The Republican Hindu Coalition, which has worked closely in Donald Trump’s presidential campaign and with his transition team, is in the eye of a storm within the Indian-American community as it supported President’s temporary ban on immigrants and travelers from 7 Muslim-majority countries.
“Republican Hindu Coalition Announces Full-throated Support For Trump Administration Executive Order On Immigration,” said RHC in a press release.
“We applaud the Trump administration for taking this decisive move to protect our citizens from Islamic terror,” Shalabh Kumar, chairman of RHC said.
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“A firm stance against terror is one of the pillars of our organization and one of the central tenets of the Trump campaign, and we fully support our Commander-in-Chief taking the necessary steps to protect our country,” said Kumar, a Chicago-based entrepreneur.
“The actions of the Republican Hindu Coalition today do not reflect the breadth and diversity of the Indian American community, or our Diaspora,” asserted Rep. Ami Bera, D-California, at a press conference organized by the AAPI Victory Fund at the National Press Club.
“It is good that we have Indian-Americans belonging to different parties. We need that,” Shekar Narasimhan, a Democratic activist and founder of AAPIVictory Fund said.
“I am also a Hindu-American. I don’t agree,” Narasimhan said. “I want to make sure our position as Indian-Americans, as Hindus, As Americans, were not misrepresented,” he added.
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“While the Foundation understood the Trump Administration’s desire for diligent and extensive vetting of people entering the US from the nations that the Obama Administration identified as being potential sources of terrorist threats, even a temporary ban on the entry of all refugees, as well as those individuals already holding valid immigrant or nonimmigrant visas from these seven Middle Eastern and North African countries risked harm to innocent people,” Hindu American Foundation said in a statement.
The HAF Executive Director, Suhag Shukla said that “implementing any sort of religious preference for admittance would be fundamentally unconstitutional and any permanent blanket ban based on national origin would be illegal.”
“This executive order does not make us safer,” said Nisha Desai Biswal, assistant secretary for South and Central Asian Affairs at the State Department in the Obama administration, adding, “To single out people because of their nationality or their faith is unethical. It goes against our responsibilities from the Geneva Conventions and poses an unjust, un-American and what we believe to be an unconstitutional ban on immigrants and refugees.”
“I am listening to a whole bunch of people in Silicon Valley, including students and Green Card holders, who are worried. I have no answers for them,” Vivek Wadhwa, a research scholar, columnist, and former IT entrepreneur, who opposed the ban, said. “Here (Silicon Valley), Indians and Pakistanis, especially those who are Muslim, are fearful. Pakistanis are worried they will be next and Indians feel they will not be far behind,” Wadhwa said.
By Premji
