Rep. Broun Baselessly Speculates That The Child Who Died From Swine Flu In The U.S. Was An ‘Illegal Alien’
Rep. Broun Baselessly Speculates That The Child Who Died From Swine Flu In The U.S. Was An ‘Illegal Alien’
Yesterday, Rep. Paul Broun (R-GA) was on C-SPAN’s Washington Journal and talked about the outbreak of the H1N1 virus. When discussing the first death in the United States from the disease, Broun used the tragedy to rail against “illegal aliens”:
Q: What do you think happens next here? Or should happen?
BROUN: Of course, it’s sad to see a 23-month-old child die from this disease. We don’t have any specifics. I tried to find out this morning specifics about this child that has died — whether it was someone who is from Mexico, possibly an illegal alien who has been brought into this country.
One big problem we have in this country is an open border. The border is like a sieve, and so these illegal aliens are coming across, and I think a lot of the health care facilities throughout Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, and California are going to be overwhelmed by cases coming out of Mexico — Mexican citizens — putting a further strain on those facilities. So, I don’t know if this child was a Mexican, or if it was an American child — what the situation is — but it was sad that this child died.
Watch it:
In fact, the child was a Mexican citizen whose family was visiting relatives in the United States. “The family had traveled to South Texas. The child became ill and they transported the child to Houston for medical care,” said a Houston health department official. This case had absolutely nothing to do with undocumented immigration. Most of the U.S. cases are arising in people who legally traveled to Mexico for various reasons.
Media Matters and CAP’s Eric Alterman have also documented right-wing media figures blaming Mexican immigrants for the spread of the virus. On April 24, hate radio host Michael Savage said, “Illegal aliens are the carriers of the new strain of human-swine avian flu from Mexico,” and on April 27, Neal Boortz asked, “[W]hat better way to sneak a virus into this country than give it to Mexicans?”
Transcript:
Q: What do you think happens next here? Or should happen?
BROUN: Of course, it’s sad to see a 23-month-old child die from this disease. We don’t have any specifics. I tried to find out this morning specifics about this child that has died — whether it was someone who is from Mexico, possibly an illegal alien who has been brought into this country.
One big problem we have in this country is an open border. The border is like a sieve, and so these illegal aliens are coming across, and I think a lot of the health care facilities throughout Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, and California are going to be overwhelmed by cases coming out of Mexico — Mexican citizens — putting a further strain on those facilities. So, I don’t know if this child was a Mexican, or if it was an American child — what the situation is — but it was sad that this child died.
Q: Looking over more Associated Press stories, I do not see right now where the child was from. But how should the government respond? What should they do next?
BROUN: I think we need to have very active screening of people that are coming to this country across the Mexican border. Right now what the border people are doing is — they’re just asking people if they’re sick. I think it’s just totally inane to do that.
We need to investigate, see if people have fevers and — we can do some non-invasive screening of individuals coming into this country. But again, the huge problem that we have is the open-border policy that the Bush administration, and now even worse with the Obama administration — of allowing illegal aliens across the border. We just cannot control the border, and we must secure the border.
Q: Why not just close the border?
BROUN: Well, I don’t think closing the border is going to help. It’s going to cause a tremendous economic interruption in America if we do that.
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In fact, the child was a Mexican citizen whose family was visiting relatives in the United States. “The family had traveled to South Texas.
– - Well in that case I guess we have no choice but to boot Texas out of the Unites States.
April 30th, 2009 at 5:58 pm- – Umm, United.
April 30th, 2009 at 5:58 pmI wonder if you now have to give up any semblance of humanity and/or a conscience to be in the Republican Party?
April 30th, 2009 at 6:00 pmraynman Says:
I wonder if you now have to give up any semblance of humanity and/or a conscience to be in the Republican Party?
Yes. The pro-dead-Mexican baby, pro-rape, pro-murder, pro-torture, pro-pandemic, pro-natural-disaster Republican Party.
April 30th, 2009 at 6:02 pmIt’s not like Republicans are bigots and fear mongers or anything like that…is it?
Fcuk the Republicans
April 30th, 2009 at 6:02 pmIt looks as if Rep. Broun is the latest to join the “Yacking on without any facts to make political points” wing of the GOP, right behind Rep. Bachmann.
April 30th, 2009 at 6:02 pmThese idiots would cite indigestion from a Mexican restaurant as grounds to close the borders.
Considering H1N1 is no more dangerous than the common strain of influenza, the republicans are, once again, tapping into the hysterics keg and gittin’ their buzz on…
..along with our excitable, idiotic media.
April 30th, 2009 at 6:07 pm“Yesterday, Rep. Paul Broun (R-GA) was on C-SPAN’s Washington Journal [...]”
Why does C-SPAN constantly let these EXTREME phucks from the reich only on the air?
C-SPAN has become Fox II. WTF?
