Wrestling Darkness

The most famous and emblematic American hero of his time, he defended us against the offenses of foreigners, fairies, and egoists. He abused illegal steroids, but denied it so he could be a good role model for generations of children for whom he recommended more traditional vitamins.

Behind the scenes, he ratted out his fellow wrestlers as they sought healthcare and labor protections from a boss who exploited them. Disgraced and erased after leaked audio of his bigoted remarks surfaced in 2015, he was later redeemed and reclaimed, as attitudes shifted to make room for bigotry, even in our heroes.

Hulk Hogan died of heart failure on July 24, 2025. Now that his family, his friends, and his millions of fans have had time to mourn, we feel it is our responsibility to talk about Hulk Hogan, less as an action figure, and more as an historical figure.

Somebody had to.

To help me, I’ve invited back media critic and wrestling fan Sarah Kurchak and wrestling’s world-leading scholar, Dr. Sharon Mazer. Sarah joined us from Toronto and Sarah from New Zealand, where she had been in high demand as an interviewee on the day of Hogan’s demise.

Early on, we threw off the thoughtless reverence that accompanied such early reports, while embracing nostalgia and compassion for a man who was a hero of mine three decades ago. When Sharon suggested that he died knowing his actions and his words had alienated the majority of the wrestling world, I genuinely felt sorry for him, as you can hear and/or see.

The most relevant previous episode of Wrestling Darkness, and all of the others, are listed below with hyperlinks.

Ep. 5: Why wrestling fans boo Hulk Hogan

Boos and screams of “Nobody cares!” and “f***ing b******t!” drowned out Hulk Hogan’s pitch for his homophobic beer brand. Why are today’s wrestling fans so sick of yesterday’s hero, and what might it mean for America’s future?

Read full story

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Episode 2 — Wrestling Has Infected Everything

In which we trace wrestling’s important impact on entertainment, cable news, culture, and politics in the U.S., as well as the psychology of fandom, and the appetite for Mr. Trump’s carnival of fascism.

Episode 3 — How to Please a Demigod

In which we speak to two Australian university students who posed as MAGA fans in order to interview Trump supporters and attend one of Mr. Trump’s political rallies.

Episode 4 — Age of the Fantasist

In which Prof. Larry Lessig explains the impact of the algorithms that govern social media, and how a pro-wrestling standard for authenticity has impacted social media, and thereby politics and culture.

Episode 5 — Why Wrestling Fans Boo Hulk Hogan

In which wrestling experts Sharon Mazer and Sarah Kurchak offer a closer analysis of professional wrestling in its current incarnation.

Episode 6 — The Stubborn Illusion of the Theatrical

Wrestling experts Sharon and Sarah comment on the fiasco in the Oval Office starring President Trump and President Zzelenskyy, then predict the future of Trump’s America, including, correctly, the break with Elon Musk and Mr. Trump.

Episode 7 — Sins of the Algorithmic Curator

Follows on from Episode 4 and the impact of algorithms and social media technology with author and expert Renee DiResta

Episode 8 — Virtual Manhood, Virtual Rape

Connects back to “Woman Hating” and it’s most sinister manifestations online, including death threats, rape threats and “Deep Fake Porn” targeting outspoken women, with author and expert Nina Jankowicz.

Episode 9 This Molten Thing About Interracial Sex

The intersection of race, sex, and politics in America with historian Tim Tyson, focusing on his bestselling books “The Blood of Emmitt Till” and “Blood Done Sign My Name.”

Episode 10 and Episode 11 White Genocide, Black Fatigue

Two-part interview with author and political theorist Sisonke Msimang about South Africa and the United States. Episode 10 focuses on her memoir, “Always Another Country.” Episode 11 debunks President Trump’s fable about a “white genocide” in South Africa.

In part 1 of my interview with Sisonke Msimang, I brought up the phenomenon of “Black fatigue” by telling her a story about a white man who had attended a Black Lives Matter rally during the aftermath of George Floyd’s murder. After the police shot him with a rubber bullet, he decided he would no longer attend such rallies.

From there, Sisonke and I agreed upon a basic definition of “Black fatigue” — the expression of annoyance or exhaustion with the awareness and/or attempts to address the legacy of white supremacy. Confronting the past and the present in an honest manner can make people feel sad, ashamed, and uncomfortable. It’s understandable.The flip side of “Black fatigue” is the grotesque overinflation of white victimization and grievance. There is perhaps no better example than President Donald Trump’s “white genocide” fable, which has become a foundation of U.S. foreign policy despite the fact that is fabricated for the purpose of winning a land policy dispute.

