By Derrick Tat
LOS ANGELES – Since the beginning of Covid-19, President Donald Trump has created a stigmatization against Asian Americans.
A study now shows that over the past eight months, 24 tweets, and millions of retweets, this stigmatization has caused a divide in the country. With tweets, such as, “the China plague”, and “It’s all China’s fault,” it created many conspiracy theories against Asian Americans. Since the beginning of Covid-19, many reports of harassment, assault, and cyberbullying against Asians have significantly increased.
According to Stop AAPI Hate’s report titled “The Return of ‘Yellow Peril,’” there were about 1,227 tweets sent out from both Republican and Democratic candidates about Asian Americans. Ever since the beginning of Covid-19, new policies against Asian Americans were brought up. The discrimination against Asian Americans leads to creating new Anti-Asian American policies, which 
could help boost either party for the upcoming election.
Research conducted by Stop AAPI Hate has found that 10 percent of the political candidate’s tweets included some sort of racism or stigmatization. Also, according to Stop AAPI Hate, “nearly half of stigmatizing tweets are unrelated to Covid-19. . . .” This suggests that these policies being brought up is not for the sole purpose of the pandemic, but to create anti- Asian American rhetoric.
The exponential increase of racist tweets against Asians has created more of a barrier. These tweets from Republican politicians are spread and sometimes go viral, with some tweets getting over a million retweets.
Stop AAPI Hate received 2,738 reports of racism and discrimination against the AAPI community between March 19 and October 7, 2020. These tweets have shown to have a big impact in our society.
Now, the 2020 election is right around the corner. The fear mongering and scapegoating of Asian Americans continues to be a strategy, used by Trump as a way to win the election.
“We have seen this strategy used before in the past election, where Trump planned to build a wall between the U.S. and Mexico. His rhetoric against minorities continues to this day,” said the group.
About 11 million Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders are eligible voters this year.
“Asian Americans are the fastest growing electorate of all racial groups … and are expected to make up nearly five percent of the nation’s eligible voters.” Racial discrimination is one of the top concerns for not only Asian American voters, but also other minority groups as well, said Stop AAPI Hate.
The study notes that racism in America is not a new topic, it has been suppressed. Racism has reemerged to the forefront of society.
Stop AAPI Hate states, “The Trump administration and other elected officials have brought a resurgence of the racist ‘Yellow Peril’ ideology.
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