Throughout election season, America’s Voice has been tracking xenophobic and racist ads that candidates, campaigns, and PACs are running through our 2020 Ad Watch campaign. Although hateful election rhetoric did not start with Trump, the president’s attacks during the 2016 and 2018 campaigns were some of the most troubling in our nation’s history. Worse, they have become a fixture of GOP election strategy across the country.
These hateful themes have continued to be a central, animating narrative of the 2020 election season. Trump and the GOP candidates supporting him used similar themes in 2017 and 2018, and the strategy backfired both times. That fact has not stopped Trump and his party’s candidates from using hate to turn out his base in 2020.
To help constituents discover if candidates in their district are using racist ads to hold politicians willing to use this abhorrent rhetoric accountable, we have now launched an interactive map showing which racist ads have come across our radar.
Using the tools provided by Facebook and Google, we are tracking all of the xenophobic and racist political ads that campaigns publish through those platforms. We are also monitoring more traditional spaces such as TV, radio, and newspapers. To learn more about our campaign, please visit our project site. If you see an ad you think should be included in our database, you can report it here.
