Media Unwittingly Aids Trump’s Deportation Agenda

Since the start of President Donald Trump’s second term, the ever-shrinking percentage of Americans who still trust the legacy media has been subjected to countless horror stories about masked Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents jumping out of unmarked cars, pulling people off the streets, and terrorizing law-abiding citizens.

Polls show that these sensationalized and fake stories are failing to sway the public against the President’s efforts to arrest and deport violent criminal illegal aliens – no doubt because the public has long since grown wise to the endless stream of media hoaxes when Trump is in office. Ironically, however, there is reason to believe that all the lurid tales of “ICE abuses” may be scaring many illegals into self-deporting.

The producers and editors of the corporate “news” media have evidently failed to consider how their tendentious coverage of ICE raids would affect the people they insist on calling “undocumented migrants.” Illegal aliens also watch the news, and it isn’t difficult to imagine how some will respond to reports that many of their compatriots have been caught and deported during Operation Midway Blitz. Is it unreasonable that many might consider accepting the Trump administration’s offer of $1,000 and a free flight back to their home countries?

Consider this dramatic description of the situation supposedly facing illegal aliens from The New York Times:

“Videos and news reports have captured federal agents surrounding or chasing down immigrant street vendors, delivery drivers and construction workers. Clashes between officers and activists and observers have broken out at courthouses, workplaces and front yards. The apprehensions have entangled beloved community members, undocumented parents with American-born children and spouses, and U.S. citizens, many of whom have been Latino.”

From the perspective of an illegal alien – especially one with a criminal record – after reading that, wouldn’t you self-deport?

According to a statement issued by the Department of Homeland Security, it appears that an impressive number of illegals have indeed taken that option or have gone home by some other means: “Two million illegal aliens have left the United States in less than 250 days, including an estimated 1.6 million who have voluntarily self-deported and more than 400,000 deportations.”

This suggests that the scary stories churned out by the legacy media are inadvertently encouraging self-deportation. In their efforts to keep as many illegal aliens as possible in the United States, partisan “journalists” actually may be inspiring them to leave.

Moreover, public polling shows that the media has failed at its other goal of turning the American people against deportations. A Harvard CAPS/Harris survey conducted in early October asked 2,413 registered voters if they approved of President Trump’s immigration policies, and their responses were by no means ambiguous. With regard to deportations, a whopping 78 percent approved of deporting illegal aliens with criminal records.

That total included 87 percent of Republicans, 77 percent of Independents, and 69 percent of Democrats. The percentage of Independents and Democrats who approved increased by five and six points, respectively, since the poll asked this question last August.

Harvard/Harris also asked respondents about mass deportation of all illegal aliens – whether they had committed a crime in addition to entering the country illegally or not – and 56 percent of respondents approved of Trump’s policy. This included 76 percent of Republicans, 54 percent of Independents, and 38 percent of Democrats.

Harvard/Harris didn’t pose that question in August, so the data doesn’t tell us if Independent and Democrat support increased for general deportations as it did for deporting only illegal aliens who have committed additional crimes. Regardless, the poll does suggest that the negative media coverage is failing to produce its intended effect.

This fact is further borne out by a New York Times/Siena University poll released on October 8. According to the findings of that survey, “Nine months into President Trump’s mass deportation campaign, registered voters largely support the idea of removing immigrants who have arrived in the country illegally… More than 90 percent of Republicans, 52 percent of independents and nearly 20 percent of Democrats continue to broadly support the idea of deporting those here illegally.”

The Times does its best to spin the survey’s findings in a negative way but finally admits defeat:

“Since Mr. Trump returned to power, his administration has enacted a new travel ban, sought to pull temporary humanitarian protections from hundreds of thousands of people, flown immigrants to countries where they are not from and deployed federal law enforcement officers to Chicago, Washington, D.C., and other major cities in a made-for-TV show of force to combat crime and illegal immigration… In that time, the share of registered voters who favor deporting immigrants living in the country illegally — 54 percent — has remained unchanged.”

This brings us back to the proposition that the corporate “news” media’s negative coverage might well be backfiring. If one examines the crosstabs of the Times/Siena poll, the respondents most likely to get their news from legacy media are more supportive of President Trump’s deportation policy.

In the 65+ age category, for example, 61 percent of the respondents favor deporting all illegal immigrants. Likewise, in the 45 to 64 age category, 62 percent of the respondents favor mass deportation. Most of these people are getting their news from legacy cable outlets that have run almost universally negative coverage of the deportations.

Ultimately, despite the best efforts by the legacy media to drive up disapproval of the President’s immigration policies, their coverage seems to be hardening support for deportations. And in a profoundly ironic twist, all the sound and fury is very likely scaring many illegal aliens into self-deporting. This is, as Shakespeare would put it, “a consummation devoutly to be wished.”

David Catron is a Senior Editor at the American Spectator. His writing has also appeared in PJ Media, the American Thinker, the Providence Journal, the Catholic Exchange and a variety of other publications.