Fuentes, the influencer who praises Hitler and Stalin sends US conservatives into crisis

This right - the new right - wants no more compromise.It is not enough to be a patriot, you have to be 'America First', hence white, Christian and ready for the culture war. It was with this energy that Fuentes founded the AFPAC conference, the radical twin of the traditional CPAC (the most important annual conference of the US conservative movement). Republican congressmen like Paul Gosar appear on stage. The line between conservatism and supremacism is becoming thinner.

Fuentes presents himself as a political comedian, but it is difficult to speak of a 'simple joke' when calling the Holocaust 'a fiction', Jews 'biscuits in the oven' and claiming that 'many women want to be raped'.

Banned from YouTube, Twitch and PayPal, Fuentes finds refuge on Rumble and in cryptocurrencies. In 2024 Elon Musk rehabilitated him on X, invoking freedom of expression. His comeback - like that of so many like him who set foot on the platform again after the pre-Musk management ban - is in grand style, so much so that he regains millions of followers in just a few months. An investigation by Wired reveals that his content is relayed by dozens of satellite channels, in a media ecosystem capable of evading controls. From hate influencer, Fuentes soon became a hate industry, supported by a network of donations and automated content.

In November 2022, Donald Trump invited him to dinner at his Mar-a-Lago residence together with the rapper Kanye West, then in full anti-Semitic drift. The photo of the three goes around the world. The president defends himself by claiming that he "didn't know who that boy was", but nobody believes him. In the years that followed, the two parted ways. Fuentes accuses Trump of 'weakness towards Israel' and of 'betraying the legacy of the America First movement'. On his channels he calls the tycoon 'a politically finished old man' and urges young radicals to build a new identity front. The bond is broken, but Fuentes' influence remains. In every key state, groups of his sympathisers organise as independent committees, ready to intervene online and at rallies to influence the Republican base.

The interview published on 27 October by Tucker Carlson is the definitive consecration of Fuentes. For two hours, Carlson listens in silence, almost complicit, his theories on the Jewish elite, the power of the 'globalists' and the need for a return to a mono-ethnic America. When the episode exploded in the media, the Heritage Foundation went into crisis. Kevin Roberts, president of the think tank, defends Carlson, calling the coalition attacking him 'poisonous'.

In just a few hours, several members of the task force against anti-Semitism resigned, including Rabbi Yaakov Menken. The case becomes political. In a leaked internal video, a senior fellow at Heritage denounces: 'We expelled David Duke and the John Birch Society. Now we have to choose whether to keep the new extremists in". Roberts, under pressure, publicly apologises, but the damage is done:the American intellectual right appears unable to disown those who, like Fuentes, use their own language against liberalism, but bend it to hate.

Far beyond mere provocative intent, Fuentes has forged a precise political project. He does not want to found a party, but to infiltrate the Republican Party. His followers - young graduates, programmers, journalists - are encouraged to enter as assistants and consultants in local campaigns, think tanks and the media, so as to conquer the ganglia of communication and culture, even before politics. An internal document leaked in 2025, analysed by Wired, speaks of 'cadre training' and 'taking over the nodes'.

Fuentes's ideological core is a mixture of white nationalism, Catholic fundamentalism and anti-Semitic conspiracy. He speaks of 'political baptism' and a 'crusade against globalism', combines Christian symbols with neo-Nazi rhetoric, and presents liberal democracy as a deception constructed to destroy the purity of the American people.

Fascism echoes in his words, along with a fascination with order, virility and community. More than an ideologue, for his followers he is a pastor, a preacher who restores identity to those who feel lost. Because in an increasingly fragmented America, where loneliness mingles with anger, Fuentes offers a cause and, above all, an enemy.

His discourse is part of a broader current on the American right that rediscovers the myth of a society founded on Christian faith, family, and ethnic identity. This vision, albeit cleansed of overtly racist language, shares his view that multiculturalism and immigration have broken down national cohesion. This is the same sentiment that animates part of so-called national conservatism, now influential at the top of Trumpian power.

In Europe, identity groups in France, Italy and Germany relaunch his translated speeches. In Australia and Canada, his phrases circulate on Telegram and Rumble as 'patriotic quotes'. According to the Anti-Defamation League, Fuentes is now the main vector of youth anti-Semitism in America. His live broadcasts reach millions of views, every scandal amplifies its echo, and every institutional condemnation turns him into a martyr.

The case, which exploded after the Carlson interview, has opened an irreversible rift. On the one side, traditional Republicans trying to save the Reagan legacy; on the other, a new online right-wing that speaks of purity, religion and authority. In between, a young, confused electorate, attracted by a simple message: "They hate you, we understand you".

The young leader has already declared that he wants to 'put pressure' on GOP candidates who do not accept his line, promising to move his supporters to key primary states. Also in the crosshairs is Vice-President J.D. Vance, Trump's political heir and also suspected of being too cautious towards Israel and immigration.

Smiling, Fuentes turns hatred into performance and intolerance into belonging. He is the prophet of an era in which politics is consumed on platforms, where the algorithm replaces the public square and radicality is the language of attention.His strength is perhaps all here, not in formal power, but in the ability to make normal what until yesterday was unspeakable.