Roots

The “white genocide” narrative has roots in the pre-Apartheid, British colonial era of South Africa. In fact, as Sisonke says, it was instrumental in the political campaign that installed the Apartheid regime in 1948.

Today’s incarnation of the white genocide fable is the project of Kallie Kriel and Ernst Roets, two white South African activists of Dutch ancestry (Afrikaners) who have found allies among American white nationalists such as Tucker Carlson, Steve Bannon, and Charlie Kirk. Their performances on podcasts and other mediums have captivated President Trump ever since his previous administration. But this time around, Trump isn’t just watching the wrestlers in the ring; he has joined them.

Foggy insinuations about “terrible things” soon grew to accusations of genocide in the Oval Office, and in between, the United States expelled the South African ambassador Ebrahim Rasool.

(Elaborate lies spewed at campaign rallies or spread on social media are par for the course in Trump’s America. But when an unfounded conspiracy theory becomes a state-sponsored soap opera, and that soap opera becomes the basis for U.S. foreign policy, that really should be some sort of red alert. But that is not our purpose here.)

While the general public in South Africa has responded with flippancy and laughter, the political class and the business community have failed to see the humor. As Sisonke Msimang writes for The Intercept:

At first, the nation was furious with the Afrikaner organizations. The executive order was strongly worded and threatened sanctions. South Africans across all race groups criticized Kriel and Roets for convincing a foreign government to collectively punish the entire country over falsehoods. They were accused of peddling lies and disinformation and called traitors, as the nation worried that the U.S. would impose sanctions. Even AgriSA, a group that specifically represents the interests of farmers and has historically been dominated by Afrikaners, said “claims linking farm murders to the signing of the [Land Expropriation] act are baseless and irresponsible.”

As the anger mounted, AfriForum and Solidarity held a press conference in which they tried to distance themselves from Trump’s order. With his tail between his legs, Kriel backtracked on his claims of a white genocide. He has gone on to turn down Trump’s offer of asylum, insisting he was a patriotic South African who wanted to reaffirm “our commitment, our recommitment, to the country and all its people.”

Catching up with Mr. Trump’s wrestling show

On Feb 2, 2025, President Trump announced that South Africa is “under investigation.” A reporter had asked him why he posted to social media that the U.S. would suspend aid to South Africa. What was the offense?

That’s when Trump stumbled on the fateful phrase, “Terrible things are happening in South Africa.” These seven words would inspire waves of mockery, defiance, and interracial fellowship, as South Africans of all races posted videos and memes depicting kissing, dancing, and fully integrated, harmonious daily life as sarcastic examples of “terrible things.”

But Mr. Trump wasn’t finished. His executive order five days later proclaimed that the U.S. would no longer provide foreign aid or assistance to South Africa, and it established a refugee program for the white people in South Africa “who are victims of unjust racial discrimination” (meanwhile, legitimate refugee programs that bring nonwhite people to the United States had been indefinitely suspended).

By the time South African President Cyril Ramaphosa sat down in the Oval Office on May 21, 2025, Mr. Trump had prepared a stack of web clippings and a video montage that he thought would expose white genocide, embarrass Ramaphosa, and shock the world.

Journalists quickly fact-checked Trump’s presentation and found jaw dropping mistakes, such as photographs of events that did not take place in South Africa, and the inclusion of white crosses arranged for a political demonstration which Mr. Trump had mistaken for a mass grave for thousands of murdered white people.

Notes:

* Click here for part 1 of this conversation, which focuses on Sisonke’s acclaimed memoir, Always Another Country.

* During this episodes, we discuss Sisonke’s article, How Trump’s Embrace of Afrikaner “Refugees” Became a Joke in South Africa. You might also read On Trump and the invention of white victims in South Africa, which she published on Substack.

* During this conversation, I referenced Episode 10 of Wrestling Darkness as I compared South African Apartheid to the Jim Crow Era in the United States.

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Attempts to address racism are fruitless unless we find paths that lead to healing. This is one of many epiphanies I found in reading Sisonke Msimang’s acclaimed memoir, Always Another Country. We talked at length about South Africa and the United States, our two, sister nations each struggling to free themselves from caste systems that date back to colonial times.

The emotional heart of Always Another Country is in South Africa, but Sisonke’s revolutionary father and accountant mother raised their three daughters in exile during Apartheid. Born in Zambia, Sisonke also grew up in Canada and Kenya before attending university in the United States.

