Meet Nick Fuentes, the White nationalist, who wants India on US’ travel ban list

Nicholas J Fuentes, an American white nationalist known for his racist and sexist rants, has now come after India. On a report on X about the Donald Trump administration announcing “full suspension” of immigration and naturalisation for citizens of 19 countries, he commented, “Now do India”.

These countries with full or partial travel restrictions include Afghanistan, Burma (Myanmar), Chad, the Republic of the Congo, Equatorial Guinea, Eritrea, Haiti, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Yemen, Burundi, Cuba, Laos, Sierra Leone, Togo, Turkmenistan and Venezuela. The US has intensified its crackdown on immigration after an Afghan national was accused of shooting one National Guard member and critically wounding another in Washington, DC.

Now do India

— Nicholas J. Fuentes (@NickJFuentes) December 3, 2025

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Fuentes, who represents the American far right, has exposed chasms within Trump’s Maga movement. But who is he?

We take a look.

Who is Nick Fuentes?

Nick Fuentes is a 27-year-old right-wing podcaster labelled a white supremacist by the US Justice Department. The social media wunderkind has gathered a loyal base of young male conservative followers known as Groypers.

The name is linked to an originally apolitical internet meme of Pepe the Frog, which was appropriated by white nationalists around 2015.

Fuentes’ father, a vice president of a company making conveyor products, is half Mexican. The livestreamer grew up in La Grange Park, an upper-middle-class suburb of Chicago, as per New York Times (NYT).

Two people who knew him during his teenage years told the American newspaper that he was a “lone wolf” who was “highly intelligent” but also “abrasive” and “condescending”.

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Fuentes, who boasts 1.1 million (11 lakh) followers on X, rose to fame in 2017 when he joined the Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville, Virginia. He chanted “You will not replace us” and claimed that white Americans were being subjected to a “cultural genocide.”

Fuentes hosts a show called “America First”, where he openly espouses racist, misogynistic and antisemitic views.

He gained more notoriety during the storming of the US Capitol building on January 6, 2021. He stood a few hundred yards from the building and exclaimed through a megaphone, “Never relent!” While Fuentes did not himself enter the Capitol, five Groyper associates did and were later indicted, according to NYT.

He has been banned on YouTube since 2020 for violating the platform’s hate speech policy. His name cannot appear on TikTok, but his followers have found ways around it. He also does not have a blue check mark on his X account, which would enable him to gain paid subscribers.

Fuentes told NYT he earns his income from tips paid by viewers of his streaming show and from merchandise he sells on his website.

Nick Fuentes’ controversial remarks

Nick Fuentes is a notorious bigot and Holocaust denier who thrives on rage bait. His anti-Israel, anti-immigrant, anti-transgender and anti-civil-rights views have become mainstream.

He has said that Adolf Hitler “had aura” and hit out at Polish people for having “this bad habit of hating Hitler all the time.” Fuentes called the German dictator both “awesome” and “right.”

He also claimed that Jews run America. In October, he said on far-right commentator Tucker Carlson’s podcast that “organised Jewry” held outsize influence and that he was a fan of Joseph Stalin.

Fuentes further expressed his views in a video after the podcast. “Do us all a favor,” he said. “We are done with the Jewish oligarchy. We are done with the slavish surrender to Israel, the wars, the foreign aid, the policing of antisemitism, the Holocaust religion and propaganda.”

After Trump’s victory in the November presidential race, Fuentes mocked women and wrote on X: “Your body, my choice?” Fuentes has also reportedly said that rape is “no big deal”.

He said on his show in August that all Black people should be “ashamed” of crimes committed by those of their race, adding, “White people are every single bit justified in being racist.”

He also yearns for the segregation era, saying it was better for Blacks and mocking that they had anything to complain about.

According to the Christian nationalist, “only Christians” should occupy public offices.

Fuentes’ racist overtures have also touched US Vice President JD Vance’s Indian-origin wife, Usha Vance.

On X, he described the Indian American in-laws of VP Vance as “Uber drivers and call centre scammers.” He has also used a racist slur for the Second Lady.

In one discussion, he described Latin American and Asian immigration as the “true demographic threat” to the US.

Maga divided over Nick Fuentes

Fuentes’ extremist views have exposed the Maga infighting.

Nick Fuentes once dined with Trump at Mar-a-Lago. In 2022, he had accompanied rapper Ye, formerly known as Kanye West, for dinner with Trump.

The US president has claimed Ye brought Fuentes, whom he said he knew nothing about.

Many Republicans criticised Tucker Carlson when he hosted Fuentes on his show. Texas Senator Ted Cruz criticised the host for platforming Fuentes.

He said after the podcast: “Now is a time for choosing. Now is a time for courage … If you sit there with someone who says Adolf Hitler was very, very cool and their mission is to combat and defeat ‘global Jewry’, and you say nothing, then you are a coward, and you are complicit in that evil.”

Amid the backlash, Trump came to the ex-Fox News anchor’s defence.

“We’ve had some great interviews with Tucker Carlson, but you can’t tell him who to interview,” President Trump said on November 17, 2025. “Ultimately, people have to decide.”

Fuentes has, however, not even left Trump and has gone after him for not being right-wing enough.

“When I was a teenager, I thought he was a Caesar-like figure who was going to save Western civilisation,” Fuentes said in an interview. “Now I view him as incompetent, corrupt and compromised.”

Fuentes had unsuccessfully tried to mobilise Groypers against Trump in 2024, calling the president a “scam artist” earlier this year for not releasing the files in the Jeffrey Epstein case.

Last year, JD Vance called Fuentes a “total loser.” Fuentes is not his fan either.

If Vance wins the Republican nomination in 2028, Fuentes said he would urge his followers to “either stay home or vote for a protest candidate.”

“He’s going after JD Vance at a time when Donald Trump is likely in the twilight of his political career,” Matt Dallek, a political historian and expert on right-wing movements at George Washington University, told NYT. “What we’re seeing is Fuentes, Carlson, Vance and others engaged in the battle to be the legitimate heir to Trumpism.”

With inputs from agencies