Political advertising on social media exposes how parties tailor messages to different audiences within algorithmic environments. This study analyzes over 45,000 Facebook ad campaigns from populist and mainstream parties across five EU countries, showing how populist movements achieve disproportionate reach through targeted appeals to gendered and age-specific demographics. The results highlight how populist communication adapts to platform logics, reinforcing national narratives while remaining ideologically fluid.

Political advertising on social media exposes how algorithmic targeting intersects with nationalist discourse and demographic bias. By analyzing over two thousand migration-related campaigns from the Facebook Ads Library, this study uncovers how anti-immigration messages reach audiences differentiated by gender, age, and location, amplifying visibility among groups aligned with nationalist sentiment. The results reveal how algorithmic mediation reinforces cultural divides, showing that persuasion in digital politics depends as much on audience composition as on ideology.

Targeted advertising plays a crucial role in the mobilization of nationalist and nativist narratives. Analyzing thousands of Facebook campaigns about immigration, this study shows how parties deploy demographic targeting—by gender, age, and region—to reinforce alignment with anti-immigration sentiment. The findings illustrate how algorithmic personalization operationalizes ideology, embedding far-right communication within the infrastructure of digital campaigning.