Trump Hell-Hole Remark Row: US President Donald Trump issued a clarification over remarks that referred to India as a “hellhole," with the American Embassy in New Delhi saying that Trump considered India “a great country" led by “a very good friend of mine."
“The President has said, ‘India is a great country with a very good friend of mine at the top’," a US Embassy spokesperson said. This comes as Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal said that the government had “seen some reports," declining to elaborate further.
What Triggered Hell-Hole Row
The clarification came after Trump reposted a transcript of a conservative political talk show hosted by American radio host Michael Savage, in which Michael Savage referred to India, China and other nations as “hellholes"- describing them as places from which people travel to the United States in their ninth month of pregnancy to secure automatic citizenship for their children under American birthright citizenship law.
The post that Trump shared was primarily an attack on the American Civil Liberties Union, accusing it of backing policies that allegedly benefited undocumented immigrants over US citizens. Michael Savage wrote that “the country has been stolen from us by these effing lawyers."
Trump also shared the video and full transcript of Michael Savage’s podcast Savage Nation, in which the host called for a national referendum on birthright citizenship rather than leaving the matter to the courts, and sharply criticised the US Supreme Court’s ongoing deliberations on the issue.