After the fall of Apartheid, Sisonke “returned” to a country she had not yet seen. She engaged in suburban turf battles with white South Africans during the historic presidency of Nelson Mandela, and through them, she learned lessons about herself and her country that are germane to the challenges we now face in the United States.

In reflecting on her efforts and encounters in South Africa and in North America, she concludes that once we have created a caste system, it’s difficult to replace it or even change it very much.

Rifts created by race and class, she finds, should not supersede our moral responsibility to one another as human beings. She writes that “decisions I make, even the small ones, like extending a hand in friendship, will make a difference in the long run.”

In both the memoir and our chat, Sisonke holds herself accountable for wielding power and privilege not unlike that which had been reserved for whites in South Africa not so long ago.

In part two of our conversation, I ask Sisonke if there is a “grain of truth” in President Trump’s assertion that there is a “white genocide” in South Africa.

To support Wrestling Darkness, please become a subscriber (free or paid) and/or make a tax deductible donation.

NOTES:

* This episode was recorded before Mr. Trump sent the U.S. military to suppress immigration protests in Los Angeles.

* I searched far and wide to find the right guest to follow episode 9 which also discusses race and racism. Of all places, I located Sisonke in Australia, a complete coincidence (I recently returned to the U.S. after six years Down Under).

* Rev. Dr. William Barber II is mentioned in the second half of this episode. The interview clip I included is from a work-in-progress documentary called Blood Kin.

* The film I mentioned that begins with “Learn how to speak English!” is called 9500 Liberty can be seen here.

On the evening of April 2nd, 2013, Rev. Dr. William J. Barber II proposed what would become the Moral Monday movement to an emergency gathering at a North Carolina church. Within three years, they had taken down a governor and transformed the national conversation about the role of morality in civic life.Today, Rev. Barber faces the challenge of his life as the leader of the Repairers of the Breach movement, which is organizing civil disobedience actions at the U.S. Capitol on the first Monday of each month this summer.“This sacred action is a bold response to an immoral budget and unjust policies that harm the poor, women, children, and workers,” he writes.

“Grounded in Micah 6:8 and the prophetic traditions of justice and mercy, we will stand together to say No to oppression and Yes to love, justice, and the sacred dignity of all. Sign up now and declare: ‘We will not be silent anymore.’”

“This molten thing about interracial sex” was always at the core of fights about integration and equality, explains historian and author Dr. Timothy B. Tyson.

“The Southern Rape Complex” fueled a century of hate crimes & white dominance of our political process. But this racist lie and covenant was gradually vacated by white women, and its simmering rage now targets women in general, as well as nonwhite men.

The ritual of sexually charged political violence echoes throughout this episode as it does throughout American history, as it continues to deform our psyche and our culture. The historical roots of today’s technology-driven, crowdsourced abuse of women online — the subject of a previous episode of Wrestling Darkness — can be traced back to the waves of domestic terrorism that ended Reconstruction.

History catches up with us

Tim Tyson is a dear friend of mine. He taught me to like whisky, something I never would have expected, honestly. And, he showed me that a loving and moral man can love his culture and his country without being blind to its sins.

This episode is, on one level, two friends catching up after a period of separation caused by my six years as a family man living in Australia.

But this friend happens to have written two New York Times best-selling books, the first of which was impelled by his confusion and pain during a “late-model lynching” that took place during his childhood.

The resulting book, Blood Done Sign My Name, lured one of the vanishing ghosts of the Jim Crow Era to come out of hiding. After reading it, she summoned Tim to her home for a private confession about the most infamous hate crime in American history, the murder of Emmett Till.

Tim wasn’t planning on writing a book about the Till case. But Carolyn Bryant — the woman who accused Till of having sexually harassed and touched her at the family store — had given him the only two interviews she had granted in the five decades since Till’s death. And she had entrusted him with the pages of her unfinished memoir, which he agreed to one day furnish to the appropriate historical archive, but until then keep under wraps.

He spent the next seven years researching the case. When The Blood of Emmett Till was published in 2017, Tim was contacted by the Mississippi Attorney General and the FBI. Under subpoena, he turned over all his research materials, including the unfinished memoir for a renewed investigation, that could potentially charge Carolyn Bryant with a crime.

