"They Want An Open Border!"

"Liberals want open borders!"

Ever hear that one? Even from within a well-insulated, left-wing social media bubble, people have heard this claim reverberating its way through the right-wing echo chamber and into the legacy media. It's repeated constantly within the Right-Wing Media Machine, and never questioned.

But when have we liberals ever actually said this?

I've scoured all my favorite liberal media outlets for this one, and I've never heard a single liberal argue in favor of open borders. Not one. Oh, we've argued for compassion towards refugees, that's true. We've made the case for asylum-seekers. We've quoted the Emma Lazarus poem on the Statue of Liberty multiple times. But we've never argued for an "open border."

And we've certainly not done this through our actions politically. Barack Obama had some harsh words regarding illegal immigration in 2005, and he circumvented a do-nothing congress in order to crack down on illegal immigration. A Republican-led do-nothing congress, I hasten to remind you. The REPUBLICANS were the ones who wanted an open border. So they could campaign on it!

Almost the same thing happened again in 2024, when Biden and the Democrats had a bi-partisan deal with Republicans to secure the U.S. border in exchange for aid to Ukraine. As you should recall, Donald Trump derailed that agreement. HE wanted an open border. So he could campaign on it!

So why, with all these Republicans deliberately and maliciously keeping the border open is the Right-Wing Media Machine repeating the lie that Democrats and liberals are the ones who want an open border?

Put simply, because they know that disinformation reigns supreme right now. There simply is no solid commitment from the general public towards the truth, nor is there any semblance of responsibility on the part of media to report only the truth. There is no North Star for people to navigate by, and zero accountability for liars and deceivers. All that matters is more clicks; more follows; more retweets; going viral. The truth is ancillary to all that.

And Mark Zuckerberg just decided that even more disinformation will help improve Facebook. Fuck you too, dumbass.

Anybody else find it odd that the same ones claiming that liberals want an open border are also complaining about how childless many liberals are? One of the crazier memes of the 2024 presidential campaign was aimed at "childless cat ladies." And more than once, J.D. Vance said that parents should have more of a voice in government than non-parents. And, of course, Republicans made it their business to force pregnancy upon rape victims by outlawing abortion.

Are we full up in this country or not? Pick a lane!

It's sometimes hard to believe that this is the same Republican party that once so strongly criticized "welfare mothers" (a dog-whistle for unmarried black women on welfare) for being a drain on society. Then again, it's always been the right-wing policy to have more children, provided those children are 1) white and 2) Christian.

When Trump does his promised deportations, you can rest assured that none of the deportees will be white people from Europe.

So every time you hear some crazy Trumpist nutball saying, "liberals want an open border," just remember that person is full of shit.

Just like the rest of the unfettered Right-Wing Media Machine.

Eric

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