On Dec. 15 last year, Washington DC-based civil rights activist Deepa Iyer sent out a tweet: “On this year’s #desiwallofshame, Ajit Pai tops the list for being on the wrong side of history, for choosing profit over civil rights, and for advancing the anti-immigrant, white supremacist agenda of the Trump Administration.”
Iyer’s voice is one that the progressive South Asian community in the US is familiar with and reveres. For over a decade, she has been attempting to bridge the gaps within the diaspora and leading solidarity efforts with other immigrant communities and people of colour. Her book, We Too Sing America, is a vestibule to the post-9/11 experiences of south-Asian Americans and the attendant discrimination they faced. In Donald Trump’s America, the need for her work has intensified.