Two Indian Americans, running as candidates for Senate and Congressional elections, have raised USD 4.6 million and USD 1.2 million respectively.
Shiva Ayyadurai, 54, is running as an independent senatorial candidate from Massachusetts against the powerful incumbent Elizabeth Warren from the Democratic party.
Trying to run an unconventional campaign on the slogan of "Only A Real Indian Can Defeat The Fake Indian", Ayyadurai said that his campaign ended March 2018 with a total of USD 4.6 million in contributions. The first quarter of 2018 saw the campaign receiving over USD 2.5 million and it had over USD 105,000 cash on hand, he said.
The Warren campaign has not released its latest figures. But at the start of the year, she had more than USD 14 million in her campaign account.
The Mumbai-born scientist and entrepreneur is known for his controversial claim of being the "inventor of email", based on the electronic mail software called "EMAIL which he wrote as a high school student in the late 1970s.
The "Shiva 4 Senate" campaign said its fund-raising contributions, a formidable social media presence, combined with nearly 4,000 volunteers, who have signed on to the campaign across Massachusetts, reflect the enormous strength of this historic grassroots campaign.
On April 5, the campaign received a letter from the City of Cambridge stating that fines of USD 300 per day would be levied along with legal action if the campaign refused to take down the signage "Only A Real Indian Can Defeat The Fake Indian."
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