Even though President Biden has a historic illegal immigration crisis on his hands, CNN deflected blame from the Democrat this morning to attack his Republican critics instead. On New Day this morning, co-host Brianna Keilar accused Florida Governor Ron DeSantis and Texas Senator Ted Cruz of perpetuating a “dangerous trope” that illegal immigrants were spreading Covid.
Keilar started off her rant against the right, begrudgingly admitting things didn’t look good for the Biden administration:
You know, there is a crisis on the border. The last time the border patrol saw this number of migrants trying to cross in a month was two decades ago. This morning the Ed board for the Washington Post is demanding a coherent strategy. So yes, President Biden has a real problem on his hands here.
Before she sharply pivoted into attacking Biden’s critics as similar to far-right racists in Charlottesville:
And his critics are capitalizing on it. Listen to former speaker of the house Newt Gingrich who is echoing the tone of far right extremists when it comes to immigration reform….That is awfully close to what's known as the great replacement theory, the theory that white people are being replaced by non-white people especially in immigrants.
After playing a montage of Republicans criticizing the President’s border policy, after he blamed red state governors like Texas’s Abbott and Florida’s DeSantis for rising COVID cases, Keilar echoed the President, saying the real problem was low vaccination rates (even though there are plenty of other states with a lower vaccinated population):
KEILAR: And of course there is more. Some conservative lawmakers and pundits, some of the same ones arguing against masking in schools to protect unvaccinated children are saying COVID-19 is a problem, but only at the border. In Texas new coronavirus cases are on a steep climb. The seven-day average hit nearly 12,000 new cases yesterday. But they say it is not the states low uptake of the vaccine to blame. [shows graphic 53.2% of population partially vaxxed] If you ask Senator Ted Cruz it is this.
CRUZ: If you don't want to see this pandemic come back with the delta variant, most of these illegal immigrants coming in have not been vaccinated. They are being put in cages with other people who are called the positive. They are spreading Covid in their releasing Covid in our communities. This is lunacy.
Keilar bashed DeSantis and Rand Paul for citing reports revealing immigrants at the border were being released throughout the country, calling this a “bizarre claim with zero evidence:”
That claim is not based in fact. There is no proof of some large- scale importation of Covid second migrants to Florida that could be blamed for the terrible exit numbers in his state. And as we noted, hundreds of thousands of immigrants are being expelled. And senator Rand Paul who just slammed the CDC for offering guidelines on safely reopening schools, is making this bizarre claim with zero evidence.
The journalist ended her rant by calling this idea a “dangerous trope” of “demonizing foreign people as diseased:”
There are some in the Republican party who insist that COVID isn’t so bad. Certainly not bad enough to have kids wear masks in school even if they are too young to be vaccinated. But actually it is bad. They say, very bad, A threat in fact if it is undocumented immigrants coming into the country. Again, no evidence they are responsible for the COVID surge in U.S. Communities. It is the centuries old trope of demonizing foreign people as diseased... These conservative voices know that. They are the vectors affecting Americans they profess to care about missing misinformation. And the rising case numbers, the lagging vaccination numbers are proof of that.
Except this isn’t a figment of Republicans’ imaginations. For months, there have been reports that the border patrol has been releasing COVID-positive migrants that have come across the border through towns like McAllen, Texas. This has even been reported liberal news outlets like NBC News.
Keilar’s defense of Biden’s botching of the border crisis today was a follow-up to her Friday report seeming to criticize his handling from the left.
CarShield sponsors New Day, contact them at the Conservatives fight back page here.
Read relevant transcript portions below:
New Day
8/9/2021
BRIANNA KEILAR: You know, there is a crisis on the border. The last time the border patrol saw this number of migrants trying to cross in a month was two decades ago. This morning the Ed board for the Washington Post is demanding a coherent strategy. So yes, President Biden has a real problem on his hands here. And his critics are capitalizing on it. Listen to former speaker of the house Newt Gingrich who is echoing the tone of far right extremists when it comes to immigration reform.
…
KEILAR: That is awfully close to what's known as the great replacement theory, the theory that white people are being replaced by non-white people especially in immigrants...[plays Charlottesville footage]
..
And of course there is more. Some conservative lawmakers and pundits, some of the same ones arguing against masking in schools to protect unvaccinated children are saying COVID-19 is a problem, but only at the border. In Texas new coronavirus cases are on a steep climb. The seven-day average hit nearly 12,000 new cases yesterday. But they say it is not the states low uptake of the vaccine to blame. [shows graphic 53.2% of population partially vaxxed] If you ask Senator Ted Cruz it is this.
CRUZ: If you don't want to see this pandemic come back with the delta variant, most of these illegal immigrants coming in have not been vaccinated. They are being put in cages with other people who are called the positive. They are spreading covid in their releasing covid in our communities. This is lunacy.
...
BRIANNA KEILAR: There are some in the Republican party who insist that covid isn’t so bad. Certainly not bad enough to have kids wear masks in school even if they are too young to be vaccinated. But actually it is bad. They say, very bad, A threat in fact if it is undocumented immigrants coming into the country. Again, no evidence they are responsible for the COVID surge in U.S. Communities. It is the centuries old trope of demonizing foreign people as diseased. The [indiscernible] on that virus is sky high. These conservative voices know that. They are the vectors affecting Americans they profess to care about missing misinformation. And the rising case numbers, the lagging vaccination numbers are proof of that.
JOHN BERMAN: And Also governor Ron DeSantis, we love to hear a blip from you about the record hospitalizations in Florida and what you intend to do to get those numbers down. Because they keep on rising.
KEILAR: Yeah a lot of his policies right now are not, you know they’re not discouraging those numbers and it seems like he is looking for a scapegoat. But its like I said, it's a trope and its a dangerous one at that.
