NewsBusters Feed
NewsBusters Feed

NewsBusters Feed

@newsbustersfeed

CNN's Phillip Claims 'Legitimate Fear' Of ICE In Minneapolis Justifies Running From Them
Favicon 
www.newsbusters.org

CNN's Phillip Claims 'Legitimate Fear' Of ICE In Minneapolis Justifies Running From Them

You would think that one of the accepted rules of living in a society built on law and order, is that you should always obey orders from police, and certainly never run from them. But on Friday night's edition of CNN's NewsNight, host Abby Phillip made the absurd and dangerous claim that fearing ICE agents in Minneapolis justifies a suspect  running away from them. Mimicking much of the liberal media, the opening segment of the show focused on the father of a five year old boy in Minneapolis who ran from ICE agents, resulting in both the man and his son being taken into custody, after authorities say, the boy's mother refused to take the child. PHILLIP: ...Why would you run when you encounter ICE? Well, because in Minneapolis, what we've seen is that even American citizens who are minding their own business  walking down the street, you don't get to walk away from an ICE encounter. They might detain you for hours or even days. That has also happened. So that, I think, seems to be a legitimate fear on the part of any person.. in Minnesota right now, but particularly if you are brown, if you are Hispanic, if you are Somali, that.. you're whether you have papers or not, whether you have status or not, whether you have a pending asylum claim or not, you might get detained. And that's exactly what happened to this family. Phillip conveniently left out that, as pointed out in the story link above, the father in this family, Adrian Alexander Conejo Arias, is an Ecuadorean citizen who was in the United States illegally and was released into the country by the Biden administration. She also failed to mention the list of arrests made by ICE in Minnesota, released last week by DHS, which includes murderers, drug traffickers, and an illegal alien with 24 convictions.  Phillip wasn't finished defending those who run from ICE, as she debated GOP Strategist Lance Trover. PHILLIP: Running from law enforcement may not be okay, but it's also a reaction that people have to knowing that if they have an interaction with ICE, whether or not they are legal, whether they are a citizen, they might have their freedom stripped from them. That's a real thing. Do you acknowledge that that is happening? TROVER: I acknowledge that it happens every day in this country when somebody who has committed a crime or doesn't runs from the police, what are they going to do? Yes, you're going to be in trouble. That's how our system operates...Why are we making an exception for illegal immigrants? Darn good question. And just for good measure, panelist Xochitl Hinojosa ended the segment by weighing in, supporting Phillip's position.  HINOJOSA: It is because ICE has eroded trust and the trust of the American people. And I will say, the vast majority of law enforcement have done so much to build that trust. And I would say if this are a regular day, if this were a few years ago, yes, I agree, running from law enforcement isn't great. We live in different times, ICE is acting out of control, and that's why people are running. Shame on Phillip and Hinojosa. There are few things more irresponsible than sending a message that it's okay to run from police. It should be common sense that escalating a situation involving law enforcement can only make the situation worse, not better. But common sense and the liberal media don't seem to be a fit these days.

A.I. Cry: Scarborough Rails Against 'Tech Monopolies' Ruining Job Market for Youth
Favicon 
www.newsbusters.org

A.I. Cry: Scarborough Rails Against 'Tech Monopolies' Ruining Job Market for Youth

