On November 3, 2026, Americans provided a tremendous rebuke to President Donald Trump and the MAGA movement. Hindu Americans, Indian Americans, and South Asian Americans had faced a relentless wave of hate and white nationalism this election cycle. On the first day of Navratri, a white supremacist planned a mass shooting at a temple in Aurora, Illinois. Two Muslim lawmakers, Salman Bhojani and Suleman Lalani, became prime targets of the Republicans' anti-South Asian and Islamophobic campaigns in Texas.But like so many other affected Americans, our communities fought back.For those outside the US, these last two years of intense racism against Hindus, Indians, and South Asians may seem puzzling.But this is just the latest iteration of xenophobia and Christian nationalism encouraged by the Trump administration. It was inevitable that a man who vilified Mexican, Somali, Haitian, and Afghan communities would turn his hateful movement on us. But even this is nothing new. Like many Hindu American millennials, I grew up in some of the darkest days for our community. I was eight years old when two planes struck the Twin Towers in New York City. My life, and the lives of probably every South Asian American, were transformed by it. The gains we have made in this election, in many ways, are a direct result of 25 years of organizing.Many Hindu Americans have worked inside secular, pan-South Asian organizations or within the framework that organizations like Hindus for Human Rights provide. Unfortunately, a small but loud minority of Hindu Americans have chased a closer relationship with the MAGA movement. Prominent figures like Tulsi Gabbard, Vivek Ramaswamy, and Kash Patel have wormed their way into a movement that explicitly excludes Hindu and South Asian Americans. They are holding all of us back.Modi Govt's US Problem: Rise of Progressive Hindus and a New Democratic PartyRamaswamy, for example, has defended mass deportations and echoed Trump’s Islamophobia in his gubernatorial campaign. He contorts his faith to appeal to Christian nationalists. He recycles the same white nationalist rhetoric that puts Indian Americans in harm’s way.Ramaswamy, Gabbard, and Patel enjoy support from right-wing groups who seek to build bridges between the Hindutva and MAGA movements. Organizations like Hindu American PAC will endorse Christian nationalists, like Rich McCormick, if they are sufficiently supportive of their agenda. Other far right groups like Americans for Hindus hosted an inauguration ball for Trump, even after the Trump campaign ran an explicitly xenophobic, racist, and Christian supremacist campaign.They are part of a larger ecosystem of Hindutva-aligned organizations who insist that they are the sole representatives of Hindu Americans. In response, the rest of the Hindu American community has abandoned this strategy of representation politics that endangers us.Indeed, every single candidate endorsed by Hindus for Human Rights Action that ran in the general election won their race. Each endorsed candidate pledged to disavow support or donations from RSS-affiliated individuals and organizations. Inevitably, these same candidates also pledged to reject white Christian nationalism as well.It’s not enough for a candidate to share our faith — they must also share our values.Bo French and MAGA’s Anti-Indian Bigotry Are Disjointed From America’s RealitiesFrom New York to MichiganIn places where Hindu Americans have considerable electoral power, they have exercised it to support candidates who will take on white Christian nationalism and hate in all its forms. Nowhere has this become clearer than in New York. In 2025, Hindu Americans organized across the city to counter disinformation that claimed Zohran Mamdani was worse for Hindus compared to Andrew Cuomo or Eric Adams, the latter of whom had been criticized for not standing up to ICE as it terrorized immigrant communities. Hindus for Zohran worked with long-standing South Asian community groups like DRUM Beats to get Hindus to mobilize for Mamdani. Then, in 2026, in the heart of New York, Hindu American voters rejected Indian Hindu American Jenifer Rajkumar. Our political wing, Hindus for Human Rights Action, built on Hindus for Zohran to reach Hindu voters of all backgrounds who were frustrated that their Hindu Assemblymember would not deliver concrete results for her constituents. Rajkumar’s opponent, David Orkin, overperformed with Hindus in the district, thanks to Hindu American political organizing in the race. Hindu voters in the district wanted a politician who would work to stop ICE raids in the district.In one of his last stops before the midterm election, Abdul El-Sayed, the Muslim American Democratic Senate candidate from Michigan, celebrated an early Diwali with South Asians of all faiths, including many Hindu Americans. The room was filled with the Sikh, Muslim, and Hindu Americans who have enough political power to swing the Michigan election. Those Hindu Americans helped elect the US’s first Muslim Senator. That Senator will enthusiastically engage Hindu and Indian Americans especially as we fight to protect our communities from the forces of hate.And prominent Hindu American politicians across the US have also solidly rejected the restricting framework of identity politics. Our anti-hate pledge was led by Hindu American politicians Ro Khanna and Pramila Jayapal. Nithya Raman, who successfully ran to become the next mayor of Los Angeles, also disavowed Hindu nationalism in an interview with the streamer Hasan Piker.All of these leaders are going to become vocal fighters for Hindu American safety in the next Congress. Rep. Khanna, who donated $7,000 received in far right donations to pro-democracy causes, is leading the push to purge far right donors out of progressive politics.Rep. Jayapal will become the chair of the House Judiciary Committee's immigration subcommittee and will hold ICE and other immigration agencies accountable for their abuses, including those against South Asian immigrant communities. And as mayor, Nithya Raman, like Zohran Mamdani, will build a city that will welcome all of its constituents with open arms and a seat at the table.Fighting the Growing Tide of Hindutva in the US: Sunita Viswanath on VIGILANTAs we continue to build on the midterm successes of progressive Hindu and South Asian American organizing, our communities will thrive.This midterm election was not just a rebuke of Trump, but a rebuke of a politics that tells Hindu Americans to be satisfied with identity representation rather than real progress.This movement was built by Hindu Americans knocking doors and making calls for progressive politicians across the country. And now, they will have real champions in the halls of power.(The author is Senior Policy Director at Hindus for Human Rights. This is an opinion piece. All views expressed are the author’s own. The Quint neither endorses nor is responsible for them.)Filmmaker Shruti Ganguly Has a Message for Anti-Trump, Pro-Modi Diaspora Indians