Morning Distribution for Thursday, May 26, 2022

A [FiveThirtyEight]( email [Morning Distribution]( Thursday, May 26, 2022 Your daily briefing from FiveThirtyEight --------------------------------------------------------------- The Morning Story [A woman in American flag face paint attends a Save America rally]( [The Twisted Logic Behind The Right’s ‘Great Replacement’ Arguments]( By [Kaleigh Rogers]( Days after a white gunman shot 13 people, killing 10, at a grocery store in a majority-Black neighborhood in Buffalo, New York, Fox News host Tucker Carlson [aired a segment]( about the “great replacement theory.” “We’re still not sure exactly what it is,” Carlson claimed about the [racist, white-supremacist conspiracy theory]( that the population of white Americans is being systematically and intentionally “replaced” by nonwhite immigrants and their children, something the suspected shooter espoused prior to the attack. Yet elements of the theory have been [echoed by mainstream figures on the right]( including Carlson, as well as GOP members of Congress like Reps. Matt Gaetz and Elise Stefanik, the third-ranking Republican in the House. In last week’s segment, Carlson detailed the version of the theory he’s been spreading for years (more than 400 times according to a [recent New York Times analysis](. “There is a strong political component to the Democratic Party’s immigration policy,” Carlson said before airing a handful of clips of Democrats that [don’t actually demonstrate]( what he claims. “They say out loud, ‘We are doing this because it helps us to win elections.’” This more mainstream version of the replacement theory hides behind justifications that the criticism of changing American demographics is about politics and power. It’s a narrative so prevalent on the right that nearly half of Republicans believe that immigrants are being brought to the country for political gains. According to a poll conducted in December by the [AP-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research]( 47 percent of Republicans agreed with the statement that “there is a group of people in this country who are trying to replace native-born Americans with immigrants who agree with their political views.” [Read more]( --------------------------------------------------------------- Weekly Listen [Play]( [Politics Podcast: Trump’s Revenge Primary In Georgia Fails]( [FiveThirtyEight] [View in browser]( [ABC News]( [Unsubscribe]( Our mailing address: FiveThirtyEight, 47 West 66th Street, New York, NY 10023.