If Joe Scarborough had been around at the beginning of the 20th century, you might have found him on a street corner, haranguing anyone who would listen about the evils of the advent of the automobile. Flip to today, and there was Scarborough on Morning Joe, fulminating about artificial intelligence. AI is stealing jobs from younger Americans, says Joe. And that's because: "People in Washington will not stand up to tech monopolists. They will not stand up to the billionaires that run this economy. They will not stand up to the very people who are going to get richer and richer on AI and leave you and your friends and your generation further and further behind. It's that simple." Yes, so simple! Per Scarborough, the solution is so easy and obvious: "Break up tech monopolies."  Right on! Just like back in 1969, when the feds decided that IBM's supposed computer monopoly was the big threat, and brought an anti-trust lawsuit to break it up. Thirteen years, and tens of millions of dollars wasted by the feds and IBM later, the government withdrew the case, admitting it was "without merit." In the interim, many new companies had sprung up, producing faster, better, cheaper computers that peeled off big chunks of IBM's market share. Any possible monopoly had been undone not by government intervention, but by the power of free markets. And, seriously, Joe? AI monopolies are the problem? Have you not noticed the cutthroat competition among the many AI companies, and the producers of the chips that they depend on? If ever there were an industry that is not monopolized, it's AI! And yet, echoing Scarborough's call for the government to wield its powers, there was Axios honcho Jim VandeHei: "The only thing government should be talking about. How do we make sure that everybody benefits from this technology that's going to make a couple of companies awesomely powerful and awesomely rich? And that's fine if everybody else benefits from it. But if you have a bunch of people or a few people getting really rich, really powerful at the expense of everyone else, you're going to have a much bigger mess than we have today." Yup: We're from the government, and we're going to "make sure" that everybody benefits from AI--in the way that we politicians and bureaucrats think is best! VandeHei also buys into the notion that the wealth pie is limited: if some artificial intelligence creators are getting "awesomely rich," it will be "at the expense of everyone else" -- unless government steps in. Scarborough, wearing his best "AI, git-off-my-lawn!" face [see screencap], detected a dastardly scheme in which "political leaders" are "distracting" young people from realizing that AI is the cause of their job-hunting difficulties by instead blaming, among others, "Somalians."  "Somalians?" It's Somalis, Joe. And they are rightly being blamed—for massive fraud—but not for taking jobs. Perhaps since Scarborough was so focused on money this morning, he had "semolians"—that old-fashioned slang term for dollars—on the noggin, and that crept into his misnaming of Somalis. Here's the transcript. MS NOW Morning Joe 1/23/26 6:04 am ET JOE SCARBOROUGH: We're talking about distractions like Greenland. We're talking about, I mean, and, you know, this guy right here [laughs as he points to photo of Howard Lutnick in the NYT] saying globalization has failed, when the United States has been dominant over the past 80 years because of it.  You talk about a distraction. You talk about what my football coach in high school would talk about majoring in the minors. It's just sheer insanity. This is something that should bring everybody together to figure out how working Americans don't get started -- and they're young! Coming out of our best colleges on the planet even, not being able to get jobs because of AI.  JIM VANDEHEI: I've never in my life seen a bigger disconnect between what people are fixating on and what they should fixate on. It's the only thing government should be talking about. How do we make sure that everybody benefits from this technology that's going to make a couple of companies awesomely powerful and awesomely rich?  And that's fine if everybody else benefits from it. But if you have a bunch of people or a few people getting really rich, really powerful at the expense of everyone else, you're going to have a much bigger mess than we have today.  And so hopefully, by writing about it, by you talking about it, eventually Congress, business leaders, teachers, everyone will start thinking about how do we equip everyone to make this shift? We can do this. I believe that we can do it, but not by ignoring it, right?  SCARBOROUGH: Right. And I mean, listen, and for younger Americans who are trying to figure out why they're not getting jobs, you can blame Somalians if you want to blame Somalians. It's horrible for you to be blaming Somalians, but I know you have political leaders that are telling you, you're not getting jobs because of Somalians. You're not getting jobs because of Mexicans. You're not getting jobs because people are coming from India and they're getting H-1B visas. I understand. I understand. That's what you hear on your feeds. That's what you see on your feeds all the time.  That's simply not the case. The problem right now is, especially right now over the past year to 18 months, you're not getting jobs out of college right now,  because as Jim VandeHei and Axios has [sic, have] reported, and other people have reported, CEOs are frozen. They're saying, we're not going to fire people. But with this AI technology, we don't have to hire anybody new. And we can just get rid of our workforce by attrition. That's what they're thinking right now.  So you blame the Somali eight states over from you. If that makes you feel better, that's not going to fix anything. And it's really bigoted.  So you should actually look what the real problem is. And understand, you have people in Washington, D.C. that will not stand up to tech monopolists. They will not stand up to the billionaires that run this economy. They will not stand up to the very people who are going to get richer and richer on AI and leave you and your friends and your generation further and further behind. It's that simple.  I mean, listen, you can keep getting distracted by things they're trying to get you to distract on. Well, Washington keeps passing tax cuts and keeps passing laws and keeps refusing to do the things they knew, do, need to do to break up tech monopolies.  If you don't want to focus on that, if that's too hard for you to read about, I mean, it shouldn't be. You're in college, for God's sake. You know, then that's your problem. 

