From Horrible Rhetoric to Terrible Actions Against Immigrants

Maribel Hastings

Posted Oct. 17, 2024

As the November 5th election approaches, Donald Trump’s attacks against immigrants and the Democratic presidential nominee, Kamala Harris, are increasingly more virulent, violent, and dangerous — because such rhetoric has already had deadly consequences in the United States.

And what’s worse, Trump continues laying the groundwork to declare there was “fraud” in case he loses, which could have violent consequences in the highly polarized atmosphere of this electoral cycle.

In one of his recent campaign events, Trump attacked immigrants with extremely violent language, declaring that they “cut your throat and won’t even think about it the next morning.” “They grab young girls and slice them up right in front of their parents,” Trump declared.

If we have learned anything about Trumpism, it is not to underestimate his threats.

On Harris, he launched a barrage of insults about her mental health. He blamed her for the “invasion” at the Mexican border, saying she should be “impeached and prosecuted.” He has referred to Harris, the first woman of African American and Indian heritage nominated to be president of the United States, as “stupid, weak, dumb as a rock, and lazy.”

Among all Trump’s attacks, and those of his running mate J.D. Vance, against undocumented immigrants, they have called them murderers, rapists, fentanyl traffickers, terrorists, and criminals poisoning the blood of the country; said they are voting fraudulently in elections, responsible for the high cost of housing and inflation, as well as a decrease in salaries of U.S. workers, fraudulently using federal programs like Social Security and Medicare, and taking up FEMA funds intended for managing disasters; they blame them for the presence of guns in schools, and accused Haitians of eating the pets of Springfield, Ohio residents.

That is just a partial list. Shamefully, Trump’s racist and dehumanizing rhetoric has been normalized among some sectors who dismiss it as just “Trump being Trump.”

But this goes beyond being offensive. We are in the middle of a very atypical presidential election, starting with how Harris came to the nomination after Joe Biden decided not to seek reelection following his poor performance in the first debate with Trump. And with Trump’s presence on the ticket — a divisive and polarizing figure — it’s not surprising that the atmosphere is so charged and that the ex-president’s incendiary rhetoric has the potential to add fuel to the fire, with terrible consequences.

Trump is even already affirming that if he loses the elections, it will be because of the “fraud” that Democrats are committing. Although that is false, his fans believe it, like they continue to believe that Biden “stole” the 2020 election, and that is why the violent assault on the Capitol — to impede the certification of Biden’s victory on January 6, 2021 — was “justified.”

This electoral cycle has produced two assassination attempts against Trump himself because the consequences go both ways, and his attacks against immigrants, minorities, and Democrats can generate acts of violence against those targets or him.

As recently as October 3, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) issued a bulletin warning that violent domestic extremists “with election-related grievances” could act against the security of the candidates, political opponents, election officials, judicial officials, and reporters, among others. Their “grievances” include immigration.

The great danger is not only that this rhetoric descends into violence before, during, or after the elections but also that, in a case where Trump wins the presidency, what he will do to make good on the threat of mass deportations contained in Project 2025. He indicated that implementing the plan would be a “bloody story.”

If we have learned anything about Trumpism, it is not to underestimate his threats. This same Trump and his advisors, among them the Machiavellian Stephen Miller, separated children and babies from their parents at the border to “deter” others from coming to the United States. They are the ones who want to remove DACA protections from Dreamers to make them deportable.

The question is whether Trump’s horrible rhetoric will turn into terrible actions against immigrants if he becomes the victor on November 5.

Maribel Hastings is a Senior Advisor to América’s Voice.