5 Things You Should Know About Bobby Jindal 
 
 Enlarge this image toggle caption Rainier Ehrhardt/AP Rainier Ehrhardt/AP 
 
 This story was updated at 12:45 p.m. ET 
 
 Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal announced Wednesday he is running for president, becoming the 13th major Republican candidate to enter the race. 
 
 Once seen as a rising star in the GOP, the 44-year-old Indian-American politician now faces long odds in a crowded primary. He's mired at the bottom of most polls, a situation that threatens to keep him off the main debate stage in the first GOP presidential primary debates in August. 
 
 That wasn't always the outlook for the former congressman. Seen as a policy wunderkind, who quickly moved up the ranks from state and federal administrations to lead his state, he was mentioned as a 2012 presidential candidate, but eventually passed on the race. Though his approval ratings in the Bayou State have dropped dramatically amid budget fights, he has still tried to keep a high national profile by hitting the cattle-call circuit to build up his White House chances. 
 
 Jindal's best shot at catching fire in 2016 is to appeal to religious conservatives, especially in the early states of Iowa and South Carolina. But that's a crowded space this time around. Though he's a Roman Catholic, he has said he considers himself an "evangelical Catholic." At last week's Faith and Freedom Coalition gathering in Washington, he got a good reception from the crowd as he shared his personal journey to Christianity, and Iowa GOP observers have also said he's gotten positive marks on the trail there, too. 
 
 Here are five things to know about Bobby Jindal: 
 
 1. Bobby isn't his real name; it's a nickname inspired by The Brady Bunch. 
 
 Jindal was born Piyush Jindal in Baton Rouge in 1971 to parents who had emigrated just months earlier from India. When he was 4 years old, he asked to be called Bobby after one of the brothers on the popular family sitcom. 
 
 Raised Hindu, Jindal converted to Christianity in high school after a friend shared his faith with him. Jindal would read his Bible with a flashlight in his closet, hiding his conversion from his parents. 
 
 "I read the words of Jesus Christ, and I realized that they were true," Jindal said in a 2014 commencement address at Liberty University. "I used to think that I had found God, but I believe it is more accurate to say that He found me." 
 
 2. He's a Rhodes scholar — and had a young start in government and public policy. 
 
 Jindal graduated at just 20 years old from Brown University with degrees in both biology and public policy. He was admitted to both Harvard Medical School and Yale Law School, but he turned down both to attend Oxford University as a Rhodes scholar. 
 
 There, he studied health policy and eventually returned to his native state to serve as secretary of the Louisiana Department of Health and Hospitals — all at the young age of 24. Four years later, at just 28, he was appointed the youngest-ever president of the University of Louisiana system. 
 
 In 2001, President George W. Bush appointed him to be assistant secretary for the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, acting as the chief policy adviser to the director of HHS. 
 
 Enlarge this image toggle caption Bill Haber/Associated Press Bill Haber/Associated Press 
 
 3. Jindal lost his first run for elective office, but has won every one since. 
 
 Jindal left his role with HHS in 2003 to run for governor. Louisiana has an open primary system in which all candidates are on the ballot regardless of party. In that first vote, Jindal topped the field, easily besting the second-place finisher, Democratic Lt. Gov. Kathleen Blanco. But in that November's runoff election, Blanco narrowly prevailed, despite the fact that Jindal earned some Democratic support, including an endorsement from then-New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin. Some believed racism was to blame for his close loss. 
 
 Jindal went on to be elected to Congress the following year, though, and was re-elected in 2006. Under fire for her handling of the recovery from Hurricane Katrina in 2005, Blanco decided not to run for re-election. Jindal ran again and, this time, he easily beat state Sen. Walter Boasso, who had switched from the GOP just that April to run for governor. In 2011, Jindal won outright without a runoff, winning with more than 65 percent of the vote. 
 
 4. One of Jindal's biggest moments instead drew comparison to Kenneth the page. 
 
 In 2009, the young Louisiana governor was tapped to deliver the GOP response to newly elected President Obama's first address to a joint session of Congress. The plum post was supposed to launch him onto the national stage and buttress a Republican Party badly in need of diversity. 
 
 YouTube 
 
 But Jindal, normally a fast talker, looked halting and timid, as he awkwardly delivered an attempt at a folksy speech. Both Republicans and Democrats panned the address, and many unflatteringly compared him to 30 Rock's bumpkin character, Kenneth the page. 
 
