WASHINGTON, D.C. — A familiar ecosystem of amateur detectives, conservative operatives and right-wing media churned out manufactured allegations and smears against peaceful protests against ICE’s brutality in Minnesota that congressional Republicans and administration officials used to justify politically motivated investigations into civil society organizations.
This MAGA slop machine spearheaded by organizations like the Capital Research Center (CRC) does not produce credible journalism or legitimate oversight—they exist to generate pretext, smear targets, and launder partisan attacks into government action, underscored by the Deputy Attorney General’s admission that the DOJ is now probing Minnesota civil society groups. To add to this suspicious chain of events, Capital Research Center publicly floated the possibility of Don Lemon’s arrest during a Tuesday episode of their podcast—and by Friday, he had been arrested by federal agents.
Right-Wing Media Manufactures Consent for ICE Deployments With Attacks on Civil Society
To defend the Trump’s administration’s extreme mass deportation agenda, ICE’s violence in Minnesota, and the federal government’s targeting of civil society organizations on the ground, right-wing media has used the same playbook they’ve turned to anytime the Trump administration commits violence against Americans: dehumanize victims, attack their families, and reframe legitimate grief and protest as part of a sinister conspiracy, all while promoting baseless claims about immigrant communities. In Minnesota, that has meant using half-baked claims about day care centers to defend ICE’s enforcement operations and Donald Trump’s targeting of a state that didn’t vote for him.
Capital Research Center Smears Victims to Justify Killings in Minnesota
In the aftermath of Alex Pretti’s killing, Sarah Lee, Capital Research Center’s Director of Communications and External Relations, called the statement from Pretti’s parents about their son’s death “deeply weird” and “a bit calculated from an ostensibly grieving family.” Lee also characterized Pretti, who was shot and killed by ICE agents, as a “very foolish man” who didn’t realize “he was expendable in service to the chaos being used to distract from the almost unimaginable fraud and corruption by state leaders and the Somali population in Minnesota.”
Lee also spent the week embracing conspiracy theories about “election fraud” in the state of Georgia and justifying the Department of Justice’s arrest of journalist Don Lemon.
###