It’s no secret that President Donald Trump and his allies want to convince people that the United States’ southern border is a dangerous place warranting a border wall that would cost tens of billions of dollars. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) shredded a Fox News reporter this week for how far he proved willing to go to “prove” that point, proudly sporting a supposed protective vest while reporting live from the border that was so out-of-place looking it clearly didn’t even cover his vital organs. If the garb was supposed to protect reporter Lawrence Jones from roving bands of immigrants hiding in the shrub with machine guns — or whatever Trump’s shills made up this week — the Fox correspondent would have been left incredibly vulnerable.
Ocasio-Cortez asked:
‘Does ‘live from the border’ mean Party City? Fox is really out here doing the most on a budget to make the border look more dangerous than it is.’
Does “live from the border” mean Party City?
Fox is really out here doing the most on a budget to make the border look more dangerous than it is ?
h/t @jacobsoboroff pic.twitter.com/uvzIPE5jPG
— Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (@AOC) April 5, 2019
Indeed — besides the laughable nature of Jones wanting us to take his melodramatic safety concerns seriously while wearing that skimpy “protective” garb, there’s plenty of clear evidence that the claims are false that stretch across the Republican camp from Jones up to the president about the border being a supposedly dangerous place. The Washington Post shared that the majority of border counties are actually documented as significantly safer than jurisdictions of comparable size elsewhere in the U.S. Only a single county among 23 has a crime rate above that of similarly sized inland counties, according to data compiled by the Wilson Center.
Despite the facts of the situation, Jones and Fox stuck to their line that we should all be very worried. During a Thursday segment the day after the photo was snapped that Ocasio-Cortez mocked, Jones wore a more clearly actually protective vest, although it’s unclear why. The Thursday attire is meant to house plates to offer additional protection for vital organs, but it’s unclear they were actually in place. He claimed that Customs and Border Patrol (CBP) officials “instructed” him to wear the attire, although the agency didn’t return a request for comment from The Post, although the publication noted that in theory they could have provided the attire to identify Jones as a vetted reporter. Still, placed in the context of Jones’ claims of facing real danger while out with Border Patrol, that’s a stretch at best.
Fellow border correspondent Jacob Soboroff, who reports for MSNBC, shared in response:
‘This is totally ridiculous. I have never once worn a bulletproof vest at the border, nor has CBP ever asked me to — even while on a chase with Border Patrol to apprehend migrants in remote Arizona desert in the middle of the night. Because. The. Border. Is. Not. A. War. Zone.’
This is totally ridiculous.
I have never once worn a bulletproof vest at the border, nor has CBP ever asked me to — even while on a chase with Border Patrol to apprehend migrants in remote Arizona desert in the middle of the night.
Because. The. Border. Is. Not. A. War. Zone. https://t.co/Q1V95e7N5x
— Jacob Soboroff (@jacobsoboroff) April 4, 2019
Tell that to Donald Trump. He claims that there is a vast unreported network of crime associated with immigration over the southern border, which — despite the lack of evidence — he’s used as support for dramatic steps like declaring a national emergency over the “crisis” in an effort to use subsequent executive power to redirect already appropriated government funds towards border barriers. The Defense Department has already approved the reappropriation of some $1 billion as Congressional Democrats continue to grapple with the president’s insistence on steamrolling over their legally mandated oversight of government spending.
Check out Twitter’s response to the Congresswoman…
Featured Image via screenshot