This Is PBS: Renee Good 'Killed,' Murdered National Guard Member Merely Shot
Favicon 
www.newsbusters.org

This Is PBS: Renee Good 'Killed,' Murdered National Guard Member Merely Shot

Intentionally or not, the PBS News Hour exhibited a liberal double standard in descriptions in a story by Liz Landers from Minneapolis, where residents are apparently being persecuted under ICE. A long 13-minute Thursday segment, which was capped with two guests, one from the Trump administration and one from the Obama administration, twice underlined that anti-ICE protester Renee Good was killed by an ICE agent in Minneapolis, but the November murder of another federal law officer in Washington, D.C. was downgraded to a mere “shooting.”  The story did lead with a strong statement from Vice President J.D. Vance from on the ground in Minneapolis. PBS News Hour co-anchor Amna Nawaz: Vice President J.D. Vance was in Minneapolis today, as federal agents continue to clash with protesters two weeks after an ICE agent shot and killed 37-year-old mother Renee Good. Vance had this message for city residents: Vice President J.D. Vance: Do we want these things to happen? Do we want these arrests to be so chaotic? No, we don't. These guys want it least of all. But if we had a little cooperation from local and federal -- or -- excuse me -- from local and state officials, I think the chaos would go way down in this community. The inconsistent labeling came in standard liberal criticism of Trump’s move to cut both legal and illegal immigration. While Renee Good was “killed,” the two members of the National Guard targeted for assassination by an Afghan national were merely shot, even though one of them, Sarah Beckstrom, died a day later from her injuries. Landers: In total, more than 8,000 student visas revoked in the past year, the State Department says. The Trump administration has also moved to narrow pathways for legal immigration, using executive orders to institute travel bans in June, revoke humanitarian programs that shielded migrants from deportation and cut refugee admissions to record lows. The shooting of the two National Guardspeople in the nation's capital in November prompted a further tightening of visas. Also this year, the administration began a controversial rollout of deportation operations in major sanctuary cities across the country, with agents often masked arresting immigrants at workplaces, courthouses, even Home Depot parking lots. In June, fiery protests in Los Angeles caused President Trump to send in National Guard troops. Later, Landers also emphasized an ICE officer had killed “unarmed woman” Renee Good. Landers: In the aftermath of the killing of an unarmed woman, Renee Good, by an ICE officer in Minneapolis, protests flared again…. A transcript is available, click "Expand. PBS News Hour 1/22/26 7:19:25 p.m. (ET) Amna Nawaz: Vice President J.D. Vance was in Minneapolis today, as federal agents continue to clash with protesters two weeks after an ICE agent shot and killed 37-year-old mother Renee Good. Vance had this message for city residents: Vice President J.D. Vance: Do we want these things to happen? Do we want these arrests to be so chaotic? No, we don't. These guys want it least of all. But if we had a little cooperation from local and federal -- or -- excuse me -- from local and state officials, I think the chaos would go way down in this community. Amna Nawaz: This is just the latest development in what's been a turbulent year as President Trump has carried out his campaign promise to crack down on illegal immigration. Liz Landers takes a closer look. President Donald Trump: First, I will declare a national emergency at our southern border. (Applause) Liz Landers: President Donald Trump wasted no time following through on his campaign promise to crack down on immigration, signing executive orders his first day in office designed to expedite removal and reinterpret the Citizenship Clause of the