New Delhi: US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said on May 25 that New Delhi had not raised any objections to Islamabad’s role as a mediator in the Iran conflict and that India’s concerns about Pakistan centred on armed terrorist groups operating from Pakistani territory.Speaking to reporters at the Air Force base in New Delhi before flying to Agra and Jaipur for a day of sightseeing, Rubio said India “is always pointing to the fact that there are armed terrorist groups operating from Pakistani territory that target India” and that “there are always concerns about that”.However, he added that Pakistan’s role “as a mediator and a facilitator in the Iran situation” had not come up in his talks with Indian leaders. “I don’t think they were complaining about that,” he said, adding that India’s “issue with Pakistan is different”.At a joint press conference with external affairs minister S Jaishankar on May 24, Rubio had faced a question on whether the Trump administration’s engagement with Pakistan’s military leadership was coming “at India’s expense.” He had responded without naming Pakistan directly. “I don’t view our relation with any country in the world as coming at the expense of our strategic alliance with India,” he had said.Since the conclusion of the four-day clash between India and Pakistan in May 2025, Trump has grown closer to the Pakistani leadership, especially army chief Asim Munir, while repeatedly claiming credit for helping stop the fighting between the two South Asian rivals.Jaishankar had similarly been guarded on the question of Pakistani mediation in the Iran war, saying only, “Now, as to who all are involved in the matter which Secretary Rubio addressed, I think it’s for the parties to work out, it’s for them.”Racist commentsRubio also returned to the question of racist rhetoric targeting Indians in the United States, which had come up at the Sunday press conference. Asked then about “racist comments” directed at Indians, Rubio had repeatedly pressed the journalist to specify which comments he was referring to. The journalist did not directly identify the controversy, but the exchange appeared to allude to the backlash triggered in April after President Donald Trump reposted remarks describing India and China as “hellhole” countries and accusing Indian immigrants of taking American jobs. India’s external affairs ministry had termed those remarks “uninformed, inappropriate and in poor taste” without directly naming Trump.Rubio had dismissed the issue by saying “every country in the world has stupid people.” He described the United States as a country “enriched by people who come to our country, from all over the world, have become Americans and assimilated into our way of life and have contributed greatly.”On Monday, asked again about the exchange, Rubio defended his response. “I don’t know who we’re talking about. I figured – I assume that he was talking about, like, people posting stuff online. I don’t even know. Some of those could be a troll or could be a bot,” he said.“That’s why I asked him specifically, can you tell me what you’re talking about and who you’re talking about? He didn’t have a specific example,” Rubio added.“But the bottom line is that in the modern era, you go online and there are people saying all kinds of crazy stuff online. I don’t even know if they’re real people or who they are,” he said.A Carnegie Endowment survey published in February 2026 found that nearly half of Indian American respondents said they frequently encountered racist content targeting Indians and Indian Americans on social media.