"All the evidence suggests this is not “a baseless urban legend.” Rather, it is a packaged neo-Nazi attack designed to sow violence against migrant communities.
According to
a local leader in the Haitian community, while there were tensions, none of that boiled up until a car accident involving a legal Haitian ended up killing a school boy.
What were things like over the course of the first couple of years that you were living in Springfield? Was the community welcoming?
We were just here working peacefully and caring about our family and all of this. The community was okay. There was still a group of people in Springfield who saw the coming of the Haitians as a threat. But normally, generally, the community was so open with us. We had so many people working with us and things like this. Until the recent incident of the recent bus accident and people have been building up on that just to tell bad news about us.
So you think the bus accident was when things really started to change?
Yeah, it triggered it. There was some tension before but not like it came after the bus accident.
A neo-Nazi group responded to that by organizing a march in the town. And then one of them created a conflict at a local city commission.
Late last month, a neo-Nazi group called Blood Ties organized a march outside the Springfield Jazz and Blues Festival. At the Aug. 26 city commission meeting, Drake R. Berentz took credit for organizing that march while introducing himself via an anti-Black pseudonym. He was promptly removed from the hearing after stating, “Crime and savagery will only increase with every Haitian you bring in.”
A national far right network with intimate ties to Trump’s team start magnifying disinformation from Springfield.
Shortly after, racist claims aimed at the state’s Haitian community began to surge online, boosted by known disinformation outlets and eventually echoed by GOP officials.
The unfounded narrative that Haitian immigrants were eating pets reached national attention after being repeated this week first by Republican vice presidential nominee J.D. Vance (the junior senator from Ohio) and then his running mate Donald Trump at the latter’s debate with Kamala Harris.
The origins of the conspiracy theory remain largely unknown, but a New Lines investigation has identified several points of amplification from known spreaders of disinformation. Its fairly rapid spread reveals how extremist narratives travel from the fringes of the internet into the mouths of politicians, seemingly overnight.
Less than a week earlier, End Wokeness, an account on X (formally Twitter) that has been connected in the past to the white nationalist Jack Posobiec, shared a Facebook post alleging that Haitian immigrants were eating pets in Ohio. The claim was quickly repeated by the political commentator and founder of Turning Point USA, Charlie Kirk, during his broadcast hosted on Steve Bannon’s media network.
Kirk commented that this brought the United States “one step closer to the great replacement,” referring to a white nationalist narrative that claims non-white immigrants are replacing white people in the U.S. The narrative was originally obscure but has been increasingly embraced by the GOP mainstream in recent years.
Kirk is a close associate of Posobiec. Both his claims and the End Wokeness account’s tweet reference a single anonymous post on a private Facebook group as proof of their claims.
This was followed up on Sept. 8, when the End Wokeness account tweeted a video from a Springfield City Commission meeting where an influencer and podcaster named Anthony Harris claimed Haitian immigrants were eating ducks in the parks. This seemingly spawned from a repurposed image of a man holding a dead Canada goose in Columbus, Ohio, taken a month before.
This entire story, then, is about creating false stories in order to stoke far right violence against immigrants. It’s not an urban legend. It is deliberate propaganda.
It is already
having real effects on the Haitians in Springfield."
https://www.emptywheel.net/2024/09/...etcon-his-fascist-attack-on-haitian-migrants/
“
The neo-Nazi group Blood Tribe, led by two former Marines,
organized a protest in Springfield weeks before the presidential debate, with the aim of fanning xenophobic sentiments.
The Proud Boys, designated as a terrorist group in Canada, have also allegedly descended on Springfield. These groups were fundamentally important in spreading the false accusation against Haitians about eating pets, a claim first made by a local woman who now
regrets the impact her post has had on the Haitian immigrant community.
After the recent presidential debate, Christopher Pohlhaus, the leader of the Blood Tribe, celebrated on his
Telegram channel that former President Trump brought attention to Springfield and emphasized the group’s influence in shaping U.S. public perception of the impact of immigration. In August, members of the Blood Tribe started to amplify the rumor about the Haitian Springfield community engaging in the eating of cats on Gab, an alt-right microblogging platform, and Telegram, an unregulated and encrypted messaging application. Ohio ranks
sixth in the country for the state with the largest number of hate groups and anti-government organizations, according to the Southern Poverty Law Center. ”
https://www.lawfaremedia.org/articl...is-a-microcosm-of-american-political-violence
Saying, “I think that any Jewish person who votes for a Democrat…should have their head examined.” (This is one of his go-to claims.)
Declaring that a group of neo-Nazis had some “very fine people” among it
Having dinner at Mar-a-Lago with a Holocaust denier
Saying a man known for going on antisemitic tirades had “a good heart”
Hosting a White House Hanukkah party that featured an evangelical pastor who once said Jews were going to hell
Allegedly claiming that Hitler “did some good things,” and having to be told by his then chief of staff, “Sir, you can never say anything good about the guy”
Attacking “liberal Jews” on Rosh Hashanah, one of the holiest days of the year
Telling a room full of Jewish people that Jews who work in real estate are “brutal killers” and “not nice people at all”
Suggesting Jews control the media
Reportedly saying that Jews are “only in it for themselves,” following phone calls with Jewish lawmakers
Saying Jews who vote for Democrats “hate Israel” and Judaism
Reportedly wanting his military leaders to operate like “the German generals in World War II”
Tweeting an image of Hillary Clinton’s face against a backdrop of $100 bills and a Star of David, along with the words “most corrupt candidate ever”
Using Hitler-esque rhetoric, like calling his enemies “vermin” and claiming immigrants are “poisoning the blood of our country”
Suggesting that Jews only care about money
Keeping a book of Hitler’s speeches next to his bed
Meanwhile, during his blame-the-Jews
