Laura Loomer, far-right political activist and commentator made a tweet suggesting to feed the alligators undocumented immigrants. The the makeshift Florida immigration detention center, coined “Alligator Alcatraz“, that was recently toured by the Trump Administration is located in the Florida Everglades – which home to over 200,000 alligators.

There is not 65 million undocumented immigrants in the United States, according to Pew Research Center – the number is closer to 12 million. There is however, around 65 million Hispanics living in the United States. Loomers Tweet was later taken down by the “X” platform for “violent speech”. Loomer claimed that her Tweet was merely a joke.

Fundamentally, the content of Loomers Tweet isn’t just about a Tweet. It has nothing to do with Loomer, its the fact that the United States government is being influenced and led by people who believe in violence and bigotry. If the Trump Administration truly cared about America, they would publish real – unfiltered data, discuss important political issues with facts, and condemn fake news and extremism.

American populism has opened the floodgates to allow extremists and radicals to gain political power. When the Trump Administration first gained power, he moved to empower an overlooked demographic within the Republican Party – the extremists, the theorists, the racists, and ignorant. The mass use of misinformation is widely successful, primarily because American voters do not fact check content. They prefer to believe a lie that aligns with their views rather than researching the topics they believe are important.

So long as the Trump Administration continues to promote extremism and misinformation, President Trump is only manipulating the bottom denominator of Americans to further his own political agenda.