During World War II, the U.S. government threw 60,000 Italian immigrants in internment camps, and forced hundreds of thousands of Italian immigrants and Americans of Italian descent from the east and west coasts of the United States for being what was described as “enemy aliens.”

Like the Japanese immigrants and Japanese Americans, Italian immigrants and Italian Americans were seen as a “threat” and possible supporters of Fascist Italy. Despite the fear, there was never any evidence that this was the case. The U.S. government never found any Italian immigrants to be traitors to the United States, and certainly no American citizen of Italian descent was ever found to be a spy for the Axis powers.