Washington: Sydney Kamlager-Dove, the Democratic Congresswoman from California and the Ranking Member of the Subcommittee on South and Central Asia, has termed the Trump administration’s tariffs on India “incredibly unfortunate” and advocated deeper ties with New Delhi.
In an exclusive interview with IANS, Kamlager-Dove said that “tariffs are playing a disproportionate role in how we are able to move together”.
“I think that’s incredibly unfortunate, mostly because there was so much work that happened under the Biden administration to really move this bilateral relationship along in a positive way,” she added.
She also criticised the silence of Republican lawmakers even as India-US relations continued to worsen.
“The Republicans are either staying silent or supporting, either way, (they are) being complicit with policies that are creating major setbacks,” she added.
Kamlager-Dove, along with her 18 Democratic House members, co-signed a letter to US President Donald Trump on Wednesday (local time) urging him to “reset and repair” the India-US “critical partnership”.
The letter was also signed by several prominent Democratic leaders, including Deborah Ross, Ro Khanna, Brad Sherman, Raja Krishnamoorthi, and Pramila Jayapal.
The lawmakers called on Trump to “review” his tariff policy and continue “dialogue with the Indian leadership”, stressing that the path forward “demands recalibration, not confrontation”.
Kamlager-Dove said she was “disappointed” that not a single Republican lawmaker signed onto the letter, but not “surprised”.
“Republicans in Congress are afraid to speak truth to Trump. And where were those voices during the Biden administration, when Republicans were also lauding the importance of the US-India relationship and asking us to do more,” she said.
She added that now Democrats have an “outsized responsibility to remind the American people and also our international audiences that we in fact are the ones that care deeply about international relationships”.
The Congress member also revealed that she has “authored an amendment through congressional process,” demanding Trump attend the “incredibly important” Quad summit.
“Why do you have to tell a president to participate in and to attend a Quad Leadership Summit? That’s about unity with our partners across the Indo-Pacific,” she said.
The Quad Leaders’ Summit, initially scheduled to be held in India later this year, is now expected to take place early next year.
On September 10, in a speech on the floor of the House, Kamlager-Dove had targeted the Trump administration’s policy towards India, calling it “reckless”.
“This partnership is too important to be sacrificed by Trump’s ego and Republican complicity. Trump must reverse course, make a deal and fix the damage that he has caused. He needs to get his act together on behalf of this country and our relationship with India,” she stressed. (IANS)
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