It’s hard to think of anything that more perfectly sums up everything warped and wrong with the US immigration debate than the ongoing row over Haitian migrants in an Ohio town.

In case you haven’t been acquainted with this rancid incident, for the past week, right-wing influencers and the Donald Trump presidential campaign have been spreading a rumor that Haitians who immigrated to the Ohio town of Springfield are killing and eating other locals’ pets. They are not. In fact, it is hard to overstate just how much they are not: not a single shred of evidence has surfaced for this made-up story, the claims underlying it have been repeatedly debunked, and it turns out the Trump campaign even directly asked Springfield’s city manager whether there was any truth to the claim and was told there wasn’t, only to push the fake stories anyway.

It would hardly be worth giving this repulsive, racist fantasy any more attention if not for what it says about the ugly state of US politics right now.