Antisemitism and Public Support for the Great Replacement Theory

• In Event: Anti-establishment, Populist, and Conspiratorial Attitudes

Abstract

In recent years, scholars, pollsters, and pundits have drawn attention to a concerning rise in public support for the Great Replacement Theory (GRT) – a racist and xenophobic conspiracy theory gaining traction in the United States. This theory alleges that political leaders and economic elites have intentionally implemented permissive immigration policies, leading to a massive influx of immigrants into the United States. Proponents of the GRT claim that these elites intend to produce a demographic replacement of “native” (white) residents by those from other nations and cultures, eroding the cultural and political influence of natives.

Once confined to obscure white supremacist websites, the GRT has entered the political mainstream in the United States. Prominent Republican elected officials, including former president Donald Trump, have publicly endorsed ideas associated with the GRT. Conservative media figures such as former Fox News host Tucker Carlson and X/Twitter owner Elon Musk have also become prominent advocates of this theory. Meanwhile, public opinion polls indicate that between one-third and one-half of Americans endorse tenets of the GRT and that supermajorities of Republicans do so. Most troubling of all, GRT beliefs appear to have motivated several recent mass shootings in the United States.

In this paper, we theorize that antisemitism plays a central role in determining public support for the GRT. We note that the GRT is broadly consistent with longstanding cultural tropes about the insidious influence of Jewish people in American society. However, we argue that the relationship between antisemitism and support for the GRT has been cemented by conservative elite discourse that uses implicit appeals to draw connections between powerful Jewish people, such as Hungarian-American billionaire George Soros, and the permissive immigration policies that proponents of the GRT decry. We thus hypothesize that individuals with more antisemitic attitudes will express stronger support for ideas associated with the GRT.

To test this hypothesis, we first undertake a content analysis of Donald Trump’s fundraising emails featuring criticism of George Soros as a case study of how conservative elites link antisemitic appeals to claims about permissive immigration policymaking, the “invasion” of immigrants from other nations, and the political and cultural domination of “natives” by immigrants. Next, we examine the relationship between antisemitic attitudes and support for the GRT on two nationally representative surveys of American adults undertaken in Summer 2023 and Spring 2024. To do this, we develop and validate a novel GRT Beliefs Battery that measures public support for beliefs associated with the GRT. We then investigate the relationship between antisemitic attitudes and support for the GRT as measured by the GRT Beliefs Battery on our surveys, controlling for various demographic, social, and political factors.

The results of our study provide insight into the nature and scope of public support for the GRT, as well as the influence of antisemitic attitudes on support for this dangerous xenophobic theory.

Authors

• Jesse H. Rhodes, University of Massachusetts, Amherst

• Tatishe Mavovosi Nteta, University of Massachusetts, Amherst

• Adam Eichen, University of Massachusetts Amherst