Fox News continued their long tradition of extremely awful anti-immigration coverage on Tuesday. And by “coverage,” I mean having reporter Griff Jenkins literally spring out of the bushes like a generic white guy jack-in-the-box in order to “foil” (his words) undocumented migrants attempting to cross the Rio Grande into the United States.
The segment, filmed on Monday but which aired early Tuesday morning, was ostensibly an attempt by Fox & Friends to capitalize on and contribute to the right-wing hysteria around the Central American caravan of asylum seekers headed toward the United States through Mexico. But since the actual caravan is currently a thousand miles away from the U.S.-Mexico border, Fox News’ Griff Jenkins was left to crouch behind some foliage alongside banks of the Rio Grande, before leaping out at a family paddling ashore in an inflatable raft, and yelling “Excuse me, sir, were you trying to cross into America illegally??”
The segment, helpfully titled “Griff Foils Illegals’ Attempt To Cross Border” by the brain trust over at Fox, marks a dangerous escalation in Jenkins’ on-site work from earlier in the week, wherein he simply tagged along like an eager puppy while the Border Patrol arrested people who were trying to cross the border.
Fox News sending its most morally unaffected employees to stand along the U.S.-Mexico border and shout “busted” at the slightest sign of movement isn’t just obnoxious or unethical, it’s actively dangerous for both Jenkins and people who already face an incredible amount of danger just trying to get themselves and their families into the United States. Don’t expect Fox to start caring about that anytime soon, though.