How GOP Candidates Are Mainstreaming Fringe Anti-Immigrant Hate

On the three year anniversary of the mass shooting in El Paso, NPR posted this article analyzing how hard-line rhetoric on immigration has shifted from the fringe to become a part of mainstream GOP election rhetoric.?

Pyrra closely tracks anti-immigrant attitudes across fringe social media sites and NPR’s report rings true: there are worrying trends in anti-immigration narratives across online extremist communities, and also an increasing link between anti-immigration sentiment and the GOP agenda.?

Anti-immigration narratives are, at their core, powered by racism and an underlying fear of the “other.” But it was Donald Trump’s arrival on the political scene that shifted the narrative into ‘acceptable’ public discourse, and whipped conservative voters into a frenzy with the notion or ‘confirmation’ that immigrants are criminals who want to steal American jobs. This disinformation has become so rapidly accepted that Republican campaigns across the country are running ads that further stoke conservative fears of a wide-open southern border, and depict an immigration invasion as an existential threat to American freedoms.?

Extremists on fringe social media often start and continue to spread the same harmful messages that these political ads imply. On sites like Truth Social, 8kun, and Gab, Pyrra has identified a fixation on the southern US border; fringe posters use inflammatory rhetoric about the border to Mexico being “wide open” with constant streams of people flowing across into the US. We see dehumanizing buzzwords like “hoard,” “invasion,” and “swarm,” which discourage any consideration of immigrants as individuals worthy of empathy and human dignity.

We are seeing repetitive posts every few weeks about a new migrant caravan approaching the border. Somehow, each of these caravans seem bigger and more threatening than the last.?

Online, these disinformation-ridden stories stoke fear and promote viral, hate-fueled engagement from users who are already politically committed to the idea that immigrants pose a danger to America.??

The creation of a constant threat (stories claiming that larger and larger groups of non-white immigrants are trying to “invade” the US) serves to deepen the radicalization of some reactionary users, who turn to violent and extreme fantasies as the only apparent solution to the so-called problem. Or, in the worst case scenario, these violent fantasies spill into the real world – like the shooting in El Paso three years ago, where a gunman killed 23 people in his attempt to stop the “Hispanic Invasion”.?

Of greatest concern is the rise in popularity of the conspiracy theory known as “Great Replacement”. The conspiracy pushes the notion that Anglo-Saxons, specifically white men, are being removed from positions of influence and replaced with minorities. Or worse, that they are being bred out of existence via a “white genocide”. As far fetched as this may seem to most, the conspiracy has already motivated high-profile acts of terrorism against non-white communities (such as the 2019 mass shooting at a Christchurch mosque and this year’s attack on a Buffalo supermarket – in both cases, the shooters left written manifestos that outlined their belief in the Great Replacement theory as a central motivation for killing non-white people). Increasingly, conspiracists allege that Democrats are orchestrating a Great Replacement in an attempt to consolidate power. This stretches far beyond the Biden administration to include the World Economic Forum, and a variety of high-profile business leaders, such as George Soros and Bill Gates.?

Racism, anti-immigrant sentiment, and all the disinformation and lies that come with it, pose serious dangers to individuals, communities, businesses and even political stability. Any use of anti-immigration sentiment to further political agendas is gravely concerning, and has long lasting and far reaching effects that are not easy to reverse.?

Pyrra enables users to identify and track narratives in the unregulated corners of the internet where hate and extremism fester unchecked. American politics is increasingly shaped by extremist responses to the accelerated news cycle. When political earthquakes happen, keep pace with the rapidly evolving extremist narratives with Pyrra’s high-level dashboard and advanced analytic tools. Visit our website to learn more.