The Racism and Antisemitism Behind Trump's Border Policy

What were once fringe racist conspiracy theories have become part of the mainstream Republican platform

Photo by Markus Spiske on Unsplash

There has been much discussion about the reelection of former president Donald Trump and his proposed immigration policies. The Republican platform focusing solely on the southern border and the targeting of Latin American and Caribbean Island immigrants in its campaign’s rhetoric tells the story. However, the underlying views behind those policies are inherently racist and antisemitic, as noted in hate group manifestos as well as those of racist mass murderers.

The written diatribes of the attackers at the Tops Grocery Store in Buffalo, NY, a synagogue in Pittsburgh, PA, a community center in Christchurch, New Zealand, and at a Walmart in El Paso, Texas, among others, all promoted the narrative that an intentional attempt to make white people extinct is underway. While not new ideas in racist circles and among hate groups, these conspiracy theories have seen a resurgence in the last 20 years and are actively developing new theories with so-called “facts” that bolster the narrative.

Conservative policy institutes, far-right influencers, and lawmakers across the country, including the U.S. Congress, are promoting fraudulent validations of the “Great Replacement” conspiracy theory. An evolution that has resulted in conservative policy wonks and lawmakers targeting non-profits or, Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs), as part of their broader narrative. The normalization of foundational hateful ideologies poses obvious dangers to marginalized groups.

In 2023, during an appearance on the Heritage Explains podcast, Heritage Foundation Oversight Project Director Mike Howell promoted the idea that NGOs are being used like shell companies – to send funds to migrants through a broader network of other NGOs – and that they are intentionally spreading nonwhite immigrants all over the United States.

“Well, what we discovered through a memo released last week is that a large network of non-profits, non-governmental organizations, NGOs for short, down at the border are acting as a massive way point and resettlement program,” said Howell. “Basically what happens is border patrol turns over overflow of illegal aliens to facilities on the border. These NGO facilities then take care of lodge and care and travel to disperse legal aliens throughout the country.”

But the co-author of Project 2025 didn’t stop there. He later invoked an antisemitic version of the idea indicating that Jewish people are funding efforts to make white people extinct. He simply conjured up visions of an evil George Soros by suggesting that he is financing migrants coming to the United States and Europe through the Open Society Foundation.

“And it's not just in America. I mean, we see this in Europe. It's really an international operation. This is why the Open Society Foundation, George Soros, and his billions of dollars are the central node in this,” Howell continued. “I mean, there's a lot more players. But it really shows that the left's view of massive, massive illegal immigration to destabilize, frankly, the West is really the plan here. That's what they're aiming to do. They don't believe in territorial sovereignty or the nation-state. And so through the mass resettlement of illegal aliens, they're trying to undo that.”

These conspiracy theories have led Republican governors and lawmakers with ties to Christian nationalist movements to target various nonprofits, including religious NGOs such as Catholic charities. Many far-right conservatives argue that despite these charities being connected to religious institutions, they contend that the groups are not religious organizations – presumably to try and avoid being accused of targeting religious groups.

People like Howell will go to great lengths to try and prove that what they say is of legitimate concern. During the same podcast, he admitted to purchasing the cellular data of tens of thousands of phones, claiming to have tracked migrants throughout the country. Despite the incomplete data, the goal was to validate the “every city is a border city” narrative that we’ve all had to endure in the years leading up to and during the most recent election.

“But no, what we found is they're virtually going to every single congressional district in the US mainland,” continued Howell. “And the way we proved this was we went out and we bought bulk cell phone data that pinged the location data of the cell phones. And so we geofenced it to these NGOs, tracked the anonymized cell phones throughout the country, and then when the numbers came back and the data came back, shocker, they're going to every congressional district. And this is just a one-month period and only 30,000 total devices. And so the spread is complete throughout the entire country.”

Mike Howell is emblematic of the broader shift to outright fascism seen across the Republican party and bleeding into the overall political discourse. Howell has also been a key driver in pushing anti-LGBTQ ideas by targeting Drag Queen Story Hours and transgender people and was caught employing blatant homophobia against a hacker who was part of a group called SiegeSec that hacked the Heritage Foundation earlier this year.

Howell, who spread misinformation saying the recent election was fraudulent before election day, seems to enjoy the idea of using migrants for free labor and has equated Black Lives Matter (BLM) to a terrorist group. While ignoring history, he claimed the Federal Bureau of Investigations (FBI) is providing cover for the BLM movement while arguing that the “woke” agency is favorable to Black-led movements.

Howell’s positions are common among Trump’s team and his base. Racist talking points, once raised using coded language, are now blatantly obvious with today’s Republicans. When considering that modern Christian nationalism resembles the ideologies and practices of the Ku Klux Klan, the rhetoric we see and hear is identical for a reason. Many of these tropes about Black people, Latinos and Caribbean Islanders, women, and the LGBTQ community – while accusing people who don't think like them of being communists – have existed for decades.

However, the current iteration the so-called “Great Replacement” has more financial and political backing than ever before. The use of dehumanizing and villainizing language in the public sphere in ways the world has never seen is largely due to the advent of social media and how easily it is manipulated to ensure the spread of malicious views. This makes recruitment effortless, manipulating conversations easier, and spreading hateful ideas under the guise of being “edgy” more prevalent than ever.

Now, with so many so-called “think tanks” and policy institutes employing the use of racist and antisemitic tropes while justifying their use, they are driving policy that puts many non-white, non-cis-male communities at risk. As lawmakers like Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL), former Senator and vice president-elect JD Vance, Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA), and governors like Greg Abbott (TX) and Kristi Noem (SD) buy-in, “white extinction” is moving from hate groups to policy institutes to laws being passed and policies implemented based on the idea.

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NOTE: Rubio was nominated to be Trump’s Secretary of State. Noem was selected to head the Department of Homeland Security. Howell served as the Heritage Foundation’s liaison to the first Trump administration and as senior advisor for government relations in the 117th Congress. Greene will chair a House subcommittee under the House Oversight Committee to work with Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy in Trump’s new Department of Government Efficiency.

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I’m a freelance journalist. Find my work at Latino Rebels, Unicorn Riot, The Antagonist Magazine, and more. I’m also on TikTok, Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Mastodon, and Threads. To support my work, consider becoming a paid subscriber or donate on Venmo, PayPal, or CashApp