 Enlarge this image toggle caption Carolyn Kaster/Associated Press Carolyn Kaster/Associated Press 
 
 5. He has the Duck Dynasty seal of approval. 
 
 One TV comparison Jindal is happy to feed is his relationship with the Robertson family, stars of the popular A&E; series Duck Dynasty. The show chronicles the camo-clad, bearded family that runs a booming duck-call business. It is popular among conservatives and those in the Bible Belt; the Robertson family are seen praying each episode and talking openly about their faith. 
 
 But Jindal's connection to the show hasn't been without controversy. The family patriarch, Phil, came under fire for comments he made about people who are gay; Jindal, though, stood behind him and criticized Robertson's suspension from the network. When Jindal began to explore a White House run, the Robertson family had his back as well. 
 
 "I'm the kind of guy who really likes smart people ... and that guy's one of the smartest people I've ever met in my life," son Willie Robertson said on Fox News earlier this year, throwing his support behind Jindal. "He's young, but he's got the values; he's got the intelligence to do it." ||||| Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal talked the importance of conservatism and faith as he joined the crowded Republican field for the U.S. presidency in 2016. (Reuters) 
 
 This story has been updated. 
 
 KENNER, La. -- Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal, a one-time rising star in the Republican Party now struggling to become one again, announced Wednesday that he is running for president in 2016. 
 
 Jindal made his entry into the race on Twitter, ahead of a planned formal announcement in this New Orleans suburb at about 5 p.m. Eastern time. 
 
 I’m running for President of the United States of America. Join me: http://t.co/MmqB4kxpUq — Gov. Bobby Jindal (@BobbyJindal) June 24, 2015 
 
 There had been little doubt that the 44-year-old second-term governor would run. He has already traveled multiple times to early-primary states -- spending 45 percent of his days outside of Louisiana last year. And this year, some of Jindal's top state-government aides left to join his presidential "exploratory committee." 
 
 Jindal becomes the first Indian American to ever be a serious candidate for president. But at this point, his chances of winning the GOP nomination seem extraordinarily low. 
 
 [Southerner. Wonk. Immigrants’ son. Can Bobby Jindal win at every role?] 
 
 There are already 12 other major Republican candidates in the race, with several more expected to enter soon. And Jindal is running behind nearly all of them: Several recent polls have shown him at just 1 percent support among GOP voters, either last or tied for last. 
 
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 In the most recent Fox News poll, the news was even worse. Jindal wasn't just behind all the other candidates, he was also behind "None of the Above," which got 2 percent. 
 
 Jindal aides and advisers say that a central part of the governor’s pitch will be that he is “fearless.” His recently declared opposition to gay marriage and an executive order on religious freedoms will be data points to show that he’s willing to take on the corporate wing of the party in ways that no one else is. 
 
 “He’s not afraid to talk about things that normal politicians are nervous to talk about,” one aide said, previewing the announcement anonymously because Jindal had not formally announced his candidacy yet. 
 
 In the months leading up to his launch, Jindal tried to stand out from his GOP rivals by playing up his Catholic faith, being unusually hawkish on defense issues, and being unusually tough on fellow Republicans in Washington. 
 
 Jindal has said that congressional Republicans frequently surrender to President Obama on issues like immigration and health-care reform and "need a spine." 
 
 Jindal, the Louisiana-born son of Indian immigrants, has also been strident about the need for immigrants to assimilate quickly into American culture. Jindal has derided the idea of "hyphenated Americans," saying that people who call themselves Indian Americans and African Americans should think of themselves as simply Americans first. 
 
 [From Piyush to Bobby: On the eve of a 2016 bid, Jindal plays down his Indian heritage] 
 
 Jindal has also called for barring people who believe in "radical Islam" from coming to the United States at all. 
 
 “So in other words we shouldn’t tolerate those who want to come and try to impose some variant of, some version of sharia law,” Jindal told a conservative think tank in March, according to the Guardian newspaper. “I fear if we don’t insist on assimilation,” he said, “we then go the way of Europe.” 
 
 Bobby Jindal released video of he and his wife, Supriya, talking to their children to accompany his announcement that he will run for president. (Facebook/Bobby Jindal) 
 
 Just eight years ago, Jindal's future looked far brighter than it does now. The former Rhodes Scholar and McKinsey consultant was elected governor at age 36, the first Indian American ever to govern a state. “The question is not whether he’ll be president,” Republican strategist Steve Schmidt said in 2008, “but when he’ll be president.” 
 
