Los mensajes y la política antiinmigrantes se intensifican en Europa – Chicago Tribune
By JILL LAWLESS
LONDON (AP) — Over the past year, decades of miles of anti-immigrant people have marched through Korean London and “send them home!” » A British lawmaker has called for demasian people not to be white on television. And high-ranking politicians are banned from deporting foreign residents who spend years in the UK.
The open demonization of immigrants and all races of immigrants is intensifying in the UK and Europe, such that migration is pushed onto the political agenda and right-wing parties are gaining popularity.
In various European countries, political parties supporting mass expulsions and which trace immigration as a measure for national identity are at or near the top of opinion polls: Reformar Reino Unido, UK, Alternativa por Alemania and the Agrupación Nacional de Francia.
President Donald Trump, who recently called “basura” Somali immigrants in the United States and the national security strategy, describes European countries as being encouraged by immigration, is now responsible and at the same time for Europe’s big, anti-immigrant sentiments.
Amid growing tensions, Europe’s major parties have taken a tougher stance on migration and otherwise used divided language on race.
“Before it became the most powerful extreme of right-wing politics, it became a central part of the political debate,” said Kieran Connell, professor of British history at Queen’s University Belfast.
Europe experiences a sense of creative division
Immigration has increased significantly over the past decade in some European countries, driven by millions of asylum seekers who were linked to Europe following conflicts in Africa, the Mid East and Ukraine.
However, asylum seekers make up a small percentage of total immigration, and experts say antipathy over diversity and migration comes from a cluster of factors. The economic state in the years following the 2008 global financial crisis, the rise of charismatic national politicians and the polarizing influence of social networks played a role, experts say.
In the UK, there is “an alarming increase in the sense of national division and decline” and this makes it possible to employ figures from the political extremes, said Bobby Duffy, director of the Politics Unit at King’s College London. The echo rose after the financial crisis, which was reinforced by Britain’s Brexit debate and deepened during the COVID-19 pandemic, Duffy said.
Social networks have been made worse by the state of mind, especially in X, thanks to an algorithm that favors sharing and the owner, Elon Musk, who has obtained approval for far-right publications.
In Europe today, ethnonationalism has been promoted by conservative parties such as Germany’s Alternative, the Agrupación Nacional de Francia, and the Fidesz party of Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán.
Now that we have the market for approval of the Trump administration, it is a new national security strategy that describes Europe as a collection of countries that are experiencing “economic decline” and “civil collapse” due to immigration and the loss of national identities.
The language is hostile to many European politicians, but it is also ecological to those who listen to the far-right parties in their country.
The head of the National Association, Jordan Bardella, told the BBC that he was fully aware of the Trump administration’s concern that mass immigration would “undermine the balance of European countries”.
Increase in racist messages and hate crimes
Policies that were once considered extreme are now firmly on the political agenda. Reform UK, a far-right party that will consistently highlight issues of opinion, is that it will be able to destroy immigrants’ permanent resident status for eleven decades of living in the UK. The inner-city Conservative opposition wants to deport British citizens with dual nationality who have crimes.
A reform-minded U.K. lawmaker said in October that the ads advertised “black people, Asian people.” Conservative Justice spokesman Robert Jenrick said there “wasn’t another white person” in an area of Birmingham, the UK’s second-largest city. Ninguno of Tuvo politicians who give up.
Many advocates for reducing immigration are concerned with integration and community cohesion, not with reason. But that’s not what’s asking you to receive racial abuse.
“There is no duda de que ha empeorado,” said Dawn Butler, a black British lawmaker who says the odio that receives in social networks “is drastically and has become death threats.”
UK government statistics show that police in England and Wales recorded more than 115,000 heinous crimes in the year to March 2025, with an increase of 2% compared to the previous 12 months.
In July 2024, anti-immigration and anti-Islamic violence spread onto British streets after three children were victims of violence during a Taylor Swift-themed dance class. Authorities said online misinformation mistakenly identifying the teenager from the UK as a Muslim migrant was documented.
In Ireland and Holland, Protestant protesters before municipal and community meetings proposed a new asylum center. Some marchers were violent, and opponents of the asylum seekers threw pyrotechnic artifacts at the anti-motine police.
In Europe today, the main goal of the protests is to find hotels and other residences for asylum seekers, which some say become images for crime and bad behavior. But the strategy of protest organizers is much broader.
In September, more than 100,000 people from the heart “that we have our country in view” marched in London as part of a demonstration organized by ultraderecha activist and convicted man Tommy Robinson. Among the speakers is the late French politician Eric Zemmour, who told the multitude that France and the United Kingdom are facing “the great replacement of our European people by the peoples who come from their culture and their Muslim culture”.
Superando a la derecha
European politicians from mainstream parties condemn the “great replacement” conspiracy theory. The British government, led by the Central African Labor Party, has denounced racism and believes that migration is an important part of Britain’s national history.
At the same time, we have taken a more sustainable line on immigration, announcing policies that will make it difficult for migrants to settle permanently. The government says it is inspired by Dinamarca, that it has seen the concerns of the asylum since it came to refugees in residence alone in the main square.
Denmark and the United Kingdom are among a group of European countries pushing to weaken legal protections for migrants and make deportations easier.
Human rights defenders say that the intentions to fulfill the law only lead to more and more extreme policies.
“For every step taken, another step must be demanded,” said the European Council’s human rights commissioner, Michael O’Flaherty, of the Guardian. “¿Dónde se detiene? For example, the investigation is now also among migrants, in large part. But, who will be treated next time?”.
Calls for a calmer response
Politicians from the political center have also been criticized for adopting the language of the far right. British Prime Minister Keir Starmer said in May that the United Kingdom was at risk of becoming an “island of foreigners”, a phrase that evokes a notorious 1968 anti-immigration speech by politician Enoch Powell. Starmer said I was unaware of the reference and lamented using the phrase.
Germany’s inner-city canceller, Friedrich Merz, endured his language on migrants as part of the most powerful Alternative for Germany. Merz sparked a review in October that Germany had a problem with its “city image”, a phrase that translates as “city image” or urban landscape. Critics believe Merz is insinuating that characters who don’t look like any Germans don’t belong in the truth.
Merz luego enfatizó that “we need immigration”, in all sectors of the economy, including medical attention, dejarían de funcionar.
Duffy said politicians must be responsible and view their politics as public business, but added that this was “a low expectation.”
“The perception of this functional discord is ongoing,” he said.
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Associated Press writers Mike Corder in La Haya, John Leicester in Paris, Suman Naishadham in Madrid, Sam McNeil in Brussels and Kirsten Grieshaber in Berlin contributed to this story.
