As its immigration crackdown in Minneapolis intensifies, the Trump administration is leaning into messaging that borrows from phrases, images, and music about national identity that have become popular among right-wing groups.
On Jan. 9, two days after a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent’s shooting of Renee Good sent tensions in Minneapolis to a fever pitch, the Department of Homeland Security posted to social media an image of a man on a horse riding through a snowy, mountainous landscape with the words 'We’ll have our home again.' That’s the chorus to a song about ousting a foreign presence by a self-described 'folk-punk' band that the Proud Boys and other far-right and white supremacist groups have used.
The next day, the Department of Labor posted on X: 'One Homeland. One People. One Heritage. Remember who you are, American.' Several Trump critics on the social media site drew a parallel to a notorious Nazi slogan, 'One People, One Realm, One Leader.'
And this past week, as President Donald Trump stepped up his pressure campaign to claim Greenland, the White House posted an image on X that showed a dog sled facing a fork in the trail, one that leads to an American flag and the White House and another that leads to the Russian and Chinese flags. Above the image was the phrase, 'Which way, Greenland Man?'
The post refers to a meme that riffs off the title of a notorious white supremacist book titled 'Which Way Western Man?' The administration had already used the framing in an Immigration and Customs Enforcement recruiting post last year, which asked, 'Which way, American Man?'
The flurry of posts has renewed criticism about a recurring pattern in Trump’s second term — the sometimes cryptic use of imagery popular with the far right and white supremacists in the administration’s campaign to rally the nation behind its immigration crackdown, which it frames as a battle to preserve Western civilization.
Administration tells critics to ‘get a grip’
The administration says it’s tired of criticism that its messaging is framed around white supremacy or Nazi slogans.
“It seems that the mainstream media has become a meme of their own: The deranged leftist who claims everything they dislike must be Nazi propaganda,” White House spokeswoman Abigail Jackson said. “This line of attack is boring and tired. Get a grip.”
Referring to the 'We’ll Have Our Home Again' post, DHS spokeswoman Tricia McLaughlin said it “was a reference to 20-plus million illegal aliens invading the country.”
“I don’t know where you guys are getting this stuff,” she added, “but it is absurd.”
