It was understood that immigration would be front and center during Tuesday night’s presidential debate. More surprising was that the conversation veered into bizarre falsehoods about migrants eating pet dogs and cats in Ohio.
While certainly strange, these accusations are hardly unprecedented. In fact, there’s a long history of accusing immigrants of eating cats and dogs.
For context, in the last few days, vice presidential candidate JD Vance has echoed a rumor about Haitian migrants in Springfield, Ohio eating people’s pets. Springfield, a city of around 60,000, has received 15,000 to 20,000 migrants in the last four years, many from Haiti.
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