A smear piece written by Khalistani separatist advocate Pieter Friedrich was briefly promoted by supporters of political opponents of Tulsi Gabbard until it began to backfire on their own candidates. However, since it will likely show up in Tulsi related threads on social media, I decided to address it.

Tulsi Gabbard interview on WHO Radio in Iowa

First, some background on the article’s author, Pieter Friedrich. Hawaii based blogger Naomi Allen, known as @girlyGRRRL on Twitter, dug up his connection to the Khalistani separatist movement several months ago. He’s also infamous for trying to associate Mahatma Gandhi with Adolf Hitler in order to get Gandhi statues torn down in the US.

Friedrich’s article titled “All in the Family” was published by The Caravan political journal which, we’ll see, either did not research Friedrich’s sources, who are political rivals of Tulsi Gabbard, or they didn’t care.

Friedrich shares that he confronted Gabbard at a town hall meeting in California. He came dressed in dark glasses and a hat to disguise his identity, then pulled them off to ask the following: “When did your collaboration with the RSS begin and how much money have they given you?” Why was he in disguise? Recently, at a town hall in Georgia, I witnessed a self-described Wahhabi member criticize Gabbard for her use of the term Wahhabi to describe Saudi backed terrorists. When someone tried to shout the man down the audience of Tulsi supporters cried out “Let him speak.” The reason Friedrich asked his question is that he has no accounting of such an RSS connection, no evidence. The audience had no idea what he was talking about or who he was. His disguise was propaganda. A video of the incident has circulated somewhat on social media.

Friedrich then cites an article from The Intercept which was retracted for Hinduphobia, in order to complain that Gabbard called him out for being a Hinduphobe. #irony

Reporter Michael Tracey on Twitter

In an attempt to paint Gabbard as some kind of pro-India partisan, Friedrich writes: “And yet, before she was even elected to office, she promised to be ‘a strong voice in Congress for improving India–US relations.’” This quote is taken from an interview with Aziz Haniffa. Friedrich conveniently leaves out the following from that interview:

“As an elected official, I will work towards defending fundamental constitutional rights of free exercise of religion and the separation of church and state and adopt legislation that promotes a message of inclusiveness for Americans of all faith traditions. I will uphold federal policies that support the religious accommodation of minority faiths in a variety of settings and preclude religious discrimination against any group.” — Tulsi Gabbard

Friedrich wants to tie Tulsi Gabbard’s own Hindu faith with what he considers far-right Hindu extremism in India. He fails to do that but, along the way, he takes a laughable detour into Gabbard’s upbringing among Hare Krishnas in Hawaii. “Her parents oversaw a Hare Krishna splinter group called the Science of Identity Foundation,” Friedrich writes. This is a fabrication. Tulsi Gabbard’s parents never ran SIF. So much for The Caravan’s fact-checking.

“She was immersed in the Bhagavad Gita, and kept her childhood copy of it with her when she was deployed as a medical administrator to Iraq. Later, she gifted the same copy to Modi.” Clinton, Obama, Harris, Warren and even Sanders supporters have promoted this line, not realizing Tulsi Gabbard served on the Foreign Affairs Committee when Obama was reestablishing relations with India and its prime minister Narendra Modi. President Obama personally wrote Modi’s Time Magazine 100 Most Influential People entry. It is impossible to attack Gabbard as working for so-called Hindutva groups without implicating Barack Obama.

Observe this next quote from Friedrich carefully: “Donor names provided in filings to the Federal Election Commission, which I collated with lists from Sangh websites and promotional materials as well as media reports, reveal that hundreds of leaders and members of such groups gave hundreds of thousands of dollars to Gabbard in the formative years of her congressional career.” This is precisely what The Intercept had to retract within its own article as Hinduphobic. This accusation is based merely on Hindu names that are the same as names supposedly on Sangh websites. Later, we’ll see how Friedrich tries to paint a nefarious connection between US-based Hindu advocacy groups and India-based ones but fails.

Friedrich corroborates his list of Hindus by citing Kallie Keith-Agaran, “a Democratic activist in Hawaii.” Kallie, whose husband serves in the Hawaii legislature with Tulsi’s father was a political activist for Tulsi’s opponent Sherry Campagna whom Tulsi defeated. This should have been a red flag to The Caravan.

