“Remigration”: an empty slogan or mass deportations in disguise?

Statement to be verified: It is possible to expel from all foreign nationals from a country’s territory, including asylum seekers and those who are not assimilable.

Context: Coined in France at the end of the last century and regaining popularity in recent years among members of the radical right, the concept of “remigration” has entered the vocabulary of several European nationalist-populist and identitarian leaders. The term refers to the voluntary or forced return of foreigners, people of foreign origin, or asylum seekers who are unable to integrate and thus tend to pollute the host population.  

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On 6 September in Grosseto, Italy, at its national festival, the far-right movement CasaPound announced that it would launch an Italian platform for “remigration”, in opposition to “mass immigration” and in defence of “national identity.” 

For years, the term remigration has been at the centre of the slogans used by the European and international far right, but recently it has also entered the vocabulary of Italian political leaders. Literally, the term means “reverse migration”, but in reality it means “forced return to the country of origin.” 

The Italian journalist Valerio Renzi, expert in the far-right and author of the book Le radici profonde: La destra italiana e la questione culturale (“Deep Roots: The Italian Right and the Cultural Question,” Fandango, 2025), explains that the word first circulated among the French far right in the 1990s, but has recently found a footing in other countries.

In Austria, the term has been revived by the leader of the Identitarian Movement, Martin Sellner. In Germany, the online newspaper Correctiv revealed a meeting that took place in November 2023 gathering a group of right-wing extremists, ethno-nationalist ideologues, high-ranking representatives of Alternative für Deutschland (AfD, far right), members of the Christian Democratic Union (CDU, conservative), entrepreneurs and lawyers, who discussed the “general concept of remigration.” The revelations sparked a wave of outrage and a large civil protest movement.

In Italy, the term been gaining currency since January 2025, following reports of sexual harassment by young men of foreign origin, derogatorily referred to in dialect as maranza, filed by several female tourists on New Year's Eve in Piazza Duomo, Milan. 

“From that moment on, all the right-wing media outlets in Italy – newspapers and TV stations – have been talking about it. Within a few weeks, the word spread, even though it is yet to appear in the platforms of institutional right-wing parties,” says Renzi. That said, the term has, for example, been used by Andrea Delmastro, Fratelli d'Italia’s undersecretary of the Ministry of Justice. 

On 26 July, a network of far-right parties marched in Vienna using this exact term, in a demonstration organised by Danish militants who in mid-July climbed onto the roof of a mosque in Copenhagen with a banner calling for the expulsion of foreigners and an end to the Islamisation of Denmark. 

The network that participated in the Vienna event is the same that met in Italy on 17 May at Remigration Summit 25. “The global forum was held in Gallarate, near Milan,” explains Renzi. “The organisers thought that it would be fertile ground for this kind of propaganda. No prominent figures from the Italian scene actually participated in the forum, but in the meantime, CasaPound has begun its own parallel campaign centred on this term, which will lead to the launch of the Italian platform at the national festival in September.” 

Presenting the Gallarate summit, Martin Sellner, one of the event's organizers, said on his social media accounts: “In recent days, the left-wing media has helped us publicize this summit, and tomorrow millions of Italians will hear about remigration.” 

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Speakers at the event in May included Lena Kotre of the AfD, John McLoughlin of the Irish National Party, Belgian political scientist Dries Van Langenhove, and other figures linked to identitarian and neo-fascist pressure groups. In Italy, it is mainly members of the Lega party who use the word remigration. 

For example, at the Gallarate summit General Roberto Vannacci, MEP and deputy secretary of Lega, said in a video message: “I am sorry I cannot be with you in person for this important event, but I want to make my voice heard and give my full support. The issue you are addressing today is one that demands courage, but it is necessary, and above all, it is an issue that has been absent from the debate for too long: remigration.”

According to Vannacci, remigration is not a slogan, but has concrete meaning: “returning to their countries of origin those who do not respect our laws, who reject our values and despise our culture.”