We discuss this during the episode, but the bulk of it is devoted to the myth of “the Black Beast Rapist” which was engineering by politicians and media moguls to incite the wave of terrorism that violently overthrew the democracies of each of the former Confederate states between 1875 and 1898 — and how this evil but ingenious narrative echoes in this, the era of Trumpism.

Watch all episodes of Wrestling Darkness on Substack and YouTube, and hear them on all the usual podcast apps such as Apple Podcast and Spotify.

Tim Tyson appears in The Headless Klansman of Selma, a short film I co-directed with Annabel Park.

Without hiding her pain or her vulnerability, Nina Jankowicz describes how hundreds of thousands of grotesquely sexual and violent online assaults have hurt her, frightened her, and impacted her life.

We must “fight for a world that recognizes that our rights as women to free expression online are just as valuable as our abusers’,” she writes in her most recent book, How to Be a Woman Online. And fight she does, effectively and ferociously.

In this episode we talk about how and why girls and women are attacked by virtual rape mobs, and how that might change with the passage of the Take It Down Act, legislation that has passed the U.S. Senate and is due for a vote in the House.

How can 250 Fox News segments be wrong?

Fox News has many, many things in common with professional wrestling. Both mass media products are conflict-driven soap operas that script and perform storylines that manufacture a pretext for violence.

In the case of Jankowicz, the violence Fox News engineered has been virtual. It has also been grotesquely sexual, misogynistic, and antisemitic.

Since Fox News aired 250 segments instructing its millions of viewers to hate her, Jankowicz has endured hundreds of death and/or rape threats, hundreds of thousands of messages containing sexualized and/or sexist abuse, a cyber stalker, and the virtual assault of “deep fake pornography.” A few weeks before she was due to give birth to her son, her private security contractor advised her and her husband to flee their home after their address was posted online.

Now, you might be asking yourself why Fox News targeted her. What she might have done to deserve these attacks? Was she caught on camera sharing a ginger mint with her mother on Election Day? Did she once sign a petition alleging that 9/11 was a hoax? Well, no. And really, that’s not the point.

She’s a progressive woman with ideas that sound threatening to some men and to many conservatives. But conservative women have faced online sexual abuse as well. Perhaps we can put political goals aside in the interest of equality, democracy, and free speech — or how about public safety?

The purpose of crowdsourced online abuse is make the target feel afraid and alone. They hope she will feel so isolated that she will decide that her voice and her online civic engagement are not worth enduring the backlash.

That’s precisely why we need the targets of such assaults to break their silences, and that’s why the rest of us need to have their backs.

Mentioned in this the episode are This Molten Thing About Interracial Sex featuring Tim Tyson, and Woman Hating (Season 1, Ep1), and Renée DiResta who appears in Sins of the Algorithmic Curator (Season 2, Ep2).

Watch all episodes of Wrestling Darkness on Substack and YouTube, and hear them on all the usual podcast apps such as Apple Podcast and Spotify.

To support Wrestling Darkness and other content on the Eric Byler Substack feed, please subscribe or make a tax deductible donation

“A deluge of content sorted by incentivized algorithms and shared instantaneously among aligned believers has enabled us to immerse ourselves in environments tailored to our own beliefs and populated with our own preferred facts.”

So writes Renée DiResta in the era-defining book Invisible Rulers. She traces the history of human-to-human influence from the local tavern in preindustrial times to the early days of radio and television, and the present day incentive structures on social media that cut in favor of nastiness, lies, and vilification.

In a previous episode of Wrestling Darkness, Lawrence Lessig attributed this phenomenon to the profit motive of Big Tech companies. Realizing that their users’ search, scrolling, and clicking preferences offered them a gold rush of data to be exploited for targeted advertising, companies like Google and Facebook kicked off an arms race, supercharging curation algorithms to induce addiction.

Lessig cited and recommended DiResta’s book during the interview. I read it, loved it, and asked her to sit down with me for this fascinating conversation.

The episode that led to this one is embedded below, and don’t miss DiResta’s interview with Mona Charon of The Bulwark.

To support Wrestling Darkness and other content on the Eric Byler Substack feed, subscribe or make a tax deductible donation.

When we buy a ticket to see a movie or a play, the worst that can happen is we’ll be bored, or disappointed, or we won’t be able to maintain our suspension of disbelief. As viewers, we do all we can to believe in worlds of make believe, and in return we get escapism, catharsis, a good cry, a laugh, or a scare.

But what happens when the form of entertainment to which we have committed ourselves follows us into our communities and our homes? What if there’s no escape from the escapism? And what if the consequences are life and death on a global scale?

