Hindu groups urge Trump to fire Navarro over Hinduphobic remarks

They condemned Navarro for circulating an image of India’s Prime Minister meditating in saffron robes, which they said mocked prayer.

Peter Navarro, Senior Counselor for Trade and Manufacturing for U.S. President Donald Trump, speaks to the media outside the White House in Washington, D.C., U.S., April 30, 2025./ Official logo HinduPACT and American Hindus Against Defamation / REUTERS/Evelyn Hockstein/ File Photo

Hindu advocacy groups in the United States called for the immediate dismissal of Peter Navarro, Director of the Office of Trade and Manufacturing Policy, following remarks they described as “Hinduphobic” and damaging to U.S.-India relations.

HinduPACT and its affiliate American Hindus Against Defamation (AHAD) urged President Donald Trump to remove Navarro over his comments on India’s caste system and his use of Hindu imagery, which they said disrespected sacred traditions.

Also Read: Trump Advisor Peter Navarro Targets Brahmins in Latest Attack on India

“Navarro’s comment is not a critique; it’s a colonial-era trope recycled to divide Hindu society,” AHAD said in a press release.

Ajay Shah, executive chair of HinduPACT, added, “This is not foreign policy. It’s weaponized Hinduphobia. Dividing Hindus through colonial scripts doesn’t build relationships. It destroys them. People like Navarro have no place in American political life.”

The groups also condemned Navarro for circulating an image of India’s Prime Minister meditating in saffron robes, which they said mocked prayer. “Navarro was trying to say our prayers are a joke,” said Deepa Majumdar, president of HinduPACT. “If that were the Pope or the Chief Rabbi, it’s diplomacy. If it’s India’s leadership, that’s diplomatic recklessness. Either way, it’s a serious violation.”

Deepa Karthik, general secretary of HinduPACT, warned of repercussions for Hindus in the U.S.: “When someone like Navarro uses caste to shame India, it lands on Hindus here. Kids get bullied. Workers get profiled. We get treated like we owe the world an apology for our heritage.”

AHAD stressed that tolerating such rhetoric undermines both Indian and American values. “If Hindu hate and Hindu ridicule are tolerated inside U.S. policy circles, it tells over five million Hindus in this country, and over a billion in India, that their identity is negotiable. This is not who we are. And it cannot be allowed to stand,” the statement read.

The controversy stems from a Fox News interview in which Navarro defended a proposed 50 percent tariff on Indian imports. He accused India of serving as a “laundromat for the Kremlin” by refining Russian oil and reselling it, and added, “Brahmins are profiteering at the expense of the Indian people.” Hindu groups denounced the remark as a casteist slur rooted in colonial-era rhetoric.

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