Media Matters weekly newsletter, June 13

Welcome back to Media Matters’ weekly newsletter. This week: 

  • Fox’s fantasy about the Los Angeles protests is setting the stage for an authoritarian federal response. 
  • Right-wing media cheered in response to Sen. Alex Padilla (D-CA) being thrown to the ground and handcuffed during a Kristi Noem press conference.  
  • The Trump administration is creating an Office of Remigration. “Remigration” is a term for ethnic cleansing. 

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  • This week in stupid

    Newsmax: America love it or leave it
    • Turning Point USA founder Charlie Kirk: “My whole life, I’ve heard people complain about traffic on the 405. Mass deportations will help solve that.”
  • This week in scary

    • War Room host Steve Bannon called for the arrest of Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass. 
    • Newsmax host Chris Plante asked, regarding Democrats, “At what point are they declared to be a terrorist organization?” Steve Bannon also suggested the Democratic Party be labeled a “terrorist organization” this week. 
    • Fox’s Sean Hannity said California Gov. Gavin Newsom “should be arrested.” 
    • The Daily Wire’s Matt Walsh: “The president should use his authority to immediately terminate all migration from the Third World.”
  • Excuse me?

    • While calling for the military to be deployed to Los Angeles, Charlie Kirk used a chart sourced to a white nationalist website. 
    • Claiming “Western civilization” is under attack, Matt Walsh said Democrats want to “make America less white.” 
    • Fox’s Laura Ingraham said Democrats are using immigration to “resettle America with new people in order to transform it completely.” 
    • The Daily Wire’s Ben Shapiro defended Medicaid work requirements that are included in Trump’s “big, beautiful bill.” Reporting shows that millions could lose Medicaid coverage as a result of this bill. 
    • Fox’s Greg Gutfeld used the Larry Nassar case to attack Simon Biles.
  • Fox’s LA fantasy is setting the stage for an authoritarian federal response

    Fox News’ depiction of the protests that began in and around Los Angeles last weekend is a grim fantasy — but one that encourages President Donald Trump to realize his vision of U.S. troops crushing left-wing dissent. 

    Fox’s coverage is full of lies. In reality, the LA immigration protests are an organized response to Trump’s dramatic escalation of immigration enforcement. Democratic politicians have vocally opposed the riots that have sometimes accompanied those protests. That rioting, while deplorable, has not engulfed the city. But Trump has used it as a pretext to deploy U.S. troops for the confrontation with protesters he has long sought. And right-wing media at large has been calling for “overwhelming force” and arrests in LA.  

    By suggesting that California officials are actively supporting riots, which Fox has done, while inflating the extent of those riots, Fox is creating a justification for Trump to step in. And given Trump’s drive to dominate his perceived enemies and his glorification of state violence, that could end very badly.

  • Right-wing media cheer Sen. Alex Padilla being thrown to the ground and handcuffed at a Kristi Noem press conference

    During a June 12 press conference with Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem in Los Angeles amid ongoing protests against Immigration and Customs Enforcement arrests, Sen. Alex Padilla (D-CA) was forcibly removed. Right-wing media immediately began to justify the incident, falsely claiming that the senator had not identified himself, misrepresenting Padilla’s behavior, and defending the actions of law enforcement. 

    In a video of the incident, Padilla is clearly heard identifying himself and, according to a statement from his office, he was in the federal building to receive a briefing. Padilla is the ranking member of the Senate Judiciary Committee’s Subcommittee on Immigration, Citizenship, and Border Safety, which has “oversight of federal agencies with citizenship, asylum, refugee, and immigration enforcement responsibilities.” 

    Right-wing media immediately rushed to defend the incident by falsely claiming that Padilla never identified himself, arguing that he was “erratic” and “causing a scene,” and justifying his forced removal because “no one is above the law.” 

    • Fox anchor John Roberts suggested that law enforcement “did not know” who Padilla was and claimed that the senior senator from California “had no identification on him, which is why they probably in that instant saw him as a threat and forcibly removed him.” 
    • Fox News’ Laura Ingraham said Padilla was performing “a carefully choreographed stunt.” 
    • Newsmax host Rob Schmitt said Padilla was “barking like a random, unstable guy that just jumped in off the street wearing street clothes.”
  • Mainstream media ignore Trump’s planned Office of Remigration, a term for ethnic cleansing

    migrants walking with purple background and usa in background

    Citation

    Andrea Austria / Media Matters

    Mainstream media outlets almost entirely ignored news that the Trump administration is reportedly reorganizing the State Department to include a new “Office of Remigration.” “Remigration” is a term long used by far-right extremists to describe ethnic cleansing. 

    On May 29, news broke on the massive restructuring operation, including the creation of the new Office of Remigration. At the time, several outlets provided accurate context for the term “remigration.” But the vast majority of outlets ignored the news. 

    The reportedly planned new Office of Remigration is the latest and perhaps most explicit move yet from the second Trump administration to pursue a white nationalist immigration policy. In just over four months, Trump has aggressively pursued his goal of deporting 1 million or more immigrants per month, moved to reinstate and expand the Muslim ban from his first term, and resettled 59 white Afrikaners while otherwise effectively closing the United States off to all other refugees. 

    U.S. immigration policy has long been a tool for maintaining structures of white supremacy, but Trump isn’t simply pushing on an open door. He’s adopting a suite of policies championed by extremists, in some cases whose goal is to create a white ethnostate. Legacy media outlets that are unable to see why a proposed Office of Remigration is newsworthy have failed to convey the stakes and scope of Trump’s immigration agenda.