Last night's troubling protests of Donald Trump's rally at the University of Illinois at Chicago (UIC) were planned and staged well in advance. Univision's news division gave us a helpful glimpse into that staging as part of its post-Democrat debate coverage.
As we indicated in our own post-debate analysis, both Univision and lawlessness were the big winners of this week's heated Democratic debate in Miami. This protest underscores different radical elements that came together last night in Chicago. In this case, radical amnesty proponents opposed to Trump's immigration rhetoric.
But the protesters made clear that their efforts went beyond just advocating for immigration reform, and intended to subsequently shut Trump down:
JORGE MUJICA, ARISE CHICAGO: Now we have to stop the deportations, and we have to stop Donald Trump.
UNIDENTIFIED PROTESTER: Race yes, Trump no!
UNIVISION REPORTER: They assure that the raids are an attack on family unity.
Here's how Arise Chicago depicts Mujica's bio, lest we think that this is a random immigration activist:
JORGE MÚJICA, STRATEGIC CAMPAIGNS ORGANIZER
Jorge Mújica was born in Mexico City and participated in several popular movements in Mexico until he moved to the United States in 1987. As a journalist, he worked in several Spanish language newspapers, in Univision and Telemundo Spanish TV stations, and won two “First Place” awards by the National Association of Hispanic Publishers. As an activist, Jorge has collaborated with many labor unions in organizing and election campaigns, picket lines, and strikes, and is a member of several community organizations dealing with Mexico-USA issues, from remittances to the right to vote from abroad. He is one of the three conveners of the historic immigrant rights marches in Chicago in 2006, and ran for the US Congress in 2009, representing the immigration movement in the electoral arena. As Strategic Campaigns Organizer he works with large groups of workers who are interested in organizing for long-term workplace improvements. Jorge is fluent in Spanish and English.
In fairness, Trump has done himself no favors by continuing to stoke vitriol and then acting shocked when things happen. My grandmother used to call that "throwing the stone and then hiding the hand", and the answer to suppressed free speech is NEVER more suppressed free speech.
It's worth asking Univision's Chief News Officer Isaac Lee whether violent protests and the stifling of free speech are things that "make the Hispanic community better"and foment a "more inclusive society".
By willfully casting a friendly face into its racial grievance narratives, Univision News has made itself into an accomplice of last night's mayhem in Chicago. Its subsequent coverage of the protests only confirms that.
Here's a preview: "Cleveland is next."
