File picture of Dr. Sampat S. Shivangi
| Photo Credit: V. Sreenivasa Murthy

Eminent Indian-American physician Dr. Sampat Shivangi has been elected as an official delegate to the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee this month that would formally nominate former U.S. president Donald Trump as the party’s presidential candidate.

Mr. Trump, 78, is the presumptive Republican Party candidate for the presidential election.

An influential Indian-American community leader, Dr. Shivangi, has been elected as a National Delegate at the convention for the sixth time.

“It is a great pleasure and honour to share the news that I have been nominated and elected as (an) official delegate at the upcoming Republican National Convention to be held in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, from July 13 to July 19, 2024,” Dr. Shivangi said.

The four-day Republican National Convention (RNC) in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, would formally nominate Mr. Trump as the party’s candidate for the November 5 presidential election.

The nomination process would be completed by Republican delegates from across the country.

Dr. Shivangi, a lifelong member of the Republican Party and a founding member of the Republican Indian Council and the Republican Indian National Council, has been nominated as RNC delegate six consecutive times.

“This will be my sixth time serving as a National Delegate at the Republican National Convention to nominate the Republican Party nominee to contest the national presidential election,” he said.

“My nomination began as early as when President George W. Bush was nominated in New York, then-Senator George McCain, Governor Mitt Romney, (and) President Donald Trump in 2016 and 2020. Now again to re-elect President Donald Trump in 2024 in Milwaukee,” he said.

He is the national president of the Indian American Forum for Political Education, one of the oldest Indian American Associations.

Over the past three decades, he has lobbied for several bills in the U.S. Congress on behalf of India through his enormous contacts with U.S. Senators and Congressmen.

“I feel this is a unique honour and an opportunity for an Indian American to represent the community at the national level,” he said.

Dr. Shivangi said he would be part of the luncheon hosted by Governor Tate Reeves of Mississippi in honour of the delegates at Northern Lights in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, on July 16, for the Mississippi delegates.

Former U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley. File
| Photo Credit: AP

Nikki Haley said on May 22 that she would vote for Donald Trump in the general election, encouraging the presumptive GOP nominee to work hard to win support from those who backed her in the primary.

“I will be voting for Trump,” Ms. Haley, Trump’s former U.N. ambassador, said during an event at the Hudson Institute in Washington.

But she also made it clear that she feels Mr. Trump has to work to win over voters who supported her during her primary campaign and continue to cast votes for her in ongoing primary contests.

“Having said that, I stand by what I said in my suspension speech,” Ms. Haley added. “Trump would be smart to reach out to the millions of people who voted for me and continue to support me and not assume that they’re just going to be with him. And I genuinely hope he does that.”

Haley shuttered her bid for the GOP nomination two months ago but did not immediately endorse Mr. Trump. Both candidates were sharply critical of each other during the primary.