A misleading concept

The term is used by far-right groups in support of a conspiracy theory, that of ethnic replacement or “great replacement”, and to mask deportation with a euphemism, i.e., a practice that is illegal in Europe, involving the arbitrary, forced transfer of foreign nationals to other countries. In Italy in 2025, the term was introduced as a new term in the authoritative Treccani dictionary. 

“Its success is due to the European identitarian network in Central Europe. But it only exploded when Donald Trump used it in his election campaign against Kamala Harris,” explains Renzi. In Europe, this network’s main ideologue is the Austrian Sellner, whose book Remigration will be published in Italy in September by a Tuscan publishing house close to Fratelli d'Italia, Prime minister Giorgia Meloni's political party.  

Then there was the role of the AfD, which has run election campaigns based on this word since 2023. That year in Germany, the word was voted Unwort des Jahres, “non-word of the year,” meaning the most misleading and dehumanising term according to the group of linguists gathered in the Unwort-Aktion initiative. “But right now, the AfD itself is considering abandoning that slogan, because it appears to be too divisive and frightening. There is a debate within the party about this,” explains Renzi.  

In Greece, where the far right has no problem talking about the “deportation” of migrants, the concept of remigration does not seem to have taken root and is mainly mentioned in media reports on the activities of the European radical right. In France “remigration” has been primarily promoted by the identitarian movement, starting with Bloc/Génération identitaire.

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The term is used by far-right groups in support of the “great replacement” conspiracy theory, and to mask deportation, a practice that is illegal in Europe

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The latter introduced the term into public discourse in 2014, with the idea of sending some immigrants and their descendants back to their countries of origin. In 2022, the far-right presidential candidate Eric Zemmour made it a policy proposal, even announcing a ministry of remigration during his election campaign. French media and researchers link remigration to the great replacement conspiracy theory, emphasising its propagandistic use in far-right circles. 

In contrast, France's leading and potentially governing party, Marine Le Pen and Jordan Bardella's Rassemblement National (RN, far right), avoids the term remigration as part of its legitimisation strategy ("dédiabolisation", or “de-demonization,” as it is called in France), while also supporting tough measures on immigration (restrictions on birthright citizenship, referendums, preference for French citizens in access to public services, expulsions of foreign criminals). On several occasions, the RN has preferred to talk about “immigration de peuplement” – immigration for population growth – without adopting remigration as a slogan.  

On the other hand, the term is widely used by the national-feminist collective Nemesis, whose campaigns focus on what they identify as the essential issue in the fight for the defense of women's rights, and against sexist and sexual violence: “viol de prédation” (predatory rape), or violence against women in public spaces. According to their data – which has been widely debunked and contextualised – this violence is mainly perpetrated by men of foreign origin, who should thus be deported. “Remigration brings peace” is a phrase that regularly appears in their posts on Instagram or X, and other communications.

What are right-wing parties proposing with the term remigration? The expulsion of all irregular immigrants, but also of all those who are “unassimilable,” a very vaguely defined category that can be interpreted in a more or less restrictive manner. “Obviously, this would mean mass deportations of people who have been living in our countries for a long time,” explains Renzi. Furthermore, these groups' idea is to move foreigners en masse not only to their countries of origin, but to third countries with which they have no connection.

In practice, this would be impractical and contrary to the fundamental laws of European countries – for the time being – but the intention is to move the needle in terms of what can be discussed and implemented in immigration policy. “In fact,” explains Renzi, “it is a further legitimisation of a racist approach to migration policy.”

👉 This article on Internazionale

🤝 Stavros Malichudis from Solomon contributed to this article. It was produced with the support of the European Media and Information Fund (EMIF). It may not necessarily reflect the positions of the EMIF and the Fund Partners, the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation and the European University Institute. The sole responsibility for any content supported by the European Media and Information Fund lies with the author(s) and it may not necessarily reflect the positions of the EMIF and the Fund Partners, the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation and the European University Institute.