AMERICA
Trump Has Broken His Promises to South Asian Americans
WASHINGTON, D.C. — Nearly two years into Donald Trump’s presidency, South Asian Americans are still waiting for him to deliver on his promises of lower costs and greater economic opportunities. Instead, the Trump administration – aided by Congressional Republicans – have broken promise after promise, leaving families to pay more and putting their safety at risk. Notably, 74% of surveyed Indian American voters view President Trump unfavorably in a recent poll conducted of likely Asian American Pacific Islander (AAPI) voters ahead of the upcoming midterm elections.
When asked about the most important problems facing the country today, Indian Americans’ top 5 are the cost of living and inflation (58%), war and U.S. foreign policy (50%), jobs and the economy (36%), healthcare (33%), and immigration (26%). Instead of addressing South Asian Americans’ pressing needs, the Trump administration has continued to put the safety of our communities at risk.
The Trump administration has perpetuated a disturbing rise in racism, xenophobia and religious bigotry against South Asian communities. They appointed a man who said to “never trust a chinaman or indian [sic].” Trump shared a post that referred to India as a “hellhole” and called Indian immigrants “gangsters with laptops.” Online hate speech against South Asians on X has increased by 240% in the past two years. Congressional Republicans have been silent in the face of this hate.
Furthermore, the Department of Education tacitly endorsed posts by a Texas Republican candidate demonizing South Asian American University of Texas at Austin students for celebrating at a football game. Days after the Department of Homeland Security shared a bigoted anti-Sikh post urging drivers named “Mr. Singh” to self-deport, a Sikh truck driver was stabbed 17 times at a Wyoming rest stop. Anti-Sikh hate crime incidents increased by 24.6% from 2024 to 2025.
The “triple othering” of racism, xenophobia and religious discrimination towards people of South Asian descent has reached a fever pitch, with nearly half of South Asian adults experiencing a hate act in 2025. How can we trust what Trump and his allies say now?
Trump Promised Lower Costs, But Made Your Life More Expensive:
Promise: “When I win, I will immediately bring prices down, starting on Day One.”
- Tariffs on everyday goods and groceries have added additional costs for families, increasing household expenses by more than $1,700 last year and are projected to reach $2,500 this year.
- Tariffs have had a disproportionate impact on Asian Americans, who own 11% of small businesses in the U.S. and nearly 20% of restaurants across the country. The Trump administration’s initial 50% tariff on all imports from India and 10% tariff on all imports from Bangladesh, Pakistan and Sri Lanka caused prices to skyrocket.
Indian American restaurant and grocery store owners have been squeezed from all sides, with tariffs on spices, basmati rice and chutneys from India, high gas and transportation prices because of the war in Iran and labor shortages because of farmworker fears about ICE raids causing them to operate their businesses at a loss.
Promise: “12 months from January 20 [2025], your electric bill will be 50 percent less.”
Monthly residential electricity rates have increased by over 15% since January 2025. In fact, families have paid $110 more for electricity in 2025 under President Trump than they did in 2024. Asian American ratepayers carry some of the highest overdue utility balances, approaching $900, compared to $750 for white ratepayers.
Promise: “Starting on day one, we will end inflation and make America affordable again…”
- The pace of inflation is getting quicker by the month, with costs jumping 0.4% from July to August. The average American household has had to spend $4,200 more on goods and services under the Trump administration.
- Americans paid $310 more for groceries in President Trump’s first year than in 2024, and grocery prices are now more than 4% higher than when Trump took office. The average price of ground beef has risen almost every month to a record high of more than $7 per pound. Coffee prices also spiked and are now more than $9 per pound.
Trump Starts Conflicts Abroad that Make Your Life Harder at Home:
Promise: “Under Trump, we will have no more wars… we will have prosperity and peace for all.”
The President launched a reckless and costly war of choice with Iran that has lasted seven months without any comprehensive strategy or endgame. Trump’s war cost taxpayers roughly $40 billion through August 1 and another $2-3 billion per month since then.
Promise: “Energy is going to bring us back. That means we’re ... getting gasoline below $2 per gallon.”
Regular gas prices are over $4 per gallon nationwide—a 37% increase since the start of the war—while diesel prices are over $6 per gallon for the first time in history. Since the start of Trump’s war in Iran, Americans have paid $71.5 billion more, or $604 more per household, on the gas they need to commute to work, run errands, pick up their kids, and live their daily lives.
Trump is Making South Asian Americans Sicker
Promise: “We’re not cutting Medicaid, we’re not cutting Medicare.”
- Last year, Trump and Congressional Republicans passed their Big Ugly Bill, which included the largest cut to Medicaid in history and $536 billion in Medicare cuts over a decade. They also refused to extend Affordable Care Act (ACA) tax credits that help millions afford health care coverage.
