Texas GOP senator John Cornyn was trolled after he shared an NYT podcast in which Indian-origin scholar Amitav Acharya said the superpower in waiting is India, not the US or China.
Cornyn posted the NYT opinion piece by the headline that said ‘Welcome to the Indian Century’ but he was called a traitor for the post, and MAGA gave a call not to vote for him. The post was later deleted.“Welcome to the Indian Century. And people wonder why Dallas looks like New Delhi. You cannot call yourself a patriot and vote for Cornyn. If you’re a Texan, send him packing March 3rd,” one wrote. “I can’t imagine a politician of any other country promoting another country.
Your policies have contributed to America’s decline. You should be ashamed of yourself,” another wrote. “Cornyn does a great job of representing Ukraine, China & India,” a third user wrote.
Acharya, in the podcast, talked about the changing equation of the world order and how India is a power to watch out for. On the question of H-1B and ‘ethnic mafia’, Acharya said it is true that a huge number of Indians come to the US on H-1B visa program, but they are all qualified.
“I can tell you that the Indian diaspora that gets H-1 B visas are not taking any jobs from the kind of support base of President Trump. I think these are completely different levels of skill,” Acharya said. This was also seen as an arrogant comment as MAGA interpreted it as a statement on H-1B visa holders’ supremacy over Americans.
The row took place at a time when Texas had been seeing a strong anti-India movement with Governor Greg Abbott freezing H-1B hiring in state agencies and universities and Attorney General Ken Paxton announcing a probe into three H-1B firms. The meetings of local city councils are regularly torn over the issue of ‘Indian takeover’.The last two city council meetings of Frisco saw major protests against Indians.
