New reporting has some calling for President Trump to be sent to the Hague for crimes against humanity.
An investigation by the journalists at Reveal details how immigrant children in U.S. custody are separated from their parents by government contractors and forcibly injected with powerful psychiatric drugs. It is horrific and truly inexcusable, which is why commentators are getting even more furious at Trump. But that anger is misdirected.
The practice did not begin under the watch of the Trump administration, and there is no evidence whatsoever that Trump had anything to do with it. Readers won’t realize that from reading the story though, which may be why liberal activists have rushed to blame Trump for the horrific acts that happened under President Obama.
Journalists Matt Smith and Aura Bogado do an excellent job detailing the abuse that occurred at Shiloh Treatment Center, a government contractor just south of Houston. It was a nightmare for immigrant children separated from their parents. Staff forced kids to choke down a cocktail of psychiatric medications, and if they refused or acted out, staff would pin them down and inject them with medication.
According to a lawsuit, which makes up the basis of the report, children at the Shiloh Treatment Center were forced into a medically induced and dangerous stupor. One was prescribed antipsychotic drugs and seizure meds while also being forced to stomach antidepressants, cognition enhancers, and nerve pain medication. Another was so drowsy, she fell down and hit her head so often she had to be put in a wheelchair.
The reporting is detailed and horrific, but the story creates a fake villain. The first words of the piece are “President Donald Trump.” The article blames Trump and his current zero tolerance policy on immigration for creating “a zombie army of children.” That is misleading at best.
Three of the four children cited in the report were drugged during the Obama administration. According to federal court filings, only one occurred while Trump was actually president. The other three happened in 2016. That timing is left out of the story, which, after opening with Trump’s policies, never mentions the years of the specific incidents of mistreatment.
The writers do mention that Shiloh’s contract and its problems predate Trump, though, reporting that Rep Sheila Jackson Lee, D-Texas, started calling for the Shiloh Center to be closed as early as 2014.
Still, the reader is left to believe that the drugging occurred under Trump. In fact, the story that begins with Trump’s name never mentions Obama’s. They sully otherwise excellent reporting with partisan bias. Searching for a hook, presumably, they pin the blame on the current president instead. Sensational and viral, it’s created plenty of outrage.
Rodger Hodge, deputy editor of the Intercept, quips that its “Trumpian child care.”
Trumpian child care: inject immigrant children with psychotropic drugs to make them settle down and stop crying. This was before zero tolerance. https://t.co/BZFE2sVZZA
— Roger D. Hodge (@RogerDHodge) June 20, 2018
Amy Siskind, president of the liberal New Agenda, demands accountability:
The stories of mistreatment by random contractors awarded $$$ and migrants from the Trump regime is just starting to come out. They must be held accountable!
“Children held at the Shiloh Treatment Center described being held down and injected.” https://t.co/yaCD9GnSdF— Amy Siskind (@Amy_Siskind) June 20, 2018
Who could blame either of them? The Reveal story makes the blood boil by pointing out a legitimate and horrific problem. It just doesn’t tell the entire truth, and unfortunately that’s becoming a trend. Even the Associated Press is making questionable editorial decisions to get the clicks.
An AP report details allegations of similar treatment of immigrant teenagers at a Virginia center. The children were thrown naked into solitary confinement. The children were handcuffed and beaten. The children were strapped to chairs and choked with plastic bags.
Pointing out that the youngest was just 14 years old, Kelly Weill of the Daily Beast correctly called it “Abu Ghraib” for eighth graders. Of course, Weill and the thousands who retweeted her did not mention when the alleged abuse occurred. Turns out that happened under the last administration’s watch in 2015 and 2016. And again, Obama wasn’t mentioned .
It was up to readers who actually finished the entire piece to point out these facts:
21
That’s the number of paragraphs you have to read into this story before being informed this was the Obama-era (2015-2016).
7
That’s the number of times Trump is mentioned.
0
That’s the number of times Obama is mentioned. https://t.co/B4L7ArBEjk
— Lyndsey Fifield (@lyndseyfifield) June 21, 2018
None of this should be used to malign or acquit either Obama or Trump. Obama’s administration doing something bad excuses neither (a) Trump’s doing the same bad thing, nor (b) his doing new bad things such as the recent practice of family separation.
Reporters should remember that when filing their stories, because while it is heroic to expose evil and report wrongdoing, it is opportunism to use the suffering of children to level partisan attacks.
