Ohio congressman Jim Jordan took news that appeared to demonstrate a successful and effective case of border agents protecting the US border — and twisted it up to stoke paranoia. The news?
Rep. Jordan excitedly describes it himself: “An illegal alien from IRAN that was flagged on the TERROR WATCH LIST was arrested during a human smuggling bust near the southern border last week.”
But wait, isn’t that good? That’s what people are asking on Twitter after Jordan added a little paranoid kicker to his tweet. The kicker asked provocatively: “Who aren’t the catching?”
Jordan is playing a professional game of “refute this” that no one can win, of course, with it being famously difficult to prove a negative, as the saying goes. The political technique also goes by the term: whataboutism? (As in: oh yeah? They caught him? What about the ones the didn’t catch?)
This thing where the GOP continually highlights how well CBP is doing their jobs and pretends like it’s a major problem is so, so played out https://t.co/QeyFSesjru
— Angry Staffer 🌻 (@Angry_Staffer) February 2, 2023
The case turned out to be not exactly as Jordan had described — maybe the man wasn’t on the terror watch list after all? But while Jordan may continue to get political mileage out of tweets like this with his base, the responses and comments were largely scornful.
Many citizens objected –“You’re using a win to create a false failure” — while some simply laughed at Jordan’s convoluted presentation of what they read as a clear win for the US, and by extension for Joe Biden.
“But he was stopped from coming in, so they did do their job. This is not quite the flex [Jordan] thinks it is,” chuckled one responder. “I love it when republicans brag on President Biden,” writes another.
Defense attorney Joe Morris had the best time, it seems, phrasing his response, using a nickname Biden has among MAGA people: “Way to go Brandon!! Grab up those bad guys.”
