“You’re a traitor.”
Those were the words heckled last week to a driver pulling into RAF Wethersfield, a former Ministry of Defence airbase in Essex currently being used to house asylum seekers.
Livestreamed from an iPhone to tens of thousands of people online, the clip shows a group of so-called migrant hunters hurling abuse at the driver, presumed to be a worker at the airbase, and threatening to publish his car’s number plate.
This – verbally abusing staff and police officers on camera, before sharing the incident with fellow “patriots” – appears to be the modus operandi of the self–proclaimed migrant hunters, who are on the rise amid growing unrest over the government’s handling of the migration crisis.
Often posing as journalists, these far-right activists will turn up at accommodation centres and hotels with the intention of harassing those who work and live there. They then post the footage online with the aim of – according to experts – laying the groundwork for anti-migrant protests, which often descend into violence.
They also use Facebook and X to spread information about the locations of hotels which have been earmarked by the government to house asylum seekers. A post shared time after time in this corner of the internet is an interactive map, purporting to show the location of more than 200 hotels across the UK where migrants live.
Their methods for identifying accommodation for asylum seekers appear to be a myriad of tip-offs from disgruntled employees at the hotels in question, information from locals, as well as meticulous monitoring of Booking.com to check which 3* hotels have been blocked out for mass bookings.
Some of the most prominent migrant hunters have nearly 200,000 followers on X and tweet around 20 times a day, often peddling false and dangerous rumours about those inside the hotels. Among the more disturbing posts are unfounded claims of an upcoming terror attack, littered among AI generated images of far-right activist Tommy Robinson.
Recent research from the anti-racism campaign group Hope Not Hate found the number of migrant hunters had doubled since 2021 and that they had visited hotels housing asylum seekers on more than 250 occasions.
But activity on social media accounts connected to the movement has ramped up particularly in recent weeks, following anti-migrant protests in Epping, Essex which triggered similar demonstrations across the country. The unrest began in July after an asylum seeker from Ethiopia, believed to be staying at The Bell Hotel, was charged with sexual assault, including that of a 14-year-old girl.
Since then, protests have taken place in cities such as Manchester, London, Bournemouth and Edinburgh, with more planned for Friday evening as part of what organisers have called Abolish Asylum Day – a mass protest at eight different locations across the country where asylum seekers are being housed.
Far-right groups have been encouraging such protests for years, yet concerns are growing over the invasive tactics used by the migrant hunters, who appear to spend their time travelling to various hotels, doxxing their opposition and harassing those temporarily given refuge there.
They then use messaging apps such as Telegram, Signal and Whatsapp to spread the word
Speaking to The Independent, Joe Mullhall, director of research at Hope Not Hate, said these individuals first became prominent online during the spring of 2021.
“Originally they were on the beaches, filming the arrival of boats and doing daily tallies, before moving from areas like Dover to the accommodation centres. They were the content creating machine that was sitting under the far-right.” he said.
“They would release daily vlogs and livestreams which would percolate through the far-right system and get picked up by people like Tommy Robinson. They have been quite important in pushing cross-Channel migration up the agenda of the far-right.”
Having analysed the locations of protests, the anti-racism charity spotted a pattern – hotels targeted during the summer of violence in 2024 had often been visited multiple times by migrant hunters.
Riots were sparked across the UK last July after three girls were killed in a Taylor Swift-themed dance class in Southport, with a wave of misinformation on social media falsely claiming the killer was a Muslim asylum seeker.
Mr Mullhall added: “Where we saw those atrocious scenes and arson outside the Holiday Inn in Rotherham, migrant hunters had visited that hotel 12 times between 2021 and 2024. It’s interesting because that hotel is not in the city centre – people knew where to go, migrant hunters had laid the groundwork.”
Momentum has picked up again and these activists are once again livestreaming themselves at protests, quickly racking up thousands of comments and clicks online.
In Epping, one protest organiser told The Independent they had been made aware that the Britannia Hotel in Canary Wharf in London’s financial district was being repurposed by the Home Office after being contacted by an employee who had been made redundant.
Two protests broke out there after the information spread online.
Meanwhile, one former soldier, who claims to have raised more than £30,000 in donations to help fund an anti-migrant movement called the Great British National Protest, claims to be behind 20 demonstrations around the UK.
Richard Donaldson, 33, told The Times the money raised would be used to fund “covert investigations inside hotels”, and claimed to have recruited members of staff who were supposedly willing to wear hidden body cameras and share intelligence.
“There has been a proliferation of online social media accounts that are promoting anti-migrant sentiments,” Sabby Dhalu, co-convenor of Stand Up To Racism said.
“Firstly since Elon Musk took over X and secondly since Donald Trump became President, there has been a shift in the algorithm, a bias towards far-right material. Such content is getting a wider reach.”
She added: “We’ve noticed in our demonstrations that people say they are journalists and pick up their phones, but what they are really doing is doxxing people and identifying people they can target.”
On Monday, the Home Office announced it was providing another £100 million to tackle people smuggling and Sir Keir Starmer has struck a deal to return Channel migrants to France in exchange for asylum seekers with ties to the UK.
While the move has been criticised by refugee charities, the government are hoping it will prevent an outbreak of similar disorder to that of last summer.
Enver Solomon, CEO of Refugee Council, said: “Protests against people seeking asylum is causing alarm amongst adults and children who have fled war in countries such as Sudan and Afghanistan.
“Last summer, we witnessed refugees we support fear for their lives as an angry mob tried to set fire to the hotel where they were living. Rhetoric that dehumanises people who’ve come to Britain seeking sanctuary creates a climate where violence can flourish.
“Our frontline staff work in many of the communities affected and see that most people are fair-minded and compassionate. While they may have valid questions about why hotels are used, these concerns are being hijacked by a violent minority.
“Asylum hotels have become flashpoints – a symbol of a broken system that traps people in limbo, unable to work or rebuild their lives at huge public cost.”