It seems the people best equipped to navigate politics in America today are wrestling performers, their followers, and their ringmasters. Donald Trump and Jon Stewart certainly understand the game. Vladimir Putin and Volodymyr Zelenskyy do too.

Trumpian politics, like wrestling, is a never-ending parade of ruptures and realignments. When you have the power, the money, and the skill to decide for your audience who to hate and why, you have the power to transform a narrative, or summon a mob.

Stewart’s breakdown of the infamous Oval Office debacle was both hilarious and tragic. He didn’t even need to mention Trump’s meteoric success as a professional wrestling performer 18 years ago, nor his shift to two important derivatives of wrestling theatricality: reality TV and cable news. His success on The Apprentice depended on the illusion that he had been successful as a businessman. His success as a cable news personality derived solely from his shameless depiction of a deranged bigot fixated on Barack Obama’s birth certificate.

Most people I know think wrestling is for fools, not to be studied or considered beyond a cheap insult or a punchline. But the joke is on us, if a deeper understanding of wrestling parlance and culture eludes us for any longer.

While season one of Wrestling Darkness examines how and why we came to live in the world pro wrestling created, Season 2 kicks off with an introduction to some of the most famous plot twists in wrestling history as a prism through which to see, yes, Trump and J.D. Vance’s tag team debacle in the Oval Office, but also other political performances that are otherwise incomprehensible.

Wrestling’s leading scholar Dr Sharon Mazer joins us once again from New Zealand along with author and journalist Sarah Kurchak who joins us from Toronto.

In her forthcoming essay, Dr Mazer grapples with the stubborn illusion of the theatrical as it applies to wrestling, politics, and humanity’s uncertain future.

Below are three relevant episodes from Season 1 of Wrestling Darkness:

To support Wrestling Darkness and other content on the Eric Byler Substack feed, please subscribe or make a tax deductible donation.

A $5 billion dollar deal to stream World Wrestling Entertainment on Netflix kicked off on January 6, 2025 with 4 matches sprinkled across three hours of pageantry.

But the headlines were stolen by Hulk Hogan. Boos and screams of “Nobody cares!” and “f***ing b******t!” drowned out his pitch for a beer brand he launched as part of a right wing backlash against a Bud Light commercial that featured a transgender woman.

What does the Hulkster’s rude reception tell us about wrestling's past and America's future?

Wrestling’s preeminent scholar, Dr Sharon Mazer, joins us along with wrestling fan and media critic Sarah Kurchak to help us sort it out.

See all five episodes of Wrestling Darkness on Substack and YouTube, and hear them on all the usual podcast apps such as Apple Podcast and Spotify.—Eric

To support Wrestling Darkness and other content on the Eric Byler Substack feed, please subscribe or make a tax deductible donation.

Seasons Greetings! The holidays have snuck up on me. I have added the documentary 9500 Liberty to the Wrestling Darkness feed as a bonus episode. In the opening seconds, you’ll understand how it relates to the podcast and to the present day. —Eric

Arc of justice

It looked pretty bleak for immigrant advocates in Prince William County, Virginia. On July 10th, 2007 the Board of County Supervisors had suddenly and unanimously passed “The Immigration Resolution,” legislation written for them by an anti-immigrant lobbying firm in Washington D.C.

The Immigration Resolution required police officers to apply greater scrutiny to people who looked like immigrants. Once they had stopped a person for an otherwise lawful reason, such as a speeding ticket, police officers would be mandated to ask for proof of legal status if they discerned “probable cause” based on their appearance.

Civil rights attorneys raised concerns about racial profiling and violations of the Constitution, in particular, Equal Protection under the law.

Police officers were worried about losing the trust of communities of color, something they had worked hard to earn, and an important tool in preventing and solving crimes. Citizens and recent immigrants wondered if they would get pulled over by the cops because of the color of their skin.

In a county of 380,000 residents, no one seemed to know about the Board of County Supervisors’ fateful vote, with the exception of an arch-conservative County Supervisor, the Beltway lobbyists who had approached him, and a local group of activists calling themselves “Help Save Manassas.”

Help Save Manassas was led by a blogger named Greg Letiecq, a talented writer with fantasist communication skills far ahead of his time. It was as if Steve Bannon had used a time machine to send a digital foot soldier from the future.

