Why the ‘Come Kamala’ meme is popular among Latino exiles

In Latino exile communities across the country, one question is being raised: Is Kamala Harris really a communist?

Since becoming the Democratic presidential nominee, the vice president has been subject to numerous misleading claims that she is a socialist or communist, according to Factchequeado, the largest Spanish-language fact-checking organization in the United States.

Experts say the claims tap into “real fears” among some voters fleeing repression in countries such as Cuba and Venezuela.

In a widely circulated video, Kamala Harris and her running mate Tim Walz appear to take a selfie in front of the logo of the far-left group Revolutionary Communists of America.

This video is fake. The background was doctored by a group of Donald Trump supporters known as the “Deeley Meme Team.”

Their initial post had over 420,000 views, but was shared by numerous Spanish accounts and repeated offline.

“The question is everywhere: ‘Is this person a communist?'” Evelyn Pérez-Verdía, a cultural strategist from south Florida, told the BBC.

While listening to Spanish-language radio station La Nueva Poderosa in Miami, she heard the host discussing the false meme.

“Did you see them standing in front of that painting? They were not ashamed of who they were,” organizers said.

She contacted the TV station and pointed out that it was a fake video. The hosts later said on air that they wanted to clarify that the story was “not true” but that it “doesn’t take away from the fact that Kamala is a Marxist”.

There are nearly 36.2 million eligible Latino voters in the U.S., about 14.7% of the U.S. electorate, and many of them live in key battleground states like Nevada and Arizona, making them a coveted demographic for both campaigns.

They are by no means a homogeneous voting population, but historically Latinos have tended to support Democrats. In 2020, 44% of people voted for Joe Biden and only 16% voted for Trump. But polls showing Republicans making gains this election cycle cited a number of factors, including the economy, immigration and abortion rights.

For some immigrants, today’s concerns about the United States reflect their past experiences in their home countries.

Experts say political messages warning of “socialism” or “communism” are particularly prevalent in communities with large Cuban and Venezuelan populations, such as south Florida.

Samantha Barrios, a Venezuelan American who votes Democratic in Miami, Florida, said the diaspora is particularly vulnerable to misinformation about communism because of the trauma they experienced while fleeing repression.

She accused Spanish right-wing media of using these terms to “scare Venezuelans, Cubans, Nicaraguans” because “this is the main reason why we leave our country and try to leave these regimes”.

For some, their criticism of Democrats is based on the idea that the U.S. government has not responded forcefully enough to political repression in Cuba or Venezuela.

But Ms. Barrio is wary of the way those legitimate concerns have been weaponized through the “false claim” that Kamala Harris herself is a communist.

Ms. Perez-Verdia agreed, but she also criticized Democratic campaigns for not doing enough to address their concerns.

“Don’t laugh at people’s fears. It’s just so disrespectful. People have real fears and they come to America and leave everything behind. If they have questions, you should address their questions.

The Digital Democracy Institute of the Americas (DDIA) said not all of the accusations were specifically against Latinos.

The organization found that prominent right-wing and pro-Trump actors and influencers have been promoting “fear of socialism” since 2020.

But despite Joe Biden being accused of being a communist while running for president, Factchequeado founder Laura Zommer said their fact-checkers had “never” seen such a large amount of artificial intelligence before. Wisdom and doctored images.

Some of the misinformation was spread by Trump himself or his high-profile supporters.

Trump supporter Elon Musk posted a fake photo of Kamala Harris wearing a red uniform emblazoned with a communist hammer and sickle, with the caption: “Kama Can you believe she wore that on day one when she vowed to become a communist dictator?

Viewed more than 83.9 million times. A reverse image search shows that this is the earliest image posted on X.

Donald Trump shared an artificially intelligent image of Harris addressing a communist crowd, which has been viewed at least 81.5 million times on X, but this is not the first time the image has been posted.

Posts linking Harris to communism really took off online after the presidential debates, according to a report prepared by DDIA for the BBC.

During the debate, Donald Trump called Kamala Harris and her father “Marxists” and suggested she would turn the United States into “Venezuela on steroids” through her immigration policies.

After the debate, “Marxist” became popular on social media, and searches for “Marxist” on Google in the United States surged 1,000% in 17 hours.

Factchequeado said that after the debate, the most searched question in Spanish was: “Who is Kamala Harris’ father?”

The DDIA says two claims are of particular interest in the week following the presidential debate. According to Meta’s own indicators, a false document claiming that Kamala Harris is a member of the Russian Communist Party has gone viral. Another way to put it is that Harris is a “Kamarada” [Comrade] The term “Kamala” comes from a speech by Trump in which he described her as a “comrade, a communist.”

BBC verify traced the membership card image to a website that allowed people to create fake Communist Party documents.

The membership number, seal and other details on the membership card are the same as the template on the website for making party membership cards.

The post sharing the fake image was first shared in August and has been viewed more than 500,000 times.

The Democratic Party is not a socialist party and does not claim to support the communist regime. But some prominent members, such as Bernie Sanders and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, describe their political views as “democratic socialism.”

When Harris was a California senator, she co-sponsored Sanders’ Medicare for All bill, which would have brought a single-payer health care system to the United States. She has since said she no longer supports a single-payer health care system that would do away with private insurance companies.

She never advocated communist policies such as the abolition or confiscation of private property.

Kamala Harris’ plan to crack down on supermarket “price gouging” has been called “communist” in a Spanish social media post. Musk claimed this would mean “empty shelves, like in Venezuela.”

Her proposal would involve asking the Trade Commission to investigate price increases that are well above increases in production costs, a far cry from the widespread price controls in Cuba and Venezuela that have been blamed in part for severe food shortages.

But for some voters fleeing these countries, the fear lies in anything they see as remotely similar to the policies of the countries they came from.

Duke Machado, who runs a Latino Republican Facebook page in Texas called Latino Strike Force, said he fears the country will slide toward communism if Democrats win.

“If we are not careful, we will end up in Cuba and Venezuela. Their ultimate goal is to destroy capitalism.

Asked whether he had a responsibility to share concerns with his followers, who include Latino exiles fleeing repression, that Democrats could turn the United States into a communist country, he said: “It’s not irresponsible at all. I will It is viewed as an obligation.

Additional reporting from BBC verify’s Kayleen Devlin