 Jindal seemed to offer a new vision of what a Republican could be: an Ivy League-educated son of immigrants, who had a relentless focus on making government run faster, smarter and cleaner. 
 
 “We’ve laughed at our politicians and the ones that have gone to jail and made the funny jokes,” Jindal said in 2007, after he was elected governor on the second try. “But it’s not funny anymore.” 
 
 But, as Jindal pondered higher office, he seemed to fall into a strange and vicious negative-feedback loop. 
 
 To address doubts among national conservatives, Jindal repeatedly embraced harder-line conservative positions -- both in terms of Louisiana's budget and in terms of social issues. But each time, he moved further away from the wonky, pragmatic persona that had made him famous in the first place. 
 
 So the doubts grew. And Jindal tried to be more hard-line. And so on. 
 
 Jindal's problems on the national stage began in 2009, when he was selected to give the GOP response to President Obama's first address to Congress. The response wound up being more memorable than the speech -- but not in a good way. Jindal seemed overly slow and over-earnest, like a man explaining the government to toddlers. People compared him to Kenneth the Page, the child-like character on NBC's comedy "30 Rock." 
 
 Since then, Jindal has tried to rebuild his reputation among conservatives with a rigid anti-tax stance in Louisiana. In fact, legislators say, Jindal has often allowed the Washington-based group Americans for Tax Reform to dictate the details of his own budget policies. 
 
 The results was repeated blowups with the GOP-led state legislature and threats of devastating cuts in the state budget. By the end of this year's session, legislators were so unhappy with Jindal that they tried to stop paying for his security detail at presidential campaign events. 
 
 That fighting over the budget -- and Jindal's frequent trips out of state -- also caused his in-state popularity to plummet. In his first year as governor, 77 percent of Louisianans thought he was doing a good job. By last month, the figure had fallen to 32 percent, an all-time low. 
 
 [As he nears a 2016 bid, Louisiana's Bobby Jindal hits political bottom] 
 
 Jindal's advisers are hoping that the only place to go now is up. 
 
 "Nobody knows who he is," as one aide put it. They believe most voters still only remember the governor from his botched response speech, and that -- if the bar is set that low -- voters will be pleasantly surprised to hear a more polished, experienced Jindal speak now. 
 
 He will spend this Thursday and Friday in New Hampshire and Iowa, with more travel scheduled after that. Aides think he’s an excellent retail politician, and that his up-from-the-bootstraps story will resonate in a contest with former Florida governor Jeb Bush, the heir to a presidential dynasty. 
 
 In preparation for this run, Jindal's supporters launched a super PAC called "Believe Again." That motto echoed one from Jindal's first inaugural address as governor: "I'm asking you to once again believe in Louisiana." 
 
 But, in this crowded field, Jindal doesn't even have a full claim on his own slogan. BuzzFeed reported this week that Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Tex.), was also using "Believe Again" as a slogan for his own, better-polling presidential campaign. 
 
 Hohmann reported from Washington. ||||| Imagine, if you will, that a young Republican governor of a Southern state is thinking about running for president. He’s wildly popular at home — on his way to winning re-election with 66 percent of the vote. He’s Indian-American in a party that desperately wants to reach out to nonwhite voters. He’s got rock-solid conservative credentials, and he would be entering a historically weak primary field. 
 
 But he doesn’t pull the trigger. 
 
 More Politics 
 
 Four years later, Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal is unpopular in his home state. He’s trailing Democrat Hillary Clinton there in a hypothetical 2016 matchup (Mitt Romney won the state by 17 percentage points in 2012). Jindal plans to officially enter the Republican primary today, but this year, he hasn’t polled higher than 2 percent nationally, 2 percent in any Iowa caucus survey or 3 percent in any New Hampshire primary poll. 
 
 In other words, Jindal missed his best chance to run for president. He’s jumping into a much tougher primary. 
 
 First, there was less competition in 2012. In the summer of 2011, just 47 percent of Republican voters were at least “somewhat satisfied” with their choices, according to an ABC News/Washington Post survey. That dissatisfaction allowed Rick Perry to enter the race pretty late and shoot to the top of the polls, and it might have provided an opening for Jindal. 
 
