Examining Prophecies about Multicultural America

The "far right" was prescient on how demographics would change America, but these prophets didn’t get everything right.

Written by Scott Greer.

This essay was originally published at Highly Respected.

Bill Clinton recently went viral on X—and not for anything to do with his sexual relations. A clip of the then-president celebrating America’s white minority future was spread on the social media platform. "Within five years, there will be no majority race in our largest state, California,” Clinton said in his commencement address at Portland State University in 1998. “In a little more than 50 years, there will be no majority race in the United States. No other nation in history has gone through demographic change of this magnitude over so short a time.”

The white majority crowd cheered at this statement, apparently thrilled at the prospect of living in a country that was no longer theirs. The clip shocked conservative X users. It seemed so brazen for the president and his audience to celebrate the Great Replacement. Nearly 30 years later, America is bearing out the truth in Clinton’s observations. It’s most likely that America will be minority white sooner than 2050, and whites are already a minority in several states.

There were many on the right who warned about the consequences of demographic change and why it would be nothing to celebrate. Samuel Huntington, Pat Buchanan, Sam Francis, Jared Taylor, Peter Brimelow and others tried to persuade Americans that immigration and multiculturalism would fundamentally change the country. They were proven right.

But the America wrought by diversity isn’t quite the picture painted by Who Are We? or Suicide of a Superpower. There are many predictions made by right-wingers and cultural pessimists that didn’t come true. That doesn’t mean diversity turned out to be good. It’s just different from what many on the “far-right” imagined.

The general thought is that mass immigration and multiculturalism would lead to America turning into a Brazil characterized by Balkanization, a permanent Democratic majority, non-white militancy, worse crime and greater white racial consciousness. Instead, we’re getting a Brazil with intense slopification, bizarre politics and extreme atomization.

It’s an America drifting from greatness, but in a different direction than the one imagined by right-wing prognosticators.

It’s understandable to think that a more diverse America would accelerate cultural Balkanization. All the new immigrants would carve up their own spheres and challenge prevailing American norms. They would stick to their old languages, insist on its usage in their own areas, and refuse to assimilate. Samuel Huntington and others worried we could have at least one Quebec on our hands. They saw the increased Hispanic migration to the Southwest as creating a new cultural zone that would prefer Spanish over English and see itself as distinct from the rest of the country. This territory could potentially split off from the rest of America and rejoin Mexico. Separatism, of one sort or another, would prevail in “Aztlan.”

While immigration has certainly changed much, it hasn’t quite “Balkanized” the country. One reason is that immigrants are now everywhere. One can encounter Hispanics and Indians in rural Arkansas. They’re too dispersed to form something along the lines of a Spanish or Hindi Quebec. They’re also too inclined to assimilate to America’s modern consumer identity. A person needs to know English so they can understand the latest hit songs, TikTok videos and sports news. You’re not going to make it far in American society if you can’t speak English well. Lack of fluency condemns someone to the most menial of jobs. Many immigrants stick to speaking their language out in public, but their children know they need to learn the language to get anywhere in America. English remains strong.

Immigrants seem to care far more about the Fast and Furious film franchise than creating Aztlan. They fully embrace the slop of 21st century America. They may not care for our history and heroes, but they do love our malls, movies and snacks. That’s enough for them to sorta fit in. Instead of Balkanization, immigration further exacerbates America’s slopification. Without a genuine culture or traditions to adopt, immigrants gravitate towards the lowest elements of contemporary mass culture. We now have a country where people are fatter, dress shabby, smoke weed in public, display tattoos, and share little in common besides sports fandom and the pursuit of consumer goods. We may not need to worry about immigrants trying to split off parts of America, but it’s not like they’ll make our country better. Immigrants are making a new, slop-filled America.

“Demographics is destiny” became a powerful catchphrase to warn conservatives of what the future will look like without a white majority. Both liberals and the “far right” believed that demographic change would lead to a permanent Democratic majority. It was expected that non-whites would band together as a rainbow coalition against whiteness. That hasn’t panned out. Trump did extraordinarily well among minorities in the last election—while running on one of the most-race charged platforms in recent memory. While blacks remain overwhelmingly Democratic, there are small cracks within their ranks and Democrats struggle to increase that demographic’s turnout. Hispanics and Asians are more divided and are more open to voting for Republicans than ever before. The mainstream media now warns about the rise of the “multiracial Right” rather than assuring itself of a permanent majority.

This doesn’t mean the demographic situation is a huge boon to the Right. The majority of non-whites still vote for the Democrats. It’s just not as decisive as one might imagine.

Immigrants do play a role in helping far-left candidates. Both Zohran Mamdani and Omar Fateh draw a great deal of their support from immigrants. But the primary driving force for the far-left in America are the “Yuccies”. These are college-educated creative types who are experiencing relative downward mobility. They’re the ones backing Antifa, joining the Democratic Socialists of America, and leading online cancellation mobs. A century ago, American leftism was primarily an immigrant-driven phenomenon. Without Ellis Islanders, we wouldn’t have had the Wobblies, anarchist terrorists or the Communist Party. It’s a different story today. Many immigrants may support socialism if given the choice, but they’re not the primary social base for it.

White nationalists were once confident that a diverse America would make whites embrace racial consciousness. That event has yet to happen. Just 15 percent of whites say their racial identity is important to them, which stands in stark contrast to the majority of every other group who say that identity is important to them. Nearly 95 percent of Americans approve of interracial marriage. While whites are still the group least likely to marry outside their race, the number of Caucasians in interracial marriages continues to climb. There is no white equivalent to the NAACP and explicit white nationalism remains on the fringes. White nationalism itself exhibits remarkable levels of diversity now. You’ll find people of all races in prominent roles in the “movement.” There are many Hispanics within its ranks and several of its white adherents marry outside their race. One could argue that the average white nationalist in 2025 is more “racially tolerant” than the average white Republican was in 1990. (The majority of Americans still disapproved of interracial marriage at the time.)

The issues that were only addressed by the Alt Right a decade ago—mass immigration, anti-white racism, etc.—are now mainstream conservative topics. Identity issues are at the forefront of political discourse, yet it hasn’t been quite accompanied by the white identitarianism envisioned by the Alt Right. It’s more “multiracial nativism” than white nationalism.

Demographic change has also not increased crime. Crime has, in fact, fallen. The new arrivals commit less crime than NBAs (native-born black Americans) and that crime-prone population is older, more dispersed and in demographic decline. America is still more violent and dangerous than the rest of the developed world, but it hasn’t returned to the bloody 80s and early 90s.

One thing that the prophets of doom did get right is that America would begin to resemble Brazil. There’s much more of a Latin American character to our country now. Our shabby infrastructure, dismal ghettoes and diverse population convey a Latin American feel. Our politics looks more like it, with right-wing authoritarians facing off against outright socialists. Both sides try to lock up the losers of elections and corruption is more accepted. One can walk around a mall and feel one is in Belo Horizonte rather than Kansas City. America is still far richer than any Latin American country and the state itself is much stronger than any government south of the border. But the changes are noticeable.

The Great Replacement will make America a worse country. But it likely won’t fall apart like Pat Buchanan predicted in Suicide of a Superpower. As he acknowledged in a conversation with Ralph Nader 14 years ago, consumerism and sports fandom may be enough to keep this country together even with dramatic demographic change and a declining quality of life. But it won’t be very inspiring, especially for those who remember a better America.

Scott Greer is a writer and podcaster. He is the author of No Campus for White Men. You can follow him on Twitter and Substack.

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