Two Myths Fuel the Trump Administration’s Anti-Immigrant Scapegoating

On December 9th, US Homeland Security Advisor Stephen Miller went on another xenophobic rant. He claimed that, “If Somalians cannot make Somalia successful, why would we think that the track will be any different in the United States? […] If Libya keeps failing, if the Central African Republic keeps failing, if Somalia keeps failing, right? If these societies all over the world continue to fail, you have to ask yourself, if you bring those societies into our country, and then give them unlimited free welfare, what do we think is going to happen?”

Like so many in the Trump administration, Miller blames America’s failures on immigrants. Why is our educational system faltering? Immigrants. Miller claims that, “If you subtract immigration out of test scores, all of a sudden scores skyrocket!”

Why are Americans unable to get jobs? Immigrants. Last year on the campaign trail, Trump claimed that immigrants are stealing “Black jobs” and “Hispanic jobs.” (Whatever those are.)

Why are Americans unable to succeed? Immigrants. Vice President J.D. Vance calls “mass migration a theft of the American Dream.”

From housing to the crime rate to the drug crisis to healthcare to affordability, the problem is always immigrants. The Trump administration defends these remarks by, again, blaming immigrants. On December 10th, President Trump remarked that, “Why is it we only take people from shithole countries, right? Why can’t we have some people from Norway, Sweden, just a few? Let us have a few from Denmark. Do you mind sending us a few people? Do you mind? We always take people from Somalia, places that are a disaster, right? Filthy, dirty, disgusting, ridden with crime. The only thing they’re good at is going after ships.” For Trump, because Somalia is “filthy, dirty, disgusting,” we should not allow Somalis to enter the US. Because Norway, Denmark and Sweden are ‘clean’ countries, we can admit their citizens.

This is the basis of the Trump administration’s xenophobia: immigrants fail here because they come from impoverished countries. Those countries are ‘bad’ because the people are ‘bad.’ If those ‘bad’ people weren’t in the US, then the ‘good’ people could make America great again.

This narrative is extremely popular among MAGA conservatives. However, it is false. This scapegoating narrative relies entirely on two myths: the myth of “American exceptionalism” and the myth of “third world mediocrity”

The Myth of “American Exceptionalism”

“American exceptionalism” refers to the idea that the US is distinct from other countries because its foundation rests on the principles of individualism and freedom. These values uniquely shape the American identity, thereby making Americans exceptional.

Trump often appeals to this notion. For instance, in his 2025 inaugural address, Trump remarked that, “America will soon be greater, stronger, and far more exceptional than ever before.” He further added, “We will be a nation like no other: full of compassion, courage and compassion, courage and exceptionalism.” The promise of the Trump Golden Age is precisely a promise to restore the exceptionalism that America lost due to “migration from all Third World Countries.”

American exceptionalism is, however, an illusion. America’s success relies on many factors including exploiting the poor, slavery, colonialism, imperialism, and immigration. Even the extent to which the US has embraced the ideal of freedom has been largely due to the Civil Rights Movement and other anti-oppression struggles.

Americans do not have some inherent aptitude towards freedom – they are, like any other people, taught to love and embrace others, or to irrationally hate anyone who is different. Freedom is not an exclusively Western ideal. It does not belong to any nation or to any particular people.

The Myth of “Third World Mediocrity”

The second myth is that colonialism, imperialism and racism either never existed or had little impact on poorer countries in South America, Africa and Asia. This revisionist history is the other side of American exceptionalism: the myth of “Third World mediocrity.” The idea is that, if “third world” countries have failed to succeed, it’s not because of external forces that impeded their development, but rather a reflection of the quality of its citizens.

This is apparent in Miller’s comments. In his view, “third world” immigrants will always “replicate the conditions that they left over and over and over again!” We see this myth when Trump refers to Somalia as “barely a country” and Somali immigrants as “garbage.” The two are inseparable to him.

What Trump and his allies fail to recognize (or at least admit) is that the reason why countries like Somalia struggle, and the reason why immigrants of color struggle, is largely due to colonialism, imperialism and racism.

Take Somalia, for instance: during the late 1960s and 1970s, Somalia implemented a number of progressive policies, including widening access to primary education, mass literacy campaigns, and public health initiatives. While these policies were working, the US worried about Somalia’s burgeoning relationship with the Soviet Union. Throughout the 1970s and 1980s, Somalia and Ethiopia became entangled in Cold War politics, until eventually the US invaded Somalia in 1993. This was done under the auspices of providing humanitarian relief, yet resulted in the massacre of Somali leaders, intellectuals, businesspeople and citizens. According to a New York Times article from December 1993, approximately 6,000 to 10,000 Somalis were killed by the US during a four month period. In 1994, the US withdrew, leaving Somalia in ruin. Fleeing the war and its aftermath, many Somalis came to the US, especially Minnesota. Since then, Somali Americans have faced persistent anti-Black racism and Islamophobia.

