A tale of a gigantic faux pas at Capitol Hill.
By Sujeet Rajan
WASHINGTON, DC: Saturday Night Live Alert! Comedy Central Alert! There’s a new dunce on Capitol Hill. He comes all the way from Florida: Rep. Curt Clawson.
So, before you start saying Indian American or American Indian, don’t make the mistake of voicing it aloud in front of the freshman Republican Congressman Clawson. He might just tell you to go look for them in India. If you look puzzled, he might counter you with a smug: ‘Where else can you find that species?’
To his surprise, at a House Foreign Affairs subcommittee hearing on US-India relations at Capitol Hill on Thursday, Clawson found out that some of that billion plus number in species exist in America as well, and not all are tourists, in fact. Some of them work for the government as well, and worse, some were born in America too!
In a gigantic faux pas, which he will never be able to quite get over for the rest of his life – read that as Clawson will never be a serious contender for the White House – the Congressman mistook Nisha Desai Biswal, an assistant secretary at the State Department, and Arun Kumar, an assistant secretary at the Commerce Department, to be officials of the Indian government (thankfully for him, it was not a hearing for American Indians and a discussion on reservations).
The Foreign Policy, which broke the report of Clawson’s misadventures at the hearing, along with a wonderful video of what he had to convey to the ‘guests’ from India – and which we have reproduced for our readers below – had the grand finale of him asking a question of the duo.
Kumar can be seen visibly grinning, as he realized what was going on but stayed silent. Biswal showed calm composure and presence of mind in giving a diplomatic answer to Clawson, who decided to chump it out and have the last word on it as well, much to the delight of the late night standups, whose staff must be writing scripts furiously to meet deadlines tonight.
Clawson, a former businessman and basketball player, came to the hallowed corridors of Capitol Hill by way of a special election, replacing Trey Radel, who resigned following a cocaine bust.
In case you don’t want to get into the video part, this is how things went, with Clawson remarking to Biswal and Kumar, looking into his notes surreptitiously:
“I’m familiar with your country. I love your country. And I understand the complications of so many languages and so many cultures and so many histories all rolled up in one,” he said.
He carried forth, on the issue of opening up Indian markets: “Just as your capital is welcome here to produce good-paying jobs in the U.S., I’d like our capital to be welcome there. I ask cooperation and commitment and priority from your government in so doing. Can I have that?
There was a moment of stunned silence, as everybody in the room swallowed, before Biswal showed remarkable poise, and responded: “I think your question is to the Indian government. We certainly share your sentiment, and we certainly will advocate that on behalf of the U.S.”
Clawson, who might be fondly remembering the good old controversy-free days on basketball courts, and trying to figure out who was the one who pushed him into politics, sent in an apology on Friday: “I made a mistake in speaking before being fully briefed and I apologize. I’m a quick study, but in this case I shot an air ball.”
Can’t wait for Rep. Clawson to shoot a basket.
(Sujeet Rajan is the Editor-in-Chief of The American Bazaar)