Right-Wing Influencers Want to End Immigration Completely

By Thor Benson | June 20, 2025 | 12:47pm

Photo by Jason Leung/Unsplash

Immigration right-wing media

Right-Wing Influencers Want to End Immigration Completely

As tensions increase over Donald Trump’s authoritarian immigration actions, the rhetoric surrounding the issue is also continuing to escalate. Right-wing influencers on social media are engaging with conspiracy theories and trying to convince Americans that immigration — essentially all of it, legal or otherwise — must come to a halt.

In some cases, it seems as though a group of social media ghouls attended the same webinar to get their marching orders. For example, take the recent talking point posted by multiple influential figures in the MAGA movement: Right-wing commentators Matt Walsh, Charlie Kirk and Jack Posobiec all posted that the U.S. needs to “ban all third-world immigration,” because of its supposed negative effects on “cultural, educational, housing, financial and essential services.” They are all now calling for a “net-zero immigration moratorium.”

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“My first thought is how funny it is that these right-wing influencers think they’re above the groupthink of legacy media,” Kurt Braddock, an assistant professor of public communication at American University whose research focuses on how extremist groups work to recruit and persuade, told Splinter. “They’ve stepped away from some of the rhetoric that explicitly mentions the Great Replacement Theory, but this is right in line with it. Stopping all immigration from non-white countries is exactly what that theory calls for. It’s the exact kind of thing we’ve seen in manifestos.”

Braddock said he’s not surprised that we’re seeing rhetoric become more extreme as Trump “ramps up” immigration enforcement. The president and his supporters will likely feel a need to fear-monger even more than they have in the past as public opinion turns against what’s occurring.

“If I had to guess, I think we’re going to see more demonization of immigrants, more patent lies about things like violent crime, more efforts to convince so-called ‘everyday Americans’ that immigrants are a danger to the American way of life,” Braddock said.

It’s not just the influencers, of course — Trump himself is also becoming more extreme in his rhetoric surrounding immigration issues. A notable example is his use of the term “remigration,” which is a far-right European term used to describe sending non-white immigrants back to their country of origin.

“If he’s calling it ‘remigration’ now, that’s in line with the Great Replacement Theory,” Braddock said. “The idea that Democrats are—if not facilitating then promoting illegal immigration.”

Right-wing influencers and the Trump administration have found success in repeating messages until the public starts to believe them, so this is likely to continue. They have help from the right-wing media machine, with outlets like Fox News happy to participate in repeating misleading or false claims about immigrants and the threat they supposedly pose to the country.

“The right has spent 40 years cultivating a media landscape that is self-supporting,” Braddock said. “They don’t have gatekeepers. They can say anything, and if it goes badly, they just deny it or ignore it.”

Braddock added that they’re doing everything they can to depict these immigrants as criminals, even though the “vast majority” of immigrants are “just trying to work and earn a living” and don’t have a criminal record. If immigrants were seen as they actually are, there would be little reason to support the unprecedented actions of the Trump administration.

“Polling data shows these ICE raids are pretty unpopular. People are starting to see the implications of these raids on things like farms and factories,” Braddock said. “You’re even seeing MAGA Republicans say things like, ‘I didn’t vote for this.’”

There’s some cognitive dissonance among Trump’s supporters right now, Braddock said, where they say they want mass deportations but don’t like it when they see it actually happening. They seem to have believed the claims that there were mountains of criminals out there to deport, and there simply aren’t that many, and they’re not such fans of the administration deporting people who’ve essentially done nothing wrong and have been contributing to their communities.

The polls are moving against Trump on immigration, and if Democrats are smart, they’ll do what they can to keep highlighting the cruelty and recklessness this administration is displaying. It’s easy to attack your opponent on their weak points, but it’s often more effective to attack them where they’re perceived to be the strongest.