 Today, it’s a different story. According to a YouGov poll conducted last week, 73 percent of Republicans are satisfied with the Republican field. It’s not the type of election where Republican voters are likely to leap at the next alternative. There could be up to 13 recent statewide or national officeholders running, depending on whether Chris Christie, John Kasich and Scott Walker ultimately join the fray. That would be the most since the implementation of the system of selecting nominees through caucuses and primaries in 1972. The primary four years ago featured just six recent statewide or national officeholders. 
 
 Worse, Jindal has little new to offer. There could be up to seven other current and former governors running — many more than in 2012. Jindal also would have been the only serious candidate younger than 50 in 2012, but he’s joined by Ted Cruz, Marco Rubio and Walker in 2016. 
 
 And most importantly, Jindal’s ideological space is already occupied. 
 
 In 2012, Jindal would have mainly been competing for the affections of social conservative voters with Michele Bachmann, Perry and Rick Santorum. Only the latter two had ever won statewide office, and they both had their own problems. Now, Jindal has to go up against five other candidates for the social conservative vote, including four who have won statewide office before. 
 
 All in all, 2016 is a much tougher game than 2012. But it’s not just that this field is stronger, Jindal is also weaker. 
 
 Even after his subpar State of the Union response in 2009, Jindal was quite popular with Republicans. According to a 2010 Gallup poll: 45 percent of Republicans nationwide viewed Jindal favorably, and 9 percent viewed him unfavorably. In three live interview polls conducted so far this year, he’s averaged just 30 percent favorable and 15 percent unfavorable. That is, more Republicans dislike him even as fewer people can form an opinion of him. His net favorability rating, +15 percentage points, is among the worst of the Republican candidates. 
 
 Debate criteria make Jindal’s lack of name recognition especially damaging. Jindal would have been on stage in 2012. According to what we understand about the criteria for the first televised GOP debate (sponsored by Fox News), Jindal wouldn’t make the cut. In fact, with an average of 0.6 percent in the last five national live interview surveys, Jindal is polling dead last among 16 possible candidates. He’s even trailing George Pataki. That’s a big problem; debates are one of the best ways for a relatively unknown candidate to make some noise (see Mike Huckabee, 2008). 
 
 But what if Jindal managed to bring up his name recognition? Four years ago, we might have had reason to think that increased exposure would significantly improve his chances: The Republicans who knew Jindal best — Louisiana Republicans — really liked him. In a 2010 Public Policy Polling survey of Louisiana Republicans, Jindal earned 44 percent of the vote and led his nearest competitor by 29 percentage points in a hypothetical Republican presidential primary. By June 2014, he had fallen to 12 percent and fourth place in Louisiana. No one has ever won a major party nomination when polling below 25 percent with voters in their own state at this point in the campaign. 
 
 Indeed, Jindal has managed to perturb many former allies in Louisiana, thanks to budget slashes and shortfalls. He has a Martin O’Malley problem: Jindal is unpopular at home. His approval rating among Louisiana Republicans is just 54 percent, down 25 percentage points from 2012. 
 
 When you put it all together, it’s unclear why Jindal is running. He has little shot of winning, and other candidates are articulating his ideological views. He shouldn’t have waited for 2016. He should have run in 2012. 
 
 Check out our live coverage of the second Republican debate.
– There's always room for one more: "My name is Bobby Jindal, and I am running for President of the United States of America." So declared the Louisiana governor today. The 44-year-old Indian-American is low in most polls, however, and faces steep odds. One typical example of coverage: FiveThirtyEight calls him a strong candidate—if this were 2012. NPR, meanwhile, rounds up some odds and ends about him, including: Given name: He was born Piyush Jindal in Louisiana, but asked to be called Bobby at age 4—after Bobby Brady of the Brady Bunch. Rhodes scholar: He turned down Harvard Medical School and Yale Law School to attend Oxford as a Rhodes scholar and study health policy. He then ran his home state's health department at age 24. Bad impression: He was a given a huge opportunity to make his name by delivering the GOP response to President Obama's first congressional address in 2009. Instead, he drew comparisons to Kenneth on 30 Rock. Jindal will have a formal address later tonight, notes the Washington Post, which calls his chances "extraordinarily low" among the 12 other major GOP candidates (so far). His entry is no surprise, it adds: "In the months leading up to his launch, Jindal tried to stand out from his GOP rivals by playing up his Catholic faith, being unusually hawkish on defense issues, and being unusually tough on fellow Republicans in Washington."