SEATTLE – People with anti-immigrant sentiments are emboldened after laws designed to punish immigrants are passed, according to a study by a University of Washington researcher.

Rene Flores, an assistant professor in the Department of Sociology at UW, included fieldwork and people's opinions online to study the immigration debate.

In his most recent research, Flores used Twitter reactions to the controversial "show me your papers" law passed in Arizona in 2010 that allows law enforcement officers to detain anyone they suspect isn't a citizen.

Flores says after the bill passed, rather than pacifying Arizonans, anger against immigrant populations grew.

"Some people, especially those who are more critical of immigrants, began tweeting more,” he points out. “They became energized, they became activated and this was what caused the change in the distribution of sentiment after (the) law was passed. So, it's really in agreement with my own prior research that showed this activation effect."

Ultimately, the U.S. Supreme Court struck down several parts of the Arizona law.

While Twitter does not exactly represent the population at large, Flores says it does have value for sociologists. He compares it to a "library of attitudes" that is becoming an important historical archive of opinions.

Flores also explored the role race played in these tweets.

He says people were more hostile toward Latinos before and after the law was passed, but not other racial groups.

"Immigration, it is seen as a Latino issue, despite the fact that, as we know, there's immigrants from all over the world,” he points out. “There's about half a million undocumented European immigrants. "

The racial component of anti-immigrant sentiment could be key to diffusing some of the rage.

Flores says explicitly using race to win elections seemed to be less popular after the civil rights era in the 1960s, but that isn't the case anymore. He says that fact is important for people who support immigrants' rights.

"They have to be mindful of these things,” he stresses. “They have to gain a deeper understanding about the political consequences of this highly charged discourse and also, how these punitive laws themselves could affect the mobilization of people that are against immigrants and immigrants' rights."





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HELENA, Mont. - Republican lawmakers in Montana want to investigate the 2020 election. Some are concerned this could weaken trust in voting.

In a letter to legislative leaders, 86 of 98 state Republican lawmakers called for a special committee to examine the security of last year's election. It comes amidst a wave of Republican lawmakers across the country calling for audits of elections, which former President Donald Trump lost.

Jim Elliott is a rancher and a former Democratic state representative and state senator. He said he believes the calls are undermining democracy.

"The detrimental effect of questioning the elections, I think, is to turn Republican voters off," said Elliott. "Stop saying that their vote doesn't count."

Montana Republicans' quest to investigate the 2020 election began with allegations of fraud in Democratic-leaning Missoula County.

None of the claims have been substantiated, but became part of a push to pass several laws that Republicans say tighten security around elections. The laws include an end to election-day voter registration and changes to voter ID requirements.

Susannah Goodman is director of election security with Common Cause. She said she's concerned partisan calls for investigating and auditing the 2020 results are undermining confidence in county election officials.

She called claims elections weren't secure very concerning.

"They're not being done by election administration experts and some of them are being done very badly," said Goodman. "And we need to continue to push back on that because it can do real damage going forward."

In Arizona, state Senate Republicans initiated an audit of results for the presidency in Maricopa County conducted by private firms, led by a company from Florida. A report from auditors found no evidence of fraud and actually increased the margin of victory by which Joe Biden won the county.

Support for this reporting was provided by the Carnegie Corporation of New York.

ERIE, Pa. -- The Keystone State is seeing several barrier-breaking progressive candidates running for office in unexpected places: rural Pennsylvania.

The trend of progressive Democrats running for office is not unique to Pennsylvania. It has been increasing since the 2016 election, everywhere from Maine to Virginia to Iowa.

Tyler Titus is running for Erie County Executive. A victory would mean Titus would be the first openly transgender county executive in the country. Titus tells of experiencing rural generational poverty firsthand, growing up in a small-town southeast of Erie, and said poverty solutions need a holistic and progressive approach, whether in urban or rural America.

"When you talk on progressive values that center around people and not just profit, you can win in purple spaces, you can win in red spaces," Titus asserted. "And I think that we see a momentum shifting. And that's exciting, and it shows that I really think that the U.S. is at a time of reckoning."

Titus is running against Republican Brenton Davis, a small-business owner and military veteran, in the Nov. 2 election.

The small Rust Belt city of Beaver Falls, northwest of Pittsburgh, may elect its first Black woman mayor next week.

Kenya Johns is a lifelong resident of Beaver Falls who defeated Democrat incumbent George Quay in May and currently is unopposed in the November election. Johns said her success speaks to the importance of uplifting voices reflective of the communities they represent.

"It's going to show that although we talk about needing diversity, equity and inclusion, we're at a space now where we can't just talk about it," Johns contended. "We need to be able to put people in that can make sustainable change. That's what the future of America looks like. It looks like brothers helping brothers, sisters helping sisters, to make a better place, a better environment, for all of us."

Mayor Quay is attempting a write-in campaign to have his name on the ballot. Johns' running mates, Peggy Evans and Vanessa Taylor, who are both running for City Council, also won in the May primary.

SEATTLE - Constructive conversations online can seem few and far between. Research from the University of Washington explores how the design of social media sites affects disagreements.

Amanda Baughan, PhD Student in Computer Science and Engineering at the University of Washington, helped lead that research. The research showed that spending more time on a site did not correlate to more arguments.

But Baughan said arguments are common on sites like Facebook, where the goal can be to 'win' for whatever audience is reading the posts.

"There's not really a way to scale back what is happening between two people or a group of people in the comment section," said Baughan. "It can get very heated, very quickly."

Baughan analyzed what percentage of users of certain social media sites said they had arguments.

Seventy-percent of Facebook users said they had argued on the platform. Sites like Twitter and YouTube were considerably lower, with 30% and 6% of users, respectively, saying they'd argued on those platforms.

Baughan said the venue in which these disagreements took place also is important. More than three-quarters of people who used WhatsApp, a private messenger, said they got into arguments on the platform, but were less frustrated with their experiences.

Baughan said people reacted positively to the idea of bringing their arguments on sites like Facebook to a private space, where it can be easier to be vulnerable.

"I think that replicates a lot of how we have difficult conversations in real life as well," said Baughan. "Generally, I don't think we would choose to have it in a crowded room full of people. We would choose to find a time where it's just you and the person that you disagree with, to kind of hash things out."

Baughan said social media sites would need to present such an option sensitively - perhaps not introducing it for the first time while people are in the middle of a heated argument.

"That could seem very creepy because it's like, 'Oh, the social media company is monitoring what I say,'" said Baughan. "So, I think that how the option is presented is really important - probably having it be introduced when there's not an argument."

And Baughan said she would like to see social media companies think beyond individual users' experiences when designing their platforms.

"Especially in the past year with the pandemic, so many of our relationships were carried out online," said Baughan. "And making a bit of shift towards emphasizing the relationship, in addition to the user, could be really beneficial."