It's the classic:

A) economy goes down (for real, or perceived)

B) grab power by blaming minorities

Jews, black people, foreigners, Asians, Mexicans, Italians, LGBT, women, Muslims, you name it, it works.

The book "Future Shock" was written five decades ago and predicted pretty much everything that's happened since.

The author, Alvin Toffler, realized that the coming Digital Age was going to change everything. He looked at massive changes in the past and saw a pattern; when people couldn't/wouldn't adapt to change they would cling to the past even more strongly. The Native American Ghost Shirt Society thought they could wipe out all the settlers and bring back the buffalo.

The racism never went away. It is thus very convenient to put all the blame on to the "foreigners". It is a thing that can be seen nearly anywhere in the world. Politicians love this simple trick as any country has some of them and every country has major problems that would take real effort, time and money to solve. So we don't.

Politicians these days just want the opportunities that come with the job so all they do is uphold the status quo while trying to milk their constituents for some more of their cash.