Speaking in an interview in which he spoke to far-left MS NOW (formerly MSNBC) personality Joy Reid on her podcast “The Joy Reid Show”, Wajahat Ali, a far-left political commentator of Pakistani heritage known for making inflammatory remarks about immigration and migration, told Reid that his family no longer wants to migrate to America because of President Trump. The remarks came back in September of 2025.
Making the comment, Ali began by claiming that President Trump has turned America into the laughing stock of the third world, insisting to Reid that he is “an American” and seeing the world’s scorn directed America’s way “pains” him, though it was obvious that he was gloating about how the Third World doesn’t like President Trump. In any case, he said, “What we found out, Joy, and this pains me as an American, other countries were laughing at him and laughing at us.”
Continuing, Ali noted that his family used to want to come to America because it has “many challenges”, which is certainly understating the huge set of issues that Pakistan faces. He said, “I want to tell you all something about Pakistan. My parents were from Pakistan. It’s a country with many challenges. My cousin came here from Pakistan, studied, went back.”
Adding to that, Ali explained that his cousin decided to just stay back home in Pakistan rather than move from there to America, saying, “He was about to come to America. You know what he said? He goes, ‘Hey, man, I was about to buy a ticket to America, but things look really bad. I’m just gonna stick back in Karachi.'”
While some posters and outlets claimed he said, “My family in Pakistan does not want to come to America thanks to Trump! Pakistanis are staying home!”, that appears to have been a paraphrase of the comment about his cousin staying at home. In any case, he concluded, “When people in Pakistan are looking at us and they’re like taking pity…it’s a problem.” Watch him here:
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Commenters on X, in response to a post about the incident from the “End Wokeness” account, cheered on the news in a big way, saying things like, “I voted for this!”, “I DID!!! I VOTED FOR THIS!”, and “‘My family in Pakistan doesn’t want to come to America thanks to Trump!’ Trump just solved immigration AND national security all at once.”
Others said things like, “I did. If Trump scared terrorist out of flooding our borders, that’s called success”, “If Trump could run a third time this clip would’ve earned him my vote lol”, and “‘Pakistanis are staying home because of Trump!’ – bro just became Trump’s best campaign surrogate without realizing it.” Others said, “Just being related to him is a reason to not allow someone to come to the United States” and “He should go home to his family.”
Featured image credit: screengrab from the embedded video