It has been more than a week since Republican candidate Donald Trump repeated the false rumor that Haitian immigrants in Ohio are eating Americans’ pets, and the conventional wisdom is that he has hurt himself politically by telling such a racially-tinged lie. But perhaps it’s working for him.

The fact that both Trump and his running mate J.D. Vance have repeated the dog-and-cat-eating Haitians claim several times since the former president echoed it at the Sept. 10 presidential debate makes me think that they are spreading it purposely, even if they know it’s untrue.

Their fake news claims about Haitian immigrants helps them draw national attention on their dubious claim that America “is being destroyed” by undocumented immigrants. Now that inflation is going down and the U.S. stock market is at its record high, they need to keep the narrative of an immigrant invasion alive. It’s the biggest issue they have to campaign on.

It doesn’t seem to matter to them that the pet-eating migrants story has been debunked by the Republican governor of Ohio, Mike DeWine, and by city and police authorities in Springfield, the town where the rumor originated. And it doesn’t seem to matter to them that amplifying a racist conspiracy theory has already led to bomb threats to Springfield legal immigrants and residents.

Here’s how the Trump-Vance fake news strategy has worked for them:

First, Trump repeated the false claim at the presidential debate in front of 67 million people, amplifying...

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