The free speech organization Pen America has documented nearly 23,000 book bans in public schools in the United States since 2021.
"I could never have imagined it," the author told Bloomberg.
Some of the best books ever are being weeded out, he points out, mentioning Harper Lee's classic novel "Mortal Sin" and "Beloved" by Nobel Prize winner Toni Morrison.
"One of the reasons people like me wanted to live in the United States is that freedom of speech is enshrined in the Constitution," says Rushdie, who has lived there since 2000.
Common reasons for books being banned are LGBTQI themes as well as depictions of ethnicity or violence, according to Pen.
Rushdie's novel "The Satanic Verses" was banned in India in 1988 by Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi.
In 1989, Iran's Ayatollah Khomeini issued a fatwa against Rushdie. In 2022, he was stabbed in New York and left blind in one eye.