Somali Americans are not unique in this respect. Whether Haiti, Afghanistan, Libya or so many other countries Trump describes as “hellholes,” a similar pattern persists: the US (or another Western power) destabilizes a country or region abroad. This fuels mass migration. Those migrants move to the US (or another Western country) ready to make a life for themselves only to be met with discrimination and prejudice. This is the truth that Trump and his allies are either entirely ignorant of or, what’s more likely, hoping you’ll never figure out.

Resisting Myths, Lies and Scapegoating

Trump’s scapegoating is racist and xenophobic, but it’s also tactical. The real reason why Americans are struggling is due to wealth inequalities and a lack of robust social safety nets. The problems are material. Immigrants are simply an easy scapegoat that allows Trump to sidestep making any real changes, while continuing to profit from the status quo. It gives his supporters a concrete enemy to distract them from the real systematic problems that plague this country.

In the end, these myths marginalize immigrants and maintain an oppressive status quo for citizens. We need to move past them, and here’s three things we can do to achieve that:

First, those on the political left, especially elected officials, need to change how we defend the rights of immigrants. Arguing that “this is a nation of immigrants” or that immigrants deserve dignity is not enough. While those points are true, our arguments and messaging need to focus specifically on dismantling the myths that underlie the Trump administration’s scapegoating. To this end, we need to bring more attention to the ways that US intervention abroad has fueled the immigration crisis that Trump and his allies now exploit for political gain. We need to force conservatives to grapple with the specific histories of US involvement in Somalia, Haiti, Afghanistan and so many other countries. Beyond the question of who built this country or appeals to human rights, we need to make clear that the US owes a debt to the people it has displaced. Immigration is not a privilege; it is just compensation for historical and contemporary wrongs.

Adopting this approach will be particularly important as the US pushes closer to regime change in Venezuela. If the history of US regime change is anything to go by, Trump’s unjust and illegal invasion will cause more suffering, destabilize the region and fuel more migration.

Second, we need to be more specific about how we talk about social inequalities and change. The reason why immigrants are so easily scapegoated is because the narrative is simple – ‘those people are responsible for your problems.’ We need to adopt a similar, but more truthful approach. For example, if Vice President Vance wants to blame immigrants for the affordability crisis at a Uline warehouse, then we should draw attention to the Uihlein family that owns that company. We should point out that they spend millions lobbying for less government regulation and against unions. They have given money to think tanks like the Foundation of Government Accountability that advocates for loosening child labor protections. We should point out that Elizabeth Uihlein blames the Affordable Care Act for giving young people the freedom to leave their employers at their own discretion.

Blaming immigrants is easy when the true culprits of social inequality are largely unknown to the public. We need to expose them. If Trump supporters want specific people to blame, then we should give them the real people who are actively working to grow their own wealth at the expense of the rest of us.

Third, we need to highlight policies that directly aim at tackling issues of affordability, healthcare and housing. This includes New York Mayor-Elect Zohran Mamdani’s proposal for city-owned grocery stores, Tennessee Representative Aftyn Behn’s call for more robust rent control and increasing wages, House Representative Alexandria-Ocasio Cortez’s advocacy for tuition-free public colleges, New Mexico’s no-cost universal childcare policy, Oregon’s statewide shelter program that helps people transition from homelessness into housing stability, congressional support for Medicare For All, among many other examples.

The Trump administration has to distract their constituents with scary boogeymen because they ultimately lack any solutions. This is why President Trump has to dismiss the affordability crisis as a “hoax.” This is why Vice President Vance – almost a year into the second Trump administration – is still blaming former President Biden for the current state of the economy. By contrast, there are Democrats, whether elected or running in 2026, with concrete plans designed to help the poor and middle class.

Republicans have been blaming immigrants since the 1990s. Yet despite spending billions on more militarized anti-immigrant policing, those issues persist. Immigrants are not the problem. But things won’t change unless we expose these lies, myths and scapegoating, and begin advocating for actual solutions. If we do this, then we can forge a better future for everyone.

Jordan Liz is an Associate Professor of Philosophy at San José State University. He specializes in issues of race, immigration and the politics of belonging.