Constitution. Border crossings began to drop soon after and are down dramatically year to date, a 93 percent reduction, according to the Department of Homeland Security. The agency estimates 1.9 million self-deportations and 622,000 deportations have taken place in the last year. President Donald Trump: This was an invasion. This wasn't people coming in. This was an invasion of our country. Liz Landers: But the administration quickly ran into legal challenges with some deportation measures when it deported more than 200 Venezuelan men to a notorious Salvadoran prison. President Donald Trump: These were bad people. That was a bad group of, as I say, hombres. Liz Landers: The president invoking the little used Alien Enemies Act of 1798, claiming the men were part of the Venezuelan gang Tren de Aragua, among them Kilmar Abrego Garcia, a Maryland man with no criminal record, deported despite a court order barring his removal. Abrego Garcia was eventually returned to the U.S. and is now challenging efforts to deport him to a third country. A ruling is expected next month. The arrest of Mahmoud Khalil, a Columbia University graduate student and pro-Palestinian activist, signaled a crackdown on international student visas in early March. Secretary of State Marco Rubio: We gave you a visa to come and study and get a degree, not to become a social activist that tears up our university campuses. Liz Landers: In total, more than 8,000 student visas revoked in the past year, the State Department says. The Trump administration has also moved to narrow pathways for legal immigration, using executive orders to institute travel bans in June, revoke humanitarian programs that shielded migrants from deportation and cut refugee admissions to record lows. The shooting of the two National Guardspeople in the nation's capital in November prompted a further tightening of visas. Also this year, the administration began a controversial rollout of deportation operations in major sanctuary cities across the country, with agents often masked arresting immigrants at workplaces, courthouses, even Home Depot parking lots. In June, fiery protests in Los Angeles caused President Trump to send in National Guard troops. President Donald Trump: These are paid insurrectionists. These are paid troublemakers. Liz Landers: Prompting the president to float the idea of using the Insurrection Act, which would allow the president to use the military in a domestic setting. It's a threat he's continued to make into the new year. Kristi Noem, U.S. Homeland Security Secretary: We did discuss the Insurrection Act. He certainly has the constitutional authority to utilize that. Liz Landers: Those targeted operations spread nationwide to Chicago, Charlotte, New Orleans, and, just this week, Maine, all this bolstered by a surge in funding after the president's signature tax and spending bill passed in the summer, tripling the annual budget for ICE. The administration faced significant legal pushback in Chicago, when a federal judge there determined Customs and Border Patrol official Greg Bovino was overstepping his authority in handling protesters. Gregory Bovino, Border Patrol Commander: The use of force that I have seen has been exemplary, and, by exemplary, I would say, the least amount of force necessary to accomplish the mission. Liz Landers: In the aftermath of the killing of an unarmed woman, Renee Good, by an ICE officer in Minneapolis, protests flared again. White House Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller with this message to ICE officers: Stephen Miller, White House Deputy Chief of Staff: You have federal immunity in the conduct of your duties, and anybody who lays a hand on you or tries to stop you or tries to obstruct you is committing a felony. Liz Landers: But Democrats are hoping to use the latest incidents to reduce funding or force changes to immigration enforcement if they do well in the midterm elections.  

