{"id":22861,"date":"2020-04-22T15:42:46","date_gmt":"2020-04-22T19:42:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.immigrationreform.com\/?p=22861"},"modified":"2020-04-22T15:42:49","modified_gmt":"2020-04-22T19:42:49","slug":"coronavirus-media-bias-border-security-immigrationreform-com","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.immigrationreform.com\/2020\/04\/22\/coronavirus-media-bias-border-security-immigrationreform-com\/","title":{"rendered":"The COVID-19 Immigration Moratorium: Reasonable Not Racist"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

The Washington Post<\/a><\/em> has published an article attacking President Trump\u2019s recently announced a temporary COVID-19 immigration <\/a>halt as \u201cracist,\u201c \u201cnativist\u201d and \u201cxenophobic.\u201d According to the post, \u201cimmigration is not a vector for the spread of the coronavirus, which is already circulating within the country.\u201d Therefore, the \u201cimmigration suspension has nothing to do with coronavirus.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

If Carly Goodman,\nthe author of the Post<\/em> article,\nreally believes this, she is either engaging in self-delusion worthy of Don\nQuixote or a brand of semantic hair-splitting formerly associated with\nStalinist Russia.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The first person who transmits a disease of public health<\/a> significance to a new cohort of individuals is known as the \u201cindex patient.\u201d It has been widely reported<\/a> that the index patient<\/a> for the United States is a 35-year-old man from Washington State, who apparently became infected after traveling to Wuhan, China.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What has not been\nmentioned in the news coverage is any information about the man\u2019s immigration\nstatus. And most commentary on immigration-related measures to halt the spread\nof COVID-19 suggests that because the index patient may<\/em> have been a U.S. citizen, immigration is totally irrelevant to\nthe spread of the coronavirus epidemic.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But that\u2019s\nabsurd. Whether the index patient was an immigrant<\/em>\n(i.e.<\/em>, a foreign national who has taken\nup residence in the United States) or a native-born American has absolutely\nnothing to do with whether COVID-19 is transmitted through migration<\/em> (the movement of any person from one geographic location\nto another). <\/p>\n\n\n\n

It is\nlong-established, scientific fact that this, and other viruses spread through\nhuman contact. It is also undeniably true that a traveler contracted this\nparticular virus in Wuhan, China and unwittingly served as a host who\ntransported the disease to the United States. \n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There is nothing\neither shocking or racist in such assertions. We have known for at least a\ncentury that many viruses are transmitted by living hosts, either people or\nanimals. And nobody has suggested that this virus is evidence that people of\nAsian ancestry are somehow inferior to Caucasians. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

But, unable to\ndeny the hard science, Ms. Goodman, reverts to unsubstantiated accusations of\n\u201cracism.\u201d This is a standard tactic of the open borders contingent. And, as\nChristopher Caldwell of the Spectator<\/em>\nnotes, \u201cIt conveys absolutely nothing but aggressively enough so as to cow\nothers into swallowing any inclination to stand up and disagree with you. \u201c<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The problem with that approach is that it permits those employing it to sidestep inconvenient truths. In this case: the fact that this virus originated in China and that the Chinese government tried to cover it up. Politico<\/a><\/em>, hardly a bastion of conservative nationalism, referred to the Chinese authorities\u2019 actions as a \u201cbiological chernobyl.\u201d Thus, it would appear that American criticism of China hasn\u2019t been a display of xenophobia but a legitimate observation that Chinese government behaved abominably in responding to this crisis.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And, for the record: Criticism of poor sanitary practices in so-called \u201cwet markets\u201d are scientifically based, not racially motivated. Upton Sinclair published The Jungle<\/a><\/em>, an expose on the American meat packing business, in 1906. The book was translated into at least 17 languages and became a worldwide best seller. Since that time, most people have understood that a healthy food supply chain requires hygienic processing procedures. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

And it now seems\nthat attributing the transmission of COVID-19 to the slaughter of bats in a wet\nmarket originated with the Chinese government (not \u201cracist\u201d Westerners), in\norder to hide the fact that the virus seems to have escaped from a virology lab\nwhere scientists failed to observe proper safety measures.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So, rather than some sneaky move to advance a racist immigration agenda, President Trump\u2019s immigration moratorium appears to be exactly what he says it is \u2013 an effort to protect America\u2019s public health<\/a>. The first responsibility of America\u2019s president is to protect the people of the United States from all enemies, foreign or domestic, even when those enemies are microbes. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Washington Post has published an article attacking President Trump\u2019s recently announced a temporary COVID-19 immigration halt as \u201cracist,\u201c \u201cnativist\u201d and \u201cxenophobic.\u201d According to the post, \u201cimmigration is not a vector for the spread of the coronavirus, which is already circulating within the country.\u201d Therefore, the \u201cimmigration suspension has nothing to do with coronavirus.\u201d If<\/p>\n

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