Meet 19-year-old Kaveesh Pathak, Massachusetts' youngest Electoral College member

After a few long days following the presidential election, this week’s Joy Beat offers some political coverage that’s still a much-needed reprieve from the discourse. 

We’re celebrating someone who, on Dec. 17, will become known as “The Honorable Kaveesh Pathak.” At just 19 years old, Kaveesh is Massachusetts’ youngest Electoral College member chosen by the Democratic Party’s state committee.

Although former President Donald Trump won the presidency, Vice President Kamala Harris still won Massachusetts, which means Kaveesh and 10 other electors will head to the State House to cast Massachusetts’ 11 Electoral College votes for the Democrat.

Kaveesh joined GBH’s All Things Considered host Arun Rath to talk about what the future has in store for him and his generation. What follows is a lightly edited transcript.

Arun Rath: I think we need to start off with something that’s not joyful for you, obviously, which is that the candidate you’ll be casting your ballot for, Kamala Harris, did not win the election.

I know you’ve talked about how, as an Indian American, you would have had a unique opportunity to play a part in electing the first Indian American to become president. Tell us a bit about how you’re feeling at this moment.

Kaveesh Pathak: Yeah. Tuesday night and, subsequently, Wednesday — and, of course, I think for the next decent time — it’s tough, you know. Thinking about myself and thinking about a lot of self-care and making sure that I’m taking care of myself mentally is going to be very important because there is a feeling of grief right now that the Vice President lost her election.

But, like she said in her speech, the fight really does go on for our values and what we believe in. I do have some joy, still, because even though she did not win, she’s still a very historic pick for our next president, and she’s still very historic for my community.

To still be able to represent my community and — you know, this is a historic moment for us still. It’s an incredible honor, and I’m really excited for it.

Rath: Let’s talk about your journey. Tell us a bit about your political background and when you became politically aware. When did your activism start?

Pathak: Yeah, I became politically aware after Parkland.

Rath: The school shooting.

Pathak: Yeah. Seeing what happened in Parkland was terrible. It was also scary for a lot of people. I was in middle school at the time, and I led my school walkout.

After that, I did some work on gun violence prevention, and I went to actually work in climate going into high school. I went to a fundraiser, and I remember meeting some who I met during my gun violence prevention time. That was Jim Cantwell, who is a former state rep and Senator Ed Markey’s state director, and sort of made that connection there again with him.

I led my school’s climate strike 20 days into freshman year, and then towards January, I saw that Senator Markey had a really tough reelection. And, you know, he was a climate champion, so I wanted to get involved.

I emailed Jim, and Jim got me my first political internship because he connected me with the Markey team. I learned a ton — shoutout to Team Markey — and then I was able to actually make a really solid connection with a state rep. Her name was Tami Gouveia. I was one of the first people she told that she was running for lieutenant governor, and I was staff on that campaign.

It was an incredible moment. It was an incredible learning experience because I got to find some amazing people, meet a lot of people in the state and learn from a sitting state representative firsthand.

And then, from there, I ran for the Democratic State Committee seat, which is the governing board of the party. Luckily, I won. I also had interned at the party at the time too, for a brief period.

Rath: It sounds like luck had maybe not so much to do with it. It sounds like a lot of hard work on your part.

Pathak: I think it was a lot of hard work, but I think luck did play a big key. I ended up meeting a lot of people right at the right time, is what I’ll say — which doesn’t always happen for everyone. So, I’m super thankful for the people I’ve met along the way: the mentors, the people who have given me guidance, the former bosses. All of them played a big role.

Rath: Brilliant. Now, you competed against 50 older candidates for this. What was it like to run for this?

Pathak: You know, it was definitely really tough. I remember when I first decided to run, those first couple of calls. I’d called some people pretty close to me and within the state committee — you know, the chair of the Young Dems, big supporter, and he’s a good friend of mine, [he] supported me early on. As well as a former state rep who’s on the committee, and she’s known me for a couple of years. So those were my first calls.

But other calls I had that were not people I knew had told me that this was an honor, really, for older people in the party and that they respected my choice to run, but they were unsure if I was even viable. So I definitely got off [those calls] and felt a little bit like I had a lot of friction going into this.

But I’m a really determined person. I also think I’m a really ambitious person, and I don’t like being told what to do by anyone. So, I just kept on pushing. And I ended up calling, I think, every single person in the party on the state committee. I dialed them at least once, I left a message to everyone.

I wasn’t able to talk to everyone necessarily, but was able to talk to some amazing people, and I think people saw that I hustled really hard for this, and they chose to vote for me partially because of that, which was really kind.

Rath: Yeah. Listen well, kids — this is how you do it.

Kaveesh, I’m really curious to ask — I think it’s a safe assumption that you’re not done now. As we’re looking ahead to the future, both your future political aspirations and, also, so much has been made of the youth vote in this election. And as a young person yourself, I’m curious about where you’re thinking you and things go from here.

Pathak: Yeah. You know, the youth vote was definitely really interesting this year. It wasn’t ... I could never have predicted what happened, especially with young men. That swing was shocking to me.

But I think, when it comes to my own future within the party and in the work I do politically, I don’t plan on running for public office — which surprises a lot of people, but it’s just not something I’m interested in because there’s so many ways to make an impact. It’s just not the way I see myself making an impact. Within the party, though, I do want to grow, and I want to continue to learn.

We have some amazing people on the state committee. We have an amazing leadership team on the state committee in Massachusetts. Our chair, our vice chairs, are all really amazing people if you get to know them. So I’d love to continue learning from them, our subcommittee chairs and, eventually, work my way up to leadership within the state committee.

You know, I also have my eye on — this is very long term, but potentially becoming a member of the Democratic National Committee, which is a big goal of mine. But it’s something that’s definitely on my radar because I feel like I have a lot to add as I grow and as I become more understanding of just, generally, politics, but also generally the world around us — technology, all these things that are just growing rapidly.

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