CNN Drags In Niece Mary Trump to Diagnose President as 'Psychiatrically Disordered'
Favicon 
www.newsbusters.org

CNN Drags In Niece Mary Trump to Diagnose President as 'Psychiatrically Disordered'

During a signing ceremony on Thursday in Davos, Switzerland, involving the newly created Board of Peace, President Trump revealed a bruise on his left hand, which the White House later told Fox News, was due to his hitting his hand on the table. Later, Trump himself further attributed the bruise to the daily aspirins he's been taking. This whole non-story served as another excuse for the left wing media to go after Trump's health, and for that task, CNN's Erin Burnett turned to the President's niece Mary Trump on OutFront. After showing the bruise, and playing a clip of the President's explanation, and quoting Dr. Jonathan Reiner, who advised the White House Medical Unit under President George H.W. Bush -- saying the public has a right to know about Trump's health -- Burnett introduced her Trump hitwoman -- the president's bitter niece Mary, a clinical psychologist who has declared him unfit for years, seemingly hour on the hour.  BURNETT:.. Trump's estranged niece, Mary Trump, is writing about Trump's mental fitness. She writes, 'We do not need any more proof that Donald is a deeply psychiatrically, disordered man, but if we did, more evidence can be found every day in his outbursts, his hypersomnia, his alarming lack of impulse control, and his increasingly obvious deviance and corruption..". How did Burnett she find someone so impartial? So would she press her guest on her accusations? Ha!  BURNETT: .. So you grew up with him and now you happen to be a clinical psychologist. And I know, you know, you're not here diagnosing, I'm just mentioning that you have that background as well. So what are you noticing now that makes you feel that something has changed? MARY TRUMP: It's not so much that things have changed qualitatively, it's just that they seem to be rapidly getting worse. I think that Donald has had undiagnosed, untreated psychiatric disorders for many, many years, predating his first administration. But given his advancing age, clearly there seems to be some indications that he has some cognitive issues. Hence all of the cognitive tests he's taking, and the MRI's we've heard about, but I have no specific information about. And just his behavior, the way he speaks, his inability to rein himself in, his inability to stay on topic. And oftentimes it seems that he's not exactly aware of where he is or the audience he's speaking to. Wait, I thought she wasn't diagnosing. I thought this was about the bruise on Trump's hand. It did present another opportunity for Burnett to follow-up and ask, can you be more specific in your accusations? Instead she asked her about his wanting to win the Nobel Prize, and his bringing up running for another term. Mary Trump pooh-poohed that and continued with the real purpose of this interview. MARY TRUMP: The fact of the matter is, as I said, he's a lame duck president, and he is causing untold harm to this country. And I think at this point, we need to start focusing on our attention, on the people who are allowing that to happen, the enablers. And I think this is one of the biggest problems we're seeing on the world stage. We look at Donald and we we talk about his unfitness, his psychological issues, his perhaps neurological decline, his cognitive decline. But other world leaders look at the United States as the problem. We have almost 78 million people put him back into office. We have an entire party dedicated to keeping him in power and enabling him, as well as a corrupt, illegitimate supermajority of the Supreme Court that is giving him imperial power. That is what the world sees. This interview was nothing more than a platform for Mary Trump to bash her uncle, while both host and guest used the bruise on President Trump's hand as a means to an end.  PS: Erin Burnett did not focus on Biden's mental decline when she interviewed him in May of 2024. It was a "tongue bath." Her show could have boasted the titled OutFawned. 

Nets Skip March For Life, Continue Promoting Anti-ICE Protests
Favicon 
www.newsbusters.org

