Social Mobility through Immigrant Resentment: Explaining Latinx Support for Restrictive Immigration Policies and Anti-immigrant Candidates.

This article examines the phenomenon of Latinx Immigrant Resentment (LIR), a concept describing how some Latinx individuals harbor negative stereotypes about Latinx immigrants, cognitively distinguish themselves from these "atypical" group members, and support restrictive immigration policies and politicians like Donald Trump and Ron DeSantis. Drawing on Social Identity Theory and Self-Categorization Theory, the study uses data from the 2016 Collaborative MultiRacial Post-Election Survey (CMPS), the 2020 American National Election Study (ANES), and two national online surveys of Latinxs conducted in 2020–2022 to develop and validate a measure of LIR. The findings indicate that LIR is a significant predictor of support for anti-immigrant rhetoric and policies within the Latinx community, even among those with strong Latinx identity, as a way to enhance the status of "prototypical" Latinxs by signaling distinction from immigrant Latinxs. The study highlights the complexity of Latinx political attitudes and suggests that immigrant resentment, while a minority perspective, reflects divergent views on group interests and strategies for social status advancement.