The real unheralded winner of Tuesday’s Massachusetts primary was not even on the ballot.
He is V.A. Shiva Ayyadurai — known as Shiva — who is running as an Independent for the U.S. Senate against U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Warren, the Democrat, and Republican challenger Geoff Diehl, who last week won the Republican nomination for the job.
You may have heard of Shiva. He is a successful Indian (the sub-continent) born U.S. entrepreneur who grew up in New Jersey and who claims to have invented email. He has lived the American Dream, rising from working-class poor to success.
He first announced his candidacy as a Republican, but when that went nowhere he dropped out of the GOP primary and became an unenrolled candidate.
He has gathered twice the 10,000 signatures to get on the ballot in November as an Independent.
Since leaving the GOP the MIT graduate has been riding around the state in a campaign bus attempting to stir up support by attacking Warren and, at the time, the three Republicans who ran for the party nomination last Tuesday.
That nomination was won by state Rep. Geoff Diehl, a Donald Trump supporter, who got 118,866 votes. He bested businessman John Kingston, who got 55,496 votes, and GOP activist and businesswoman Beth Lindstrom. She finished third with 37,331 votes.
One of the interesting developments (or non-developments) in the GOP primary contest was that it was a “fake Indian” free zone. None of the three Republicans took issue with Warren’s disputed claims to be descended from Native Americans, namely the Cherokee Nation.
While there is scant evidence, according to The Boston Globe, that Warren used her minority status to get ahead in the academic world, she did list herself as a Native American on official documents. She has yet to come up with any evidence, including a DNA test, that would prove she has Native American ancestry.
With President Trump calling Warren, a potential presidential rival, “Pocahontas” and a “fake Indian,” people fully expect the matter to become an issue again — especially with Shiva in the race.
Shiva, a Trump supporter, talks about himself as “the real Indian” in the contest. He even has the slogan painted on the sides of his campaign bus.
On primary night, Shiva, through his website, invited supporters to join him at a Cambridge event to “find out which Fake Republican will be running along with the Fake Indian.”
Diehl, a former Democrat who once voted for Joe Biden, is a solid, well- spoken conservative who has taken Warren to task for favoring higher taxes, abolishing ICE, and her support of sanctuary cities.
Diehl, a Trump supporter, expected to get endorsed by Trump during the primary campaign, but that failed to happen.
Said Shiva, “He voted for the guy (Biden) who wanted to punch President Trump in the face. He’s a fake Republican.”
What role, if any, President Trump will play in the Massachusetts election remains unknown. But there is the possibility that the Diehl/Warren 2018 clash could turn out to be a proxy fight of the possible Warren/Trump presidential fight in 2020.
Should Trump intervene in the Massachusetts Senate campaign, you can rest assured that Trump being Trump he will hammer Warren for being a “fake Indian.”
It would be an awkward time for Diehl, who has avoided the issue of Warren’s disputed background.
It will not be awkward for Shiva, however. He relishes the clash.
First he must get invited to the proposed television debates that will be held. And so far, he has been shut out, despite being on the November ballot.
While Warren and Diehl have agreed on three television debates, Shiva has not been invited to any. The first is in Springfield October 21, sponsored by the Western Massachusetts Media Consortium on WGBY; the second is in Boston on WCVB sponsored by The Globe and UMass; and the third is to be announced.
Shiva said debate officials conducted polls to determine qualified debate participants, but they exclude him.
“Shame on them. This is total corruption. They want to make me illegitimate. This is racist,” he said. “My parents left India and came to the U.S. to escape racism.”
The Trump angle is important. While Trump may not be popular in Massachusetts, he did get one million votes in 2016 compared to the 1.3 million that Hillary Clinton received. Shiva thinks he can get those votes.
There are 2,747,535 registered Independent or unenrolled voters like Shiva in Massachusetts. This is more than double the number of registered Democrats (1,492,399) and Republicans (465,952) combined. For that reason alone, Shiva should be part of the television debates.
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