"Before Vance, neo-Nazis helped spread the debunked claims
The now-refuted claim appears to have gotten its start online in early August, when a user on the far-right social platform Gab with the screen name "bri ory" commented on photos of members of the white supremacist neo-Nazi group Blood Tribe marching through Springfield protesting Haitian migrants and carrying swastika flags.
The commenter claimed that "once haitians swarm into a town animals start to disappear."
Later in August, a resident named Anthony Harris claimed at a Springfield City Commission meeting that the migrants were eating ducks in the park. A member of the same neo-Nazi group also attended the meeting, and the group later echoed that claim on Gab. Days later, it appeared on X."
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Haitian immigrants in Springfield have been the targets of rumors for some time, as NPR reported last month.
Republican committee woman Glenda Bailey has become one of the loudest voices against Haitian migration, publicly accusing the community of having diseases, carrying out voodoo rites and being involved in gangs.
She has also spoken at length about "great replacement theory," the baseless belief that there is a movement to replace white populations in current white-majority countries.
"Some of the Haitians are gang members," she told NPR. "I've seen them. They have become the occupiers. What they've done is they've replaced the population in Springfield, Ohio."
The Springfield Police Division told NPR in August that such claims were troubling.
"I think it's sad that some people are using this as an opportunity to spread hate or spread fear," said Jason Via, deputy director of public safety and operations.
"We get these reports 'the Haitians are killing ducks in a lot of our parks' or 'the Haitians are eating vegetables right out of the aisle at the grocery store.' And we haven't really seen any of that. It's really frustrating. As a community, it's not helpful as we try to move forward."
www.npr.org
Apparently it's possible these days to piss off local law enforcement with your stupid Culture War Lies, while gaining important Clicks on your media sites.
It's Gangsterism, not Business or even Politics.
