It’s not generally advised for an American politician to perform an exaggerated Indian accent in public, even if it’s of a specific person. Especially not while on a visit to Asia.
But that’s what Donald Trump appeared to do on Wednesday, during his swing through Asia.
Per The Daily Beast, Trump was speaking at the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation in South Korea and “gushed over Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi in the most cringeworthy way possible on Wednesday, describing the leader as ‘the nicest-looking guy’ and then attempting to impersonate him.”
“No, we will fight,” Trump said, in Modi’s “voice.”
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The impersonation came while Trump was bragging about having delivered an end to the military conflict between India and Pakistan this spring by threatening tariffs, an assertion which has been disputed by India’s government.
“I said I was going to put 250 percent tariffs on each country, which means that you’ll never do business… that’s a nice way of saying we don’t want to do business with you… and they understood that, and within 48 hours, we had no war,” Trump said of the trade talks while also, as usual, contrasting that with his predecessor Joe Biden.
Trump does a very unflattering impersonation of Modi pic.twitter.com/MQh3L2vyyV
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) October 29, 2025
“I’ll tell you what, Prime Minister Modi is the nicest looking guy,” Trump said, adding that the Indian Prime Minister is someone “you’d like to have as your father.”
Trump and Modi appeared to be close during Trump’s first presidency, even hosting each other at stadium rallies called “Howdy, Modi” and “Namaste, Trump.” However, things have been less smooth this time around, especially with Trump placing tariffs on India and exports from India to the U.S. therefore plunging. Meanwhile, the first year of Trump’s second presidency has seen an explosion of anti-Indian racism among the MAGA grassroots.
Trump’s Modi impression was not well-received online:
I feel like Trump sees Biden as much more of a rival than he saw Obama during his first term. clearly has not gotten over getting beat in 2020 https://t.co/3d6U4Ceqou
— Rowan Fornow 🚵🚉🏙🦣🇵🇸 (@rowanfornow) October 29, 2025
This man is insane. He has no idea what he’s even talking about. https://t.co/2YyZRgndkB
— Chris Sigurdson (@sigurdson_chris) October 29, 2025
He’s funny I’ll give you that, but that demented fuck lol put a map of India and he pick butan Bangladesh China or Pakistan most likely a whole different continent https://t.co/aIGTWcazW6
— flako( fuckCharliekirlsuckmydick )quisqueya 🇩🇴 (@FreeTimeBoxing1) October 29, 2025
He’s on the loopy drugs today and not the adrenaline ones. And I’ll never understand why he always has to recount dialogues instead of just outlining facts. I guess because in his head, everything’s a movie.
— miss speech (@miss_speech) October 29, 2025
Photo courtesy of the Political Tribune media library.