Friedrich bores us with a history of India’s RSS and tries to build a case for Hindu terrorism: “Months later, in 2002, the anti-Muslim pogrom broke out across the state in the wake of the Godhra train fire.” This is how Friedrich describes the Godhra train murders in which Hindu passengers were burned alive. From reading Friedrich, you might think that only people who practice Hinduism become violent.

A coach of the Sabarmati Express was burnt on February 27, 2002 at the Godhra station, triggering riots in the Gujarat.

Sprinkled in Friedrich’s article are little gems such as this: “According to some, Modi sanctioned the violence.” Modi was actually found innocent of wrongdoing by the Supreme Court of India while Modi’s opposition was in power.

Friedrich then turns to Tulsi Gabbard’s father who is Catholic and, like many conservative politicians, worked against same-sex marriage. Many have tried to smear Tulsi based on her father, but Tulsi’s LGBT record in the House is clear. She has received endorsements from the Human Rights Campaign which scores her 100% pro-LGBT.

At age 21, Tulsi picketed against same-sex unions. A few short years later, her worldview was altered by her experience in war serving with LGBT soldiers. Friedrich’s own article shows that by 2007 Tulsi had convinced her father to switch to the Democratic Party. Tulsi’s mother practices Hinduism.

Friedrich uses Tulsi’s aunt to frame Tulsi as a homeschooled child only allowed to read Hare Krishna books, but then as someone who fakes being Hindu to get votes. This is contradictory, and it contradicts Friedrich’s narrative of a Tulsi/Hindutva plot. As does Tulsi’s stepping down from her position in the DNC and risking losing her political career to defy the establishment and endorse Bernie Sanders in 2016.

Ultimately, Friedrich returns to the religious bigotry upon which his work is based, attempting to connect Tulsi Gabbard with what he considers a cultist offshoot of Hare Krishna Hinduism run by one of Gabbard’s religious mentors, Chris Butler. To do so, he cites another political activist, Christine Gralow, who was a supporter of Tulsi’s defeated opponent Shay Chan Hodges in 2016. Gralow is also a disgruntled former employee who was fired by Honolulu Magazine for harassing Gabbard online. Gralow’s conspiracy is quickly debunked, as it was investigated by Honolulu Civil Beat and rejected.

From Honolulu Civil Beat, March 16, 2015

Having no more than a list of Hindu sounding names, Friedrich must connect Gabbard to India’s RSS via Hindu advocacy groups in the US such as Hindu American Foundation (HAF), and he fails to do that. It’s a strange endeavor, to begin with, because it’s like saying a Muslim politician has connections to extremists simply because she’s received donations from members of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) when, according to The New York Times, CAIR has even worked with the FBI to root out extremists. To make his connection, Friedrich relies on the India Development and Relief Fund, Inc. (IDRF):

“The controversy began in November 2002, when the Mumbai-based Sabrang Communications released a report calling the IDRF ‘a major conduit of funds for Hindutva organisations in India.’ The report accused the group of operating under US laws granting tax-exempt status to charitable organisations in order to raise money — nearly four million dollars in total — for the Sangh. It concluded, ‘That IDRF supports Sangh organizations in India is thus not a matter of accident but is instead the very purpose for its existence.’”

The accusation caused such an upset that some US businesses stopped matching funds with IDRF and an investigation was launched by the US Justice Department. There’s just one problem, nothing came of it, and today IDRF is one of the highest-rated organizations on Charity Navigator. In fact, Sabrang itself and its owner Teesta Setalvad have been accused of pocketing its NGO funds meant for victims of Gujarat violence.

Friedrich’s smear piece ends with the following:

“Correction: An earlier version of this article mistakenly stated that Sina Gabbard recalled her brother’s family prostrating themselves before an altar to Chris Butler. The article has been corrected to state that Sina recalled hearing of the family prostrating themselves at the feet of Butler.” [Bolded emphasis mine.]

The bottom line is that Pieter Friedrich has his own political agenda and sees Tulsi Gabbard as a convenient conduit through which to raise awareness of his cause. As voters and as citizens who respect leaders who forge peace through diplomacy, we should reject his cynicism, his divisiveness, and his obvious propaganda.