- As a result, eight million Americans have now lost health care coverage and private health insurance premiums are set to increase by 136% per year. 4.5 million Asian Americans, Native Hawaiians, and Pacific Islanders rely on Medicaid; nearly 3 million rely on Medicare; and 1.5 million rely on the Affordable Care Act for health care coverage.
- The ACA eliminated the health care coverage gap between white adults and Asian American adults overall, with Indian Americans becoming the most likely Asian American subgroup to be insured in 2018. Similarly, only 5%of Sri Lankan, 7% of Bangladeshi, 8% of Bhutanese, 9% of Pakistani and 10% of Nepalese Americans were uninsured in 2023. Weakening the ACA could bring back racial inequities in healthcare for South Asian Americans.
55% of Indian Americans are not confident that the federal government will act in the best interest of the public’s health, and 71% of Indian Americans think the government is spending too little on health care.
Trump is Making South Asian Americans Less Safe
Promise: “ICE is going after the worst of the worst.”
- The majority of South Asians (53%) now carry proof of immigration or citizenship status due to the Trump administration’s indiscriminate immigration enforcement tactics.
- 68% of Indian Americans think the United States used to be a great place for immigrants but is not anymore.
- 55% of South Asian adults said they or a family member, friend or coworker from their AAPI community have been impacted by changing immigration policies or anti-immigrant sentiment. Because of anti-Indian and anti-Hindu sentiment in Texas, some families are deciding not to publicly celebrate religious holidays for their safety.
- Trump has attacked law-abiding residents, legal immigrants, refugees, asylees, skilled workers, students, and people born in the United States. 77% of people ICE tried to deport last year had never been convicted of any crime.
- Among Asians, South Asians have the highest number of ICE arrests, detentions and deportations under Trump’s second term. 29%, which is the plurality, of Asian arrests, detentions, and deportations involved Indian immigrants.
- Harjit Kaur, a 73-year-old Sikh grandmother who has lived in the United States for three decades, was detained by ICE during a routine check-in. Kaur, a strict vegetarian, did not receive an appropriate vegetarian meal until six days after she arrived in the ICE facility, and was later deported to India.
- Aliya Rahman, a Bangladeshi American and U.S. citizen, was driving to a doctor's appointment when ICE agents shattered her car windows, forcibly removed her from the vehicle, and made her walk without her cane. She was detained without being asked to provide an ID, informed that she was under arrest, or read her rights. She was later released without being charged with a crime.
- The Trump administration imposed a $100,000 fee on new H-1B visa applications, which was blocked and found unconstitutional by a judge, and proposed ending the 60-day H-1B visa grace period after job loss. Indian nationals are the largest recipient group of H-1B visas by far, comprising of 71% of approved H-1B petitions in 2024. Total H‑1B visa issuance has fallen by about 25%.
- The Trump administration indefinitely suspended all U.S. immigrant visa appointments, which included canceling existing green card interviews. This disproportionately impacts Indian immigrants, for whom the U.S. is the top immigration destination. Indian Americans are the second-largest immigrant group in the U.S., with over 3.2 million people accounting for 6% of all immigrant residents.
- This worsens the backlog already faced by nearly 1.5 million Asian immigrants who are on family waiting lists for green cards. India, Bangladesh and Pakistan are among the top Asian countries with long waiting lists. Asians have constituted the largest share of new green card holders in the last decade, averaging 390,000 over the most recent ten-year period.
- India sends the largest number of international students to study in the U.S., making up close to a third of all foreign students in America. Nepal, Bangladesh and Pakistan are among the top 15 places of origin for international students in the U.S., sending 24,890 students, 20,156 students and 13,165 students in the 2024/2025 school year respectively. 90% of Asian international students are fearful about their student visa status and 78% report negative physical or mental health impacts.
- Bhutanese immigrants are overrepresented in ICE detention relative to their population. Since 2025, the U.S. has been deporting Nepali-speaking Bhutanese refugees back to the country they fled from due to ethnic cleansing.
- Trump administration officials indefinitely halted asylum decisions, froze all refugee processing (later restarting the program to exclusively admit white Afrikaners from South Africa), and are fast-tracking deportations of asylum seekers.
- The Trump administration terminated Temporary Protected Status (TPS) for Nepal. TPS is a humanitarian designation that allows eligible immigrants coming from countries deemed unsafe to remain and work in the U.S. In August 2026, DHS ordered these 7,160 Nepali TPS holders to leave the country or face deportation.
- President Trump signed an executive order to end birthright citizenship—a core principle affirmed in the case United States v. Wong Kim Ark (1898)—that was later found unconstitutional by the Supreme Court. He has since signed two new executive orders restricting birthright citizenship and blocking entry to foreigners who travel to the U.S. expressly to give birth that are being challenged in court.