If a crime was committed by a person with a Latin-sounding name, the blog would pounce with frightening images and dire warnings about an invasion of dangerous criminals. Letiecq’s blog posts (and his chorus of commenters) created the perception that there was a crime wave in the county, even though crime rates had been steadily falling for years as the immigrant population had grown. The blog even blamed immigrants for the existence of rats.

In the year-plus before the immigration controversy, Letiecq had attracted a sizable fan base — hundreds, perhaps thousands. He could persuade many of them to write an email to the Board of County Supervisors, or appear in person to speak during “Citizens Time,” with the click of a button.

The Board of County Supervisors — made up of 6 Republicans and 2 Democrats at that time —quaked in their boots. Never had they received so many emails! The votes in favor of the Immigration Resolution in September and October were unanimous also.

The Latino community responded with mass protests and angry denunciations. But the popular perception was that the immigrants were not voters, and thus should be ignored by elected officials sworn to represent Real Americans.

And the Real Americans wanted the immigrants removed as quickly as possible, so much so that they were willing to divert public safety resources to do it.

When the widely respected Chief of Police, Charlie Deane, who had been serving the county for five decades, was informed he was being attacked on a blog, he said, “What’s a blog?”

People who opposed Letiecq’s views read the blog too. They felt compelled to keep up to date on who he was coming after next.

If a business leader or a member of the clergy expressed reservations about the Immigration Resolution, the blog and its commenters would attack them viciously. Boycott the church! Boycott the business! People were receiving death threats. And when advocates for the Immigration Resolution addressed the Board during Citizens Time, they echoed the blog’s hyperbolic rhetoric.

“One way or another, we will repel this invasion!” one man, a previously respected attorney, famously shouted. The specter of mob violence was in the air.

Oh, and there was a statewide election taking place at the same time. The Democratic candidates were under pressure to shift to the right on immigration. At one point, I walked past the office of the incumbent Democratic state senator for the area. I could see through the window that the blog was up on the computer monitor. It was everywhere!

Despite all of that, things were about to change, and quickly.

The Regular Person Strikes Back

The extended trailer for 9500 Liberty tells the story in 4-minutes. But I do recommend listening to or watching the entire film because experiencing it in 78 minutes gives you a sense of how it felt to live in a climate of fear, and what it took to overcome it.

Everyday people banded together, inspiring one another with hard work, innovative ideas, and periodic doses of civic courage.

The turning point (in my view) came when a woman created a second blog to oppose the first one. Writers on the blog used their own names to stand up to the bullies, so to speak. They also organized email campaigns and appeared during “Citizens Time, and they did all of this with a cohesive message structured around the common good; whereas the previous opposition had been immigrants standing up for themselves or religious people speaking out in defense of “the least of these.”

Facts about crime soon triumphed over fictions. Morality and ethics were still part of the argument, but these were joined fiscal responsibility and legal liability. Would the U.S. Department of Justice be okay with requiring the police to profile people? If not, would they sue the county as they had other jurisdictions that ran afoul of the Constitution? What if a legal resident felt their rights had been abused and filed a lawsuit? What if dozens of them did? Would frightening away a few thousand immigrants be worth the cost to taxpayers?

The growing coalition included moderate Republicans, Democrats, and independents. It included members of faith community, members of the business community, and concerned citizens, many of them moms with immigrant families or immigrant family histories. Each new person who stepped forward emboldened the next to do the same.

The Supervisors and others in the county government saw that there was at least as much opposition to the “probable cause” mandate as there was support.

In the end, it was an economic argument that pushed them over the top. Immigrant families took flight it droves. Homes and businesses were abandoned, decimating property values and with them the county budget and the local economy.

Proponents of the “probable cause” mandate fell victim to some unfortunate timing — the mandate went into effect just when the economic impact of all the fear and controversy was becoming undeniably visible.

The leading economist in the area explained in a widely seen video (that I produced) that business owners, customers, and capital (money) were leaving Prince William County because of the controversy and the radical shift in policy. The housing crises, he rightly judged, was part of a national home foreclosure crisis that was gripping the nation in early 2008, but Prince William County’s immigration fight had made it much worse, and he had the data to back it up.

It became clear the Immigration Resolution was hurting everyone; not just its intended targets.

The mandate for immigration status checks based on “probable cause” was stripped from the books on April 29th, 2008. Life returned to normal. And, crime? After a brief spike that coincided with the ugly controversy, crime rates continued to fall.

To support Wrestling Darkness and other content on the Eric Byler Substack feed, please make a tax deductible donation or subscribe.