Over the past few decades, there has been a substantial increase in immigration throughout Europe and North America and an observable rise in anti-immigrant and nationalist rhetoric by political elites and in the mass public. Several political movements have gained popularity by taking a hard stance against immigration, and far-right extremist parties and politicians have gained support and won important political races. Prior scholarship focusing on immigration often find that people will cite concerns about job security, labor market competition, and welfare system costs as economic reasons to favor immigration restrictions. However, immigration is repeatedly shown to have a positive impact on job growth. Rather than being a purely economic issue, I argue in this dissertation that immigration is viewed primarily as a cultural issue. As such, it is useful to study individual attitudes and behaviors rather than macro-level policy changes. To demonstrate, I conduct three different studies related to this theory. First, I employ a survey experiment of college students to examine the way framing the issue of immigration affects attitudes. I find significant evidence that negative frames and emphasizing cultural concerns impact opinions about immigration but find that positive frames and emphasis on economic issues do not. Next, I show evidence that negative attitudes toward immigrants affects voting behavior by increasing the likelihood that individuals will turn out to vote. Finally, I examine the impact that negativity toward immigrants has on party choice. I find that individuals who are unsupportive of immigration are more likely to vote for extremist parties, especially far-right parties. This has significant implications for the future of political party systems, polarization, and party realignment.
