The first rift in the victorious Trump coalition unexpectedly opened in December over, of all things, the mysterious H-B1 visas. Should US companies offer positions to foreigners who have skills we supposedly can’t find here? Trump and his “Department of Governmental Efficiency” lieutenants Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy all agreed, yes. But a visceral resentment of those who are seen as thriving while ordinary Americans still struggle erupted in the form of anti-Indian prejudice and allowed the leftish media to delight in what looked like a MAGA brawl.
H-B1 sounds like a noxious flu strain, but in fact refers to the visas that US companies can give to foreigners in fields where the number of US citizens is allegedly inadequate for hiring needs. The tech industry has a lot of these visas, but other professions such as teaching and doctors and graphic designers qualify. More than seven in 10 recipients hail from India, with China a very distant second, which draws attention to why such a discrepancy exists. A related issue is how these visas have enriched both Indian and US companies providing H-B1 labor, which may explain why even though H-B1 workers are supposed to be paid the prevailing rate for Americans, they are accused of being virtually indentured and cheap labor.
This highlights the divide in the MAGA ranks between those who are populists focusing on preserving US jobs for Americans and technocrats who want the American economy to be great again, for which a competent and reliable labor supply is critical. Right-wing influencer Laura Loomer lashed into Trump’s choice of Sriram Krishnan to be an advisor on artificial intelligence—Krishnan is an advocate of these H-B1 visas. Loomer accused Krishnan of donating to fellow Indian-American Kamala Harris (he has not denied it), releasing open FEC records to prove her point. Elon Musk, whose Tesla has hired H-B1 visa holders and Vivek Ramaswamy weighed in to defend the visas. But Ramaswamy chose to deliver a Tiger Mom-worthy lecture on the economic consequences of American cultural preferences for prom queens over math Olympians and jocks over valedictorians. He was careful to say “our American culture.”
Vivek’s diatribe annoyed the Trump supporters whose interpretation of MAGA is not “Make Americans Better.” Rightwing commentators started saying things about Indian immigrants and Indian Americans that would have outraged most observers if they were about any other minority group. Indians are only 1.7 percent of the US population in 2024, although they are concentrated in states such as California, Texas, New Jersey, and Illinois, according to the Migration Policy Institute.
Earlier this week I read a Substack screed decrying the hubris of Indians who allegedly still see themselves as separate from the general US public. The author claims that the superficial assimilation Indians easily adopt “allows them to gain incredible amounts of political and economic power, while the lack of “real” assimilation enables them to transform the country to suit their ethnic interests.” The Substack author Scott Greer in his self-described “Highly Respected” Substack tried to have it both ways. He acknowledged that Indians assimilate by quickly speaking English, adopting pop culture, and “seem” entrepreneurial. He grudgingly admitted the English part, “but the first generation speaks with a thick accent.” (and what first generation of American immigrants did not?) He accuses Indian immigrants of building “massive” Hindu temples and most alarmingly, of bringing their caste system over with them, which somehow translates into their felt superiority over the unwashed uneducated American masses. Vivek’s remarks did little to dispel this image.
Strangely, Greer dismisses evidence of assimilation by Indians as somehow concealing their inner disdain for the American citizenry (they can’t win).
“But they won’t respect the people, its heritage, and traditions. America is just a place to make money for them. Their desire to bring infinite South Asians here illustrates their commitment to make this country the new Bharat.” He illustrates this completely unfounded charge by laboring over an academic book by Manisha Sinha, a historian at the University of Connecticut, about Reconstruction. “The book drips with disdain for whites, even for ones who were progressive…the only good guys are Amerindians and blacks. Sinha’s book ends by calling for another reconstruction to erase the things she doesn’t like about America.”
This actually shows one kind of assimilation we have seen among Indian immigrants. Those that have capitalized on English proficiency and good schooling to become academics fall quickly in line with the the lockstep demonization of America that is typical of academia. Sinha, the daughter of an Indian general, got her PhD from Columbia and has garnered many prestigious awards. Greer is so eager to prove that Indians look down on Americans that he misses an opportunity to back his larger point about assimilation in which Indians adopt the coloration of their US habitat without its values. How Greer thinks a group that is 1.7 percent of the population will be converting us to Hinduism (and some are Sikhs, which he may not know anything about) or turning us into a “Bharat” is not addressed.
