The 1st “Indian” US President?

Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal — a one-time Republican rising star seeking to become one again — announced Wednesday evening that he will run for president in 2016. 

“We have a bunch of great talkers running for president,” Jindal said at the Pontchartrain Center here in this New Orleans suburb, as supporters waved “Geaux Bobby” signs. “We’ve had enough of talkers. It is time for a doer.”   

The 44-year-old son of immigrants was the first Indian American to become a U.S. governor and, now, to become a serious presidential candidate. He sought to play up his long-shot status as a strength, casting himself as a man with nothing to lose, who owes nothing to the Republican establishment.

“I will do the things you cannot do in Washington,” he told a crowd of about 500. “I will say the things you cannot say.”

Following a new tradition in U.S. campaigns, Jindal announced his intention at least three times on Wednesday. First he tweeted it, and then he said it into a microphone at this conference center in Kenner.

And in a novel move, he released  a hidden-camera video  earlier in the day showing how he and his wife had announced the news to their three children.

“We have decided we are going to be running for president this year,” Jindal said, in the tone of a father saying they were expecting another baby. “That’s good? So is that a surprise?” the governor asked.

“Maybe you’ll get a chance, if you behave, to go back to Iowa,” Jindal told his children in the video. He also promised them a puppy if he became president.

It’s looking very unlikely that Jindal’s children will get that puppy.

That’s because Jindal is the 13th Republican to enter the 2016 presidential race, and several more are expected. And at the moment, he is at the back of that large pack. In a recent Fox News poll, Jindal received just 1 percent of the vote — putting him behind all the other candidates. He also was behind “None of the Above,” which got 2 percent.

In campaign videos, and in an introductory speech by his wife, Jindal was cast as unafraid to take on long-shot fights. Beginning with this campaign.

“The key to Bobby Jindal is that he is absolutely fearless,” Supriya Jindal said, adding that she had turned Jindal down in high school the first time he asked her out.

When Jindal took the stage (to Garth Brooks’s “Callin’ Baton Rouge”), he said he would try to slash the size of the federal government, show strength to American enemies overseas, secure the U.S. border, and try to reform Medicare and Social Security.

Jindal also said — in a portion familiar from his pre-announcement stump speeches — that he would make sure new immigrants assimilated to U.S. culture to try to prevent enclaves of immigrants who reject American ways.

“I’m sick and tired of people dividing Americans,” he said. “And I am done with all this talk about hyphenated Americans. We are not Indian Americans, Irish Americans, African Americans, rich Americans or poor Americans. We are all Americans.”

Jindal also singled out former Florida governor Jeb Bush by name as insufficiently conservative. He concluded his speech by saying that for Republicans to have a chance at winning the presidency, they need to take a chance on a purist long shot.

“Republicans must stop being afraid to lose. If we try to hide who we are again, we will lose again,” he said.