File photo: Bo French lost to Jon RosenthalTOI Correspondent From Washington: Turns out Bo French wasn't the only one who got cooked in Texas on Tuesday night. Inflammatory remarks by the Republican official about Indian-Americans, and more broadly brown folk, earned him and his party electoral karma. Amid a general GOP rout, French got fried in the race to head the Texas Railroad Commission, a prestigious state-wide post, losing to Democrat Jon Rosenthal by more than 600,000 votes.French's defeat has given a stark electoral warning to an increasingly uncomfortable contradiction within the Republican Party: a party that spent years courting Indian-American voters, celebrating their entrepreneurial success and welcoming Indian investment particularly in Texas, is now struggling with a section of its own political base questioning whether Indians belong in Texas at all.French became the face of that contradiction after a September 13 post on X, where, following the University of Texas dramatic football victory over Ohio State, he shared a photograph of brown students celebrating in the stands. "I heard UT graduation this year looked like this. I didn't believe it. The problem is now obviously far worse than anyone imagined," he wrote, suggesting that Americans are being "displaced by foreigners" – a familiar MAGA bogey.The problem with his theory was that he had no idea whether the students were foreigners. Some were American citizens, including Dhairya Gupta, a naturalised citizen. Apparently, a brown face in a burnt-orange UT shirt was sufficient evidence of an immigration problem.The backlash was swift, with even Republican Senator John Cornyn, a longtime champion of the Congressional India Caucus and closer US-India relations, publicly condemned French, calling him an embarrassment to the GOP. Other prominent Republicans in the state also criticised the remarks, although the party’s leadership in Washington DC, accused of promoting racism and xenophobia, did nothing to address Indian-American disquiet at the race- and immigration-baiting that other MAGA principals picked up and amplified.The irony was particularly conspicuous because Texas Republicans have invested considerable political capital in cultivating Indian-Americans. Cornyn has been a prominent advocate of closer US-India ties. Governor Greg Abbott went on trade missions to India in 2018 and 2024, promoting Texas as a destination for Indian investment. And in September 2019, Houston hosted the Howdy Modi rally, where Trump and PM Modi addressed thousands of cheering Indian-Americans.But somewhere between the howdys and namastes, the Republican welcome mat was imprinted with a rather conspicuous do-not-enter sign.French's remarks were hardly an isolated incident. They came amid growing hostility towards Indians in North Texas, particularly in suburbs such as Frisco, Plano and Irving, which have substantial Indian-American populations. Frisco, in particular, has become a flashpoint in the increasingly heated debate over H-1B visas. At city council meetings, speakers have accused Indian immigrants of taking over the suburb, stealing American jobs and exploiting immigration loopholes.An online campaign also began doxxing H-1B workers, publishing photographs, names, employers and purported immigration details, and exposing individuals to harassment and intimidation. Abbott's decision to freeze new H-1B visa processing at state agencies and public universities added to community anxiety. Although the administration presented it as an effort to protect American workers, critics argued that the rhetoric increasingly targeted an entire ethnic community rather than abuses of a particular visa program.Shortly before polling, Abbott made no secret of MAGA's white primacy agenda ( in a state that is 40 per cent Hispanic and was once part of Mexico), telling a podcaster, "My opponent (Latina, Gina Hinojosa)…would destroy white men and their jobs in our state."Religion became another flashpoint. A 90-foot statue of Hanuman at the Ashtalakshmi Temple in Sugar Land attracted threats from MAGA activists, including from a man named Jesse Hughes, who declared on X: "Btw, when we win, we are tearing this down." Instead, voters tore down the GOP fortress.While by no stretch of imagination did Indian-American voters alone pull this off, the accumulated controversies unsettled desi conservatives who had supported Trump and Republican candidates, particularly over business-friendly policies, social conservatism and closer relations with India. They also energized Democrats and pushed Talarico to seek desi support, an effort illustrated by his effort to make dosas at an Indian restaurant in Irving, a desi hub, even as French got fried.The Republican provocateur got many fond farewells on social media following his defeat, mostly with a reproductive and copulatory undertone. A more sobering message came from Avik Roy, co-founder of a Texas think-tank: "I, a lifelong Republican, voted against every Republican on my ballot who endorsed @BoFrench : Abbott, Paxton, Dawn Buckingham, and French himself. All 4 of them lost last night."You use AI every day. Now get your AI Quotient. Take the AIQ test.