As we've already discussed here, Fox and their allies on the right have been using the death of Mollie Tibbetts to stir up anti-immigrant hatred, and to distract from the flood of bad news for Trump on everything from the Manafort indictment, to Michael Cohen's plea deal, to you name it.
Sen. Elizabeth Warren has been under attack by the right and by Donald Trump Jr., who misquoted her response during an appearance on CNN where she was asked about the tragic incident: Donald Trump Jr. Slams ‘Stupid’ Elizabeth Warren, Misquotes Her Mollie Tibbetts Comment on Instagram:
President Donald Trump’s eldest son Donald Trump Jr. called Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren “stupid” for dodging a question about Iowa college student Mollie Tibbetts, who was allegedly slain by an undocumented immigrant. But he misquoted her in his Instagram post.
Trump Jr. posted a screenshot of Warren speaking on CNN Wednesday along with the text, “Asked about Mollie Tibbetts being murdered by an illegal immigrant, Elizabeth Warren says ‘I know this is hard’ for her family, but they ‘have to remember’ that we need to focus on ‘real problems’ like illegal immigrants not being able to see their kids.”
In fact, Warren said “we”—not “they,” Tibbetts’s family—have to remember to focus on where the problems are.
“I’m so sorry for the family here, and I know this is hard not only for her family, but for people in her community, the people throughout Iowa. But one of the things we have to remember,” Warren said, “is we need an immigration system that is effective, that focuses on where real problems are.”
While Warren, who went on to say she saw children being taken away from their mothers at the border, was accused of being tone deaf with regard to Tibbetts’s death, Trump Jr.’s post twisted her comment to make it appear she called on the family to focus on migrant family separations.
“Yea the real problem is not the murder of a young American girl.?!?! You can’t make this crap up,” Trump Jr. captioned his Instagram post. “Is the left’s platform really defend anyone but actual Americans?”
“I don’t know how to interpret it any other way,” the first son continued. “How stupid can someone be and how stupid can we be to keep re-electing these Democrats? Time to finally put Americans First!!!”
It is not the first time Trump Jr. has posted incorrect information on Instagram.
Trump's favorite African-American grifters, Lynnette Hardaway and Rochelle Richardson, otherwise known as Diamond & Silk, made an appearance on Trump's favorite morning show on Fox this Friday, and after the network selectively edited Warren's CNN interview (Gee, seems like a pattern, doesn't it?), seemed to have a bit of trouble with basic math and greatly exaggerated the number of Americans killed by "illegal immigrants."
Interestingly, Fox selectively cut the interview in order to get Warren’s controversial line that “we need an immigration system that is effective, that focuses on where real problems are,” but they left out the context where she also spoke of the need for laws that “focus on people who pose a real threat” when it comes to migrants.
Brian Kilmeade bemoaned the “pivot to politics” in Warren’s answer, so Diamond & Silk seized on that right away and said she needs to resign if she can’t acknowledge the “millions of thousands of Americans” who’ve died because of criminal aliens.
“Shame on Senator Elizabeth Warren for being insensitive and dismissive of the tragedy that happened to Mollie Tibbetts. That is so sad. The mere fact that she don’t [sic] understand that millions of Americans want border security. It’s the reason why she needs to be voted out of office. I heard her talk about family separation at the border. What about these families or these millions of thousands of Americans that’s being killed by illegal aliens that’s being permanently separated from their families. They will never be able to see their loved ones again.”
Someone let me know when Fox decides to make a national story out of every local news story where a woman in the United States is either assaulted or killed while out jogging, or just trying to go about their everyday lives. They've got a lot of selective outrage over this story, and it's no mystery why.
Never mind that there is no study finding that rising immigration rates leads to more violent crime, the right is going to use this issue to feed red meat to their base every time they find another one of these stories to cherry-pick and drum up hatred for immigrants.
