Trump takes back seat to Indian prime minister
President Donald Trump played second fiddle Sunday to Narendra Modi, prime minister of India, at a boisterous cultural rally in which the U.S. president was technically just an invited guest.
But never one to let a good crowd go to waste, Trump treated the giant gathering at NRG Stadium in Houston as his own, declaring that “you have never had a better friend as president than President Donald Trump, that I can tell you.”
Tens of thousands of Indian Americans gathered to celebrate the recent reelection of India’s fiery populist leader at an event cheekily called “Howdy, Modi!” Big screens throughout the stadium displayed the face of the prime minister, who arrived to thunderous cheers on a red carpet.
Trump praised Modi, marveling that some 600 million people voted in India’s recent elections. “That’s a lot of people,” the president said, adding that Indian Americans enrich the culture of the United States and that the two nations are “grounded in our common values.”
But he mostly seized on his own rally themes, bragging about slashing regulations, lowering unemployment, implementing a tax cut and hardening the nation’s borders against “those who would threaten our security.”
The rally brought together two leaders with similar styles. Both rose to power by embracing rightwing populism, portraying themselves as champions of the masses fighting against an entrenched establishment. Both presented voters with a vision to make their respective countries “great again,” and both have fanned tensions along religious, economic and social fault lines.
Modi, who is in the United States for a week largely to attend the United Nations General Assembly in New York, won a landslide reelection in May. But Trump and Modi are also both polarizing figures among the people they lead. While many Indians see Modi as a strong, decisive leader, a small but vocal minority say he is becoming an autocrat, rapidly consolidating power, going after political enemies inside his country and sowing division between Hindus and Muslims.
In the United States, Trump is preparing to run for reelection in a bitterly divided country with polls regularly showing him receiving well short of 50% support. His participation in Sunday’s rally with Modi offered a chance to woo a constituency the 4 million U.S. residents of Indian descent whose support could prove helpful.
Modi delivered in English an over-the-top introduction of Trump, declaring that the president’s name is “familiar to every person on the planet” and “comes up in almost every conversation in the world on global politics.”
Standing next to Modi, the president beamed with pleasure as the prime minister delivered a twist on his own election slogan: “Abki baar Trump sarkar” or “This time, a Trump government.”
But earning votes from Indian Americans will not be easy for Trump, even with Modi by his side.
Indian Americans have supported both Democrats and Republicans in the past, though they have gravitated away from Trump’s party more recently. Although the president’s tax and economic policies appeal to many Indians, his tough stance on immigration, including legal immigrants from India, has caused great angst, especially in Silicon Valley, which relies heavily on Indian workers who come on H-1B visas.
An overwhelming majority of Indian American voters are registered as Democrats and voted for Hillary Clinton in 2016, according to the Asian American Legal Defense and Education Fund.