican Party, who can be qualified as a, uh, typical MAGA, right? And similarly in, in the Senate, we have about 15 out of 53 members who can be considered MAGA, right? But this, this kind of number is only set to increase as the primaries, uh, basically indicate, right? Um, although we don't have full figures yet because in certain states, primaries are still going on in certain states, the, the results are not official. And, uh, despite the primaries happening, them making it to, you know, the house and the Senate, in of itself is a different game altogether, right? So without speaking of numbers in particular, if you look at trends in particular, the MAGA faction is likely to increase not only because they're performing well in the election as the current trends indicate, uh, with, you know, Pakistan and say, uh, let go and people like that winning, uh, you know, across with Trump's endorsement.

22:19We also have a very important, interesting case of people like, uh, Thomas Massey, right? Thomas Massey can be considered somewhat America first kind of person, but he has been openly critical of Trump administration's policies, especially his handling of the Epstein files, his current handling of the Iran war and things like that. And, um, he was, uh, publicly very strongly, uh, you know, criticized by Trump. And, uh, he eventually lost his primaries. Someone with as good, uh, or a popular of an image as Massey who, who literally was among the only Republicans who very strongly fought on a case as popular among the MAGA crowd as the Epstein files. If this could happen to that person, this could happen to anyone is the broader signal that was sent here, right? And that's why more and more people are more likely to go ahead and, you know, gain Trump support or, you know, announce their loyalty for him. And that's how the MAGA faction is likely to expand.

23:20Now coming to the Democrats, in the Democrats, uh, we have, uh, the progressives and the moderates broadly, right? And, uh, the progressives are known for, obviously, more progressive policies, uh, more, uh, democratic socialism and those kind of ideologies, right? We have members like Bernie Sanders, we have AOC traditionally who have been in the US Congress and then being that kind of influence. But with the arrival of Trump, one important trend here again, which we see is, you know, the arrival of someone like, uh, Zoran Mamdani, right? Someone like Zoran Mamdani also despite not directly impacting congressional elections, is someone who has impacted the broader trend Democrats are, you know, trying to focus on. And he creates a sort of role model for, uh, you know, for the Democratic Party to attract younger voters, uh, to attract, uh, you know, um, um, strong support to attract that kind of popular support, which they require. And which moderates largely don't have, uh, as proven by the 2024 election,

24:24right? Because when Democrats release their post-Mortem reports are called for 2024 elections, the primary criticism was, uh, you know, how Kamala Harris, uh, supported Israel and was not willing to talk about, uh, you know, the genocide and things like that. And that eventually translated into how voters began looking at this thing and how it translated to electoral politics. And, uh, Zoran Mamdani kind of provided an answer to that, right? Because his chances were clear, he was not, you know, scared of offending the Zionists. And yet despite that, he, uh, garnered enough vote, especially even including from the Jewish lobby, uh, in New York and eventually one. And this model has been ever since replicated consistently throughout, uh, the US Congress, right? Uh, with the popping up of what they call the mini-Mamdani's everywhere, you know, and them pitching up these policy ideas and them pushing the progressive course. And increasingly Democratic Party and their funders are also more willing to support these kind

25:26of candidates and are comfortable with these candidates far more than, uh, when they were comfortable with say, uh, Bernie Sanders during the election of Hillary Clinton or say, uh, AOC, when they initially began, uh, you know, their small group initially on the hill, uh, under the first Trump administration, right? So these are the broad trends under which the hardliners are moving. Right? Uh, so impact on India in that sense as we had already discussed that clearly leads to new issues which we haven't seen in the past. It, uh, also requires India primarily, uh, so what India should do about it primarily is change the nature of engagement. India today focuses on a broad nature of engagements of leaderships and things like that. We've discussed, but I think India should also focus on party-level leadership. And this is not only done through lobbying, but usage of members in our embassies and things like that, they go engage at the grassroots level with these newer candidates for winning the primaries, um, and have that relationship with them from

26:32that early stage, right? And especially, uh, since this wave relies on that kind of immigrant, uh, you know, sentiment, India should also be more actively engaging with the first and second generation immigrants who are participating in these elections. And that might have very strong connotations going forward. And just because they're not in the leadership again, doesn't mean that they will not have the influence or will be worthwhile because tomorrow, if, if and when they enter the, the hill, uh, and make it to the Congress, uh, their careers will last way longer than, you know, the kind of money we will spend on say, like engaging the USTR or the Trump administration broadly. Okay. So thank you, Abhishek, for that interesting overview of things. And I think to sum up what we've gone through is essentially, you know, what exactly we mean by the change in the composition of Congress, how the, you know, Russia sanctions come into this, India is real, ties come into this. And, you know, even, you know, all these aspects of the upcoming elections,

27:37um, and the impacts they can have. So my final question, you know, to you is, what should we, as spectators, look out for, or, you know, to try to understand the layout in these mid-term, elections? So firstly, allow me to pitch in, uh, Artaxishila product here, right? We have developed dashboard that tracks the US mid-term very closely. And it tracks everything from the day to day, news to broader developments and statistical trends in everything. So I think that is a great platform to watch out for these trends. But I think, uh, going forward, the things one should watch out for is, you know, firstly, the retirements of the members because this year has been the highest, you know, recorded member retirements in, in the recent, uh, times. And it has reached 71. And going forward, it is slightly likely that more and more people, you know, are, are likely to resign from the US Congress. This means that more and more people are also shifting, and like, not only shifting out of politics, a lot of them are going back to state legislature. And that is

28:40the important trend because state legislature is, that means, is gaining greater legitimacy. Right? So two things to watch out for again, apart from the retirements here again, that means that, uh, first is the performance of these parties at the state legislature level. And also at the governor, uh, Govritorial elections, uh, you know, that, that, uh, you know, going to happen, as part of this mid-term. These are important because, uh, state level investments and state level laws are something also India and Indian diaspora, uh, should watch out for, especially even Indian businesses as well. Right? Uh, for things like, uh, investment opportunities and that growing kind of, India, US ties. Apart from that, uh, as I had already mentioned, the factions, uh, victories of these factions and their performance broadly in the elections, um, you know, going forward, is something that one has to watch. But, uh, and not only for the parties broadly, but the factions in particular, there should be something, uh, that, that should be focused. And, uh, another

29:41important element for Indians also to watch out for is the emergence of, uh, new Indian origin members first and second generation who will be entering, uh, the arena, uh, riding the greater acceptance that young folks are getting, uh, in, in US politics currently. And the broader trend, right? So that is, these are the three main things, uh, one should definitely watch out for going into the mid-terms, uh, that are set, uh, to happen on November 3rd. Okay. Thank you, Abhishek. So as Abhishek already mentioned to stay up to date with, you know, the latest ongoing developments on US mid-term elections, we have the Aksushila's 2026 mid-term election tracker. And other than that, if you're someone looking for in-depth analysis in, on the latest developments about US impact on India, you can check out Abhishek's by monthly newsletter, PC Dossier. And links for this are attached below. Thank you for tuning in. Thank you. If you like Tarsho, dive into Taksushila's research on technology, strategy and economic affairs,

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