October 15, 2026
NATIONWIDE – We are horrified by reports that a 19-year-old man is accused of planning a mass shooting targeting a Chicago-area Hindu temple during Navratri, a festival that should be a time for celebration and unity, not terror and hate. We are grateful this violent plot was thwarted and that no one was hurt – but it doesn’t erase the fear Hindu, Indian, and South Asian people feel after years of escalating hate.
Reports indicate the suspect planned the attack for two years and wrote a manifesto with white supremacist views and references to violence against Indian people. This is exactly what we feared, after years of documenting escalating hate against South Asian communities under the Trump administration.
Stop AAPI Hate’s research shows online slurs targeting South Asians rose 109% from 2023 to 2025, and South Asians were the target of 71% of all anti-Asian online threats of violence. We also found that under Trump, deportations of South Asians are about 14 times higher than under Biden, and our latest report out this week shows his anti-immigrant agenda is emboldening people to commit acts of hate and violence against Asian communities, including Indian Americans.
Trump and his political allies have continued to push xenophobic policies and rhetoric that cast Indian people as a “demographic threat” – from JD Vance calling Indian H-1B workers “indentured servants”, to Bo French calling South Asian students a “problem”. This narrative echoes the “Great Replacement” conspiracy theory, which has a history of inspiring violent threats, targeted attacks, and mass shootings.
In fact, our research partners at Moonshot found that users reacted to Bo French’s posts with calls for violence against Indian communities online, including saying they deserved to be shot, as well as calls to vandalize Hindu temples and statues. And just last month, a Sikh truck driver was stabbed in Wyoming, days after the DHS published an outrageously racist social media post depicting a Sikh truck driver. Now, we are hearing about this horrific attempted attack against Hindu people.
Violence against South Asian people is not inevitable. It is fueled when leaders stoke fear of immigrants and people of color for political gain. We call on elected officials of every party to unequivocally condemn this attempted mass shooting and to hold Trump, Vance, and other public figures accountable for their xenophobic rhetoric and policies.