Nets Skip March For Life, Continue Promoting Anti-ICE Protests

On Friday, prominent politicians and religious leaders joined thousands of people gathered in the cold as they marched for the most basic of civil rights. However, for the Friday evening and Saturday morning news shows on ABC, CBS, and NBC, the 53rd annual March for Life in Washington might as well have not even happened, as they devoted no time to it. Instead, they continued to hype anti-ICE protests in Minnesota. Continuing with the Friday theme of tying the protests in with the case of 5-year-old Liam Ramos, who was taken by ICE after he was abandoned by his father and not claimed by his mother despite ICE's promises she would not be taken into custody, CBS Saturday Morning co-anchor Adriana Diaz introduced reporter Nicole Sganga, “Tensions are rising in Minnesota after ICE agents detained a five-year-old boy in Minneapolis on Tuesday. We're told he's being held with his father, but this image of Liam Ramos and his Spider-Man backpack surrounded by ICE agents around his home has people asking a lot of questions. The family’s lawyer and school say the boy was used by ICE as quote “bait,” but the Department of Homeland Security calls that “a horrific smear.” Nicole Sganga is in Minneapolis with more.” Sganga began her report by highlighting how, “Thousands braved subfreezing temperature in the Twin Cities to protest ICE with businesses declaring Blackout Friday. Dozens of clergy were arrested in demonstrations outside of Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport.”   The networks continued to hype anti-ICE protests in Minnesota on Saturday, but all continued to act as if the March for Life didn't happen. pic.twitter.com/FbfvargJFE — Alex Christy (@alexchristy17) January 24, 2026   As the media loves to cite religious leaders, including Catholic cardinals, to go after the Trump administration, Pope Leo’s address to the March for Life was considered far less interesting even though Trump sent in a video message and Vice President JD Vance addressed the crowd in person. Back on NBC, Today co-anchor Laura Jarrett hyped another development coming out of Minnesota, “But we’re going to turn now to some other breaking news out of Minnesota, where those protests have raged for weeks after the fatal shooting of a woman who was protesting ICE raids there. Now an FBI agent involved in the investigation into that shooting has stepped down. NBC's Camila Bernal is in Minneapolis with the very latest. Camila, good morning.” After reporting how this FBI agent didn’t approve of the investigation being “focused more on Renee Good and her partner and their actions instead of the officer in this case,” Bernal turned to the protests, “This as the largest protest since this shooting took place in the city with thousands of people out in freezing temperatures. And their message is they want ICE out of this city. They do not want to see detention of people in their neighborhoods and especially not the detention of children. One of the school districts in this area said at least four children were detained this week. Here's some reaction from one of the protesters.” The protestor was then shown wondering, “What is wrong with you? That you would do that to a child?...It just fills me with sadness for the children, for the families.” NBC not covering the March for Life while covering left-wing alternatives is not new. In 2024, they skipped the pro-lifers in order to cover pro-abortion high school activists. Meanwhile, over on ABC’s Good Morning America, co-host Whit Johnson was more matter-of-fact, “We do move on now to Minneapolis, a massive anti-ICE protest in subfreezing conditions. Thousands of people filling the streets in what organizers called a no work, no school, no shopping blackout. Hundreds of businesses closing for the day and some museums also shutting their doors, the action coming two weeks after an ICE agent shot and killed Renee Good in her car in Minneapolis.” Due to the weather or pre-scheduled teacher workdays, several Minnesota schools were already closed, but when you decide to cover one side’s protest but not the other, such details tend to just get in the way. Here are transcripts for the January 24 shows: ABC Good Morning America 1/24/2026 7:11 AM ET WHIT JOHNSON: We do move on now to Minneapolis, a massive anti-ICE protest in subfreezing conditions. Thousands of people filling the streets in what organizers called a no work, no school, no shopping blackout. Hundreds of businesses closing for the day and some museums also shutting their doors, the action coming two weeks after an ICE agent shot and killed Renee Good in her car in Minneapolis. *** CBS Saturday Morning 1/24/2026 8:21 AM ET ADRIANA DIAZ: Tensions are rising in Minnesota after ICE agents detained a five-year-old boy in Minneapolis on Tuesday. We're told he's being held with his father, but this image of Liam Ramos and his Spider-Man backpack surrounded by ICE agents around his home has people asking a lot of questions. The family’s lawyer and school say the boy was used by ICE as quote “bait,” but the Department of Homeland Security calls that “a horrific smear.” Nicole Sganga is in Minneapolis with more. NICOLE SGANGA: Thousands braved subfreezing temperature in the Twin Cities to protest ICE with businesses declaring Blackout Friday. Dozens of clergy were arrested in demonstrations outside of Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport. *** NBC Today 1/24/2026 7:13 AM ET LAURA JARRETT: But we’re going to turn now to some other breaking news out of Minnesota, where those protests have raged for weeks after the fatal shooting of a woman who was protesting ICE raids there. Now an FBI agent involved in the investigation into that shooting has stepped down. NBC's Camila Bernal is in Minneapolis with the very latest. Camila, good morning. CAMILA BERNAL: Hey, Laura, good morning. So, we now know this FBI agent was a supervisor here in the Minneapolis office and resigned because this investigation was focused more on Renee Good and her partner and their actions instead of the officer in this case. This as the largest protest since this shooting took place in the city with thousands of people out in freezing temperatures. And their message is they want ICE out of this city. They do not want to see detention of people in their neighborhoods and especially not the detention of children. One of the school districts in this area said at least four children were detained this week. Here's some reaction from one of the protesters. PROTESTOR: What is wrong with you? That you would do that to a child? [jump cut] It just fills me with sadness for the children, for the families.