The unpleasant Ann Coulter also let forth a stream of invective that seemed targeted at Indian hubris. She lists about two dozen US tech companies and their overwhelmingly white male founders, to undercut claims that Indian technological ingenuity is needed, or even exists. She seems exercised by the arrogance of children of immigrants who are running for president (Nikki Haley and Ramaswamy, presumably) and those who are trying to change the US despite coming from a society that in terms of honesty and trust is far inferior to ours. Uh, they left India, so presumably should not be responsible for, or assumed to prefer its less desirable qualities. It’s not clear how Indians are trying to change our society, except some like Pramila Jayapal, a socialist congresswoman, who shares her ideological kin’s distaste for this country. If anything, Indian communities might be better known and appreciated if they shared their culture—beyond restaurants—as a community with the surrounding populations.
Unlike previous and other immigrant groups, Indians are not starting from the bottom, which may be what angers the MAGA base and less successful ethnic groups. While my husband’s and my Jewish immigrant ancestors at the turn of the 1900s were housepainters and deliverymen, whose families lived-in cold-water tenement flats and received no government favors except the right to leave Ellis Island, the Indian emigrants are well-educated, cosmopolitan, and prepared to start, at least economically, at a level comparable to third or sixth-generation Americans. If they are not, they covet education and hard work and act accordingly.
Indians embrace the language of meritocracy, even if they are skeptical it works. It is also possible that the overwhelming Brahmin background of Indian immigrants has inculcated attitudes in them that some people, not necessarily Indians, will always be superior to others, and a confidence that comes across to Americans—who generally value modesty except in celebrities—as premature arrogance. According to a University of Pennsylvania study in 2023, 90 percent of Indian immigrants to the US come from Brahmin or other high castes, and only 1.5 percent are Dalits (“untouchables”) or from lower castes. To what extent do these cultural attitudes shut off in the United States? Most Americans won’t know. But we tend to prefer immigrants who show appreciation and gratitude for what America has given them, rather than those who accept these gifts as deserved from the start.
Because of their timing—the overwhelming number of Indian immigrants have arrived since 1990—Indians plunge into the highest realms of public life without having gone through the melting pot experiences characteristic of earlier generations of immigrants, or poorer ones, who have joined the military if they did not actually fight in a major war. University campuses are not equivalent melting arenas. Nor does the Hindu religion lend itself easily to the Protestant-Catholic-Jew construct popularized by mid-20th century sociologist Will Herberg in his seminal Protestant, Catholic, Jew. Even the more visible Muslims have just begun to break into the broader faith community. We see little of Hindus outside the workplace. The polytheistic faith of most Indians is strange to the monotheistic majority, but many of us would gladly visit a Hindu temple if we were invited.
In general, I am all for immigrant groups that do not seek to convert us to their religion, support themselves legally, do not try to blow up Americans or block traffic in pursuit of ancestral hatreds, who speak our language, and generally mind their own business. MAGA has real enemies to vanquish, many of whom have long American pedigrees and not much to show for it. Let’s not play into the hands of our real enemies by indulging in a nativist temper tantrum against fellow Americans, who are in the end, in the great majority, are on our side. And yes, let’s take a hard look at those H-B1 visas AND strive to improve our science and math educational system. This is the time to do it.
Paula Weiss is the author of The Antifan Girlfriend and The Deplorable Underground.
COMMENT Some Indians immigrants are Muslims as well as Sikhs and Hindus. The Partition of India in 1947 wasn’t perfect!
It is interesting that 90% of Indian immigrants to the US come from Brahmin or other high castes – still I have noticed in the past twenty years a decline in their spoken English and have wondered if that means that a broader range of Indians are coming over. It used to be that when Indians came over their English was impeccable. (Amy Sandridge, 4 February 2025)