The Model Immigrant Hate Campaign

What Is the Immigration Issue Really About? (Part 1)

“Very fine people” at it again, in Springfield, Ohio.

What is the immigration issue really about? What are its deepest philosophical roots?

For the past week and a half, Donald Trump and J.D. Vance have been whipping up a hysteria over legal Haitian immigrants in Springfield, Ohio. This is a big story that shows us the ugly truth about the current anti-immigration campaign and the vicious corruption of the contemporary conservative movement. In Part 2, I’ll trace this back farther to the fundamental philosophical issue driving the hysteria. But first, let’s just get a handle on what has been happening recently.

Daniel Drezner had a good overview a few days ago.

A local woman posted a baseless rumor on Facebook—she subsequently took it down and expressed remorse that it “exploded into something I didn’t mean to happen”—and then far-right activists and neo-Nazis fanned the flames even further, hyping the allegations on Twitter. By Monday of last week, Vance was tweeting, “Reports now show that people have had their pets abducted and eaten by people who shouldn't be in this country.” And then Trump made his, “In Springfield, they’re eating the dogs, they’re eating the cats, they’re eating the pets” claim in his abysmal debate performance Tuesday night.

For the past week, Springfield officials pushed back hard on the allegations made by Trump and Vance. The Springfield Police Department refuted Vance’s claim last Monday. As ABC News’ David Muir pointed out during the debate, city officials said there was no evidence supporting Trump’s allegations. The Republican mayor of Springfield made it clear that the rumors of pets being abducted were completely unfounded. This weekend the Republican governor of Ohio said on This Week about the eating pet rumors, “Look, there’s a lot of garbage on the internet and, you know, this is a piece of garbage that was simply not true. There’s no evidence of this at all.” He also praised the Haitian residents of Springfield as being partially responsible for Springfield’s “great resurgence.”

The problem is that Trump and Vance have been unapologetic in hyping up the panic even more. As the Washington Post reported on Friday, “For days, Donald Trump and his allies have zeroed in on Springfield, Ohio, amplifying baseless claims that Haitian immigrants there are eating others’ pets. The promotion of such rumors, which thrust the city into the national spotlight, is rooted in a centuries-old racist trope of vilifying newcomers to the United States and highlights the country’s present-day divides, historians say.”

The resulting hysteria has paralyzed daily life Springfield. A bomb threat Thursday that forced the evacuation of Springfield’s City Hall and other buildings “used hateful language towards immigrants and Haitians in our community,” according to Springfield’s mayor. Haitian families living in the town now fear for their safety. Schools have been closed because of bomb threats as well.

I have a few follow-ups to add to that.

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The Model Immigrant Hate Campaign

First, it turns out there are not as many Haitian immigrants as conservatives have claimed. The figure they’ve thrown out is that 20,000 or even 30,000 Haitians have arrived in the past few years in a town that previously had only 60,000 people. According to a detailed analysis by an outfit dedicated to quantitative fact-checking, the real number is about 10,000. More to the point, this analysis also shows that there is no confirmation for many of the other claims about the supposedly negative effects of Haitian immigration, including unusually rising housing prices and increased demand for public schools.

This is consistent with all the available evidence. Ohio’s Republican governor, Mike DeWine, defended the Haitians.

So when you look at all of these things, people who want to work, people who value their kids, who value education, you know, these are positive influences on our community in Springfield, and any comment about that otherwise, I think, is hurtful and is not helpful to the city of Springfield and the people of Springfield.

Radley Balko has a good overview of how Haitians came to Springfield. They were not “dumped there,” as Trump and Vance claim. Haitians were attracted by local leaders’ attempt to revitalize the town.