Far-left Congresswomen Ilhan Omar (D-MN), Rashida Tlaib (D-MI), and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) announced this week they will not attend an address to a joint session of Congress on Thursday by Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
Modi, on a state visit that will feature a lavish White House State Dinner on Thursday night, is in the country on a mission to, as both Washington and New Delhi have characterized it, “deepen” ties between America and India.
The relationship between India and America has become of utmost importance in the past decade in large part due to the growing belligerence of communist China, which has repeatedly invaded India along their mutual Himalayan border and launched campaigns of espionage, intellectual property theft, and illegal police activity in the United States. Modi is expected to sign several deals with American companies in the field of defense and already clinched an agreement between GE Aerospace and Hindustan Aeronautics Limited (HAL), an Indian government company, to produce jet engines.
Modi’s itinerary so far has included a yoga session at the United Nations, meetings with Elon Musk and Neil DeGrasse Tyson, and a private dinner on Wednesday night with President Joe Biden and first lady Jill Biden during which the group exchanged gifts. He will address Congress on Thursday afternoon.
Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi performs yoga at the United Nations headquarters in New York, June 21, 2023. (Twitter/@NarendraModi)
The three representatives boycotting Modi’s address on Thursday cited human rights concerns for their absence. Modi, who has been prime minister of India since 2014, leads an explicitly Hindu nationalist government and has presided over a surge in persecution of religious minorities, particularly Christians and Muslims.
“Since 2014 when the BJP Party, Prime Minister Modi’s party, took over, there’s been a 300 percent jump in reported attacks on Christians and Christian churches,” the president and CEO of Global Christian Relief David Curry told Breitbart News last month. “It’s just been this massive escalation. That’s because he has a nationalistic agenda which is, in very simple terms, suggesting that Christians aren’t real Indians because you have to be Hindu to be a real Indian citizen.”
In addition to the three lawmakers boycotting Modi’s address, 75 Democrats wrote Biden a letter on Tuesday demanding that he explicitly address human rights concerns with the Indian prime minister.
“Prime Minister Modi’s government has repressed religious minorities, emboldened violent Hindu nationalist groups, and targeted journalists/human rights advocates with impunity,” Rep. Omar wrote in a statement on Twitter announcing her boycott. “I will NOT be attending Modi’s speech. I WILL be holding a briefing with human rights groups to discuss Modi’s record of repression and violence.”
Reps. Ilhan Omar (D-MI) and Pramila Jayapal (D-WA) listen as Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) holds a bill enrollment signing ceremony for the Juneteenth National Independence Day Act on June 17, 2021 on Capitol Hill in Washington, DC. (Joshua Roberts/Getty Images)
Rep. Tlaib similarly condemned Modi and called his presence in Congress “shameful.”
Tlaib asserted:
It’s shameful that Modi has been given a platform at our nation’s capital—his long history of human rights abuses, anti-democratic actions, targeting Muslims & religious minorities, and censoring journalists is unacceptable.
The Squad member added, “I will be boycotting Modi’s joint address to Congress.”
On Wednesday evening, Rep. Ocasio-Cortez announced she would join them, adding that she encouraged her “colleagues who stand for pluralism, tolerance, and freedom of the press to join [her] in doing the same.”
Rep. Ocasio-Cortez’s statement condemned Modi for his reported role in a deadly Hindu nationalist riot in his native Gujarat state in 2002. At the time, Modi served as chief minister in Gujarat for his Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).
“These were very serious claims – that Chief Minister Modi had played a pretty active part in pulling back the police and in tacitly encouraging the Hindu extremists,” former British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw told the Qatari outlet Al Jazeera in January. “That was a particularly egregious example.”
Rep. Ocasio-Cortez noted that the U.S. government denied Modi a visa prior to his becoming a prime minister, in part, as a result of his role in the riot, which resulted in more than 1,000 people killed.
Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) President Amit Shah greet supporters on arrival at the party headquarters in New Delhi, India, Thursday, May 23, 2019. (AP Photo)
“A joint address is among the most prestigious invitations and honors the United States Congress can extend,” Rep. Ocasio-Cortez said in her statement, adding:
We should not do so for individuals with deeply troubling human rights records – particularly for individuals whom our own State Department has concluded are engaged in systematic human rights abuses of religious minorities and caste-oppressed communities.
As of Thursday morning, the three lawmakers are the only members of Congress who have confirmed they will boycott the speech. Time magazine confirmed that every Indian American member of Congress, all of whom are Democrats, will attend. In a statement to the magazine, Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-WA) explained that she believes her presence at events with Modi will help further the human rights conversation.
“I am attending all the events that I’ve been invited to with the Prime Minister because I think that this is a really important and nuanced discussion,” Rep. Jayapal said. “India is a critical partner of the United States as a country regardless of who the Prime Minister is.”
Similarly, Rep. Ro Khanna’s (D-CA) office told Time that he would be there “along with all his Indian American colleagues in Congress in the hopes of furthering a strategic partnership and fostering a productive dialogue about human rights and religious equality.”
Rep. Jayapal, alongside Rep. Chris Van Hollen (D-MD), led a letter to Biden published this week gingerly requesting a discussion on human rights abuses in India during Modi’s visit.
“As longtime supporters of a strong U.S.-India relationship, we also believe that friends can and should discuss their differences in an honest and forthright way,” the letter read in part. “That is why we respectfully request that — in addition to the many areas of shared interests between India and the U.S. — you also raise directly with Prime Minister Modi areas of concern.”
“We do not endorse any particular Indian leader or political party — that is the decision of the people of India — but we do stand in support of the important principles that should be a core part of American foreign policy,” the letter stated., concluding, “And we ask that, during your meeting with Prime Minister Modi, you discuss the full range of issues important to a successful, strong, and long-term relationship between our two great countries.”
White House National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan insisted this week that Biden would not “lecture” Modi on human rights.
“Ultimately, the question of where politics and the question of democratic institutions go in India is going to be determined within India by Indians. It’s not going to be determined by the United States,” Sullivan told reporters, adding that Biden would make his “views known.”