The Networks Are Lying to Viewers Over Trump’s Somalia Comments

On Wednesday, ABC’s Good Morning America and NBC’s Today lied to their viewers to smear President Trump by choosing to ignore the context of his Tuesday comments lashing out at Somalis living in the United States as “garbage,” instead casting it as a “presidential tirade” either completely out of the blue or a way to lay the groundwork for Immigration Customs and Enforcement (ICE) operations in Minnesota, home to the largest U.S. enclave of Somalis.

And, in the case of CBS Mornings, they only offered a single pathetic sentence explaining the President was slamming Somalis in the Land of a Thousand Lakes for allegedly participating in a welfare scheme.

Before diving into this disinformation campaign, this was what actually happened:

 

ABC was the most vindictive. Co-host and former Clinton official George Stephanopoulos lied through his teeth in a tease: “President Trump lashes out at immigrants from Somalia...as ICE plans to ramp up operations in Minnesota, home to the nation’s largest Somali population.”

Co-host Robin Roberts was also on the team peddling leftist gruel: “But now we’re going to turn to President Trump lashing out against Somali immigrants as ICE prepares to increase activity in Minnesota, which has a large Somali population.”

Senior political correspondent Rachel Scott dutifully stated off the top without any explanation that Trump “is calling immigrants from Somalia garbage, insisting he does not want them in our country and it comes as this morning, we are learning ICE is preparing to ramp up immigration enforcement operations in Minnesota which is home to the nation’s largest Somali community”:

 

“This morning, ICE preparing to ramp up enforcement operations in Minnesota as President Trump lashes out at immigrants from Somalia saying we don’t want them in our country and continues to attack Democratic Congresswoman Ilhan Omar,” she added ahead of a long Trump soundbite.

Scott spent the rest of the segment working hand-in-hand with Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey (D) and St. Paul Mayor Melvin Carter (D) (click “expand”):

SCOTT: Minnesota’s home to the nations largest Somali population. Multiple law enforcement officials tell ABC News that ICE is preparing for a surge operation in the state, focusing on St. Paul and Minneapolis as early as this week. The city’s mayor said police will not help ICE when they arrive.

FREY: Targeting Somali people means that due process will be violated, mistakes will be made. And let’s be clear, it means that American citizens will be detained for no other reason than the fact that they look like they are Somali.

SCOTT: The Mayor of St. Paul saying this.

MAYOR MELVIN CARTER (D): The words that launched this American experience start with we the people and I believe that the sacred moments in American history are the moments we’ve had to decide who the we is. Who gets to be included in the we? Do we mean black people? Do we mean women? Do we mean immigrants?

SCOTT: The President criticizing Somalis for weeks now, terminating temporary protected status for Somalis and writing, “send them back to where they came from.” And this morning, the Trump administration cracking down immigration nationwide, pausing all applications for people from 19 so-called countries of concern including Somalia, Afghanistan, Venezuela, and Sudan. Immigrants with pending immigration and green card applications are now subject to review. As for the enforcement operations that are going to be taking place, we are learning in Minnesota, DHS putting out a statement what makes someone a target of ICE is not the race nor ethnicity but the fact that there in the country illegally, saying they don’t comment on potential operations. 

Over on NBC, chief White House correspondent Peter Alexander also went down this path, claiming in a partial segment that “Somali immigrants [were] also the target of a tirade by the President yesterday.”

Alexander falsely claimed “[t]hat presidential tirade there does not come in a vacuum” as “senior law enforcement official tells NBC News that immigration customs enforcement or ICE is prepping to target undocumented immigrants in the Minneapolis-St. Paul area this week.”

Fact-check: The proper response to said “vacuum” comment would have been the welfare scheme that occurred on Governor Tim Walz’s (D) watch with millions of dollars lost. 

Alexander could have done this and it wouldn’t have been that difficult as his colleague Gabe Gutierrez told the truth on Tuesday’s Nightly News:

 

CBS Mornings did the bare minimum, if one could even consider this single sentence an attempt to explain why Trump was “stoking a new controversy”: “He’s been talking about Somalis ever since the story broke last week about a fraud ring in Minnesota, which has the nation’s highest concentration of Somali Americans.”

 

To see the relevant transcripts from December 3, click here (for ABC), here (for CBS), and here (for NBC).