April 30th, 2009 at 6:10 pmWouldn’t this be an example of the quality of the research done by him and his staff ?
April 30th, 2009 at 6:12 pmAs I live in a big cattle and pork production area, there is a strong move here to stop calling it Swine Flu (as the name improperly casts negative aspersions against pork which is perfectly safe to eat).
One of the suggestions is to call it H1N1 flu (yeah, right, like that is gonna happen).
The other is that it should be called Mexican Flu.
I wonder what could possibly go wrong by calling it Mexican Flu ????????
April 30th, 2009 at 6:15 pmI think more emphasis needs to be placed on the company (Smithfield) that is part owner of a pig farm operation in Mexico. Not enough light is being shed on the company that polluted the water supply in Mexico.
Granjas Carroll de Mexico, 50 per cent owned by Virginia-based Smithfield Foods, Inc., has eight farms in the area.
Smithfield spokeswoman Keira Ullrich said the company has found no clinical signs or symptoms of the presence of swine influenza in its swine herd or its employees working at its joint ventures anywhere in Mexico.
Residents say they have been bothered for years by the fetid smell of one the farms which lies upwind of the community and suspect their water and air has been contaminated by waste.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/worldnews/article-1174270/I-feel-great-says-year-old-Mexican-boy-living-near-ground-zero-pig-farm-hold-key-swine-flu-outbreak.html
April 30th, 2009 at 6:16 pm8. dixie blood Says: C-SPAN has become Fox II. WTF?
That was C-SPAN? And here I thought Comcast had started “The Bozo Channel.” All clowns, all the time.
As opposed to FOX: “The EinSci-Fi-Dry Channel…”
April 30th, 2009 at 6:17 pmI’m beginning to think that these sick freaks aren’t going to shut up until we have a real-live shooting war here at home.
April 30th, 2009 at 6:21 pmThere’s nothing easier than blaming poor, brown folk for just about any problem……if you’re a Rethuglican.
LOOK – ACORN caused the flu! Nope, it was “them Mexicans!”
April 30th, 2009 at 6:21 pmThe GOP is a borg machine. Whe it breaks it stops working altogether. Comforting thought isn’t it. Some goon like limba sends the wrong command to the drones and they stand waving their arms and repeating jibberish until they can be switched off. That’s no way to run a party and it’s never going to bwe a way to run a country again.
Torture is Extortion
April 30th, 2009 at 6:22 pmBROUN is a gonner. thanks TP!
April 30th, 2009 at 6:23 pmhttp://doihavepigflu.com/
;-)
April 30th, 2009 at 6:27 pmThey need to stop blaming this on the citizens of Mexico or illegal aliens when Smithfield, an American company, is the root cause for the illness and polution. Smithfield has been cited for poluting the Pagan River in Virginia! For dumping pig wastes etc. Fracking GOPers are such evil, lying sadists!
http://www.bayjournal.com/article.cfm?article=2082
April 30th, 2009 at 6:27 pm18.hormiga brava chavez Says: They need to stop blaming this on the citizens of Mexico or illegal aliens when Smithfield, an American company, is the root cause for the illness and polution.
No, rather it’s the idiots who spread unfounded rumors that cause all the confusion and panic. There’s no evidence where the strain originated so stop using a flu outbreak to pedal environmental issues that aren’t related.
Your article is from 1997, says nothing about the current swine flu, and while I’m no fan of industrial pig farms, I’m less a fan of hysterical propaganda.
Idiot.
April 30th, 2009 at 6:33 pmAll you need to know about today’s Republican Party is that Broun and Bachmann sit on the same side as the aisle that was once haunted by Tom DeLay and Newt Gingrich. More proof that the GOP have nothing for America.
April 30th, 2009 at 6:41 pmI saw a newspaper headline today in San Diego. it shouted out: Pandemic Imminent!!!
How is that for a little fear mongering? The MSM learned that we need fear and the threat of attack to continue to purchase their products. I call BS on the whole thing. To me it is a lot about ‘crying wolf’ too often.
April 30th, 2009 at 6:42 pmThat’s ‘peddle.’
The other point is that it gives environmentalists a black eye and detracts from their credibility by perpetuating rumors or assumed guilt.
April 30th, 2009 at 6:43 pmAnd the likes of Savage and Boortz are carriers for Teh Stoopid, which is much, much worse.
April 30th, 2009 at 6:45 pmhanshiro:
I do believe there is a connection whether it be in 1997 or 2009. Smithfield has been cited in Virginia before. I was just trying to make a point that there may be a connection. No need to be an a$$hole by calling me an idiot!
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/worldnews/article-1174270/I-feel-great-says-year-old-Mexican-boy-living-near-ground-zero-pig-farm-hold-key-swine-flu-outbreak.html
April 30th, 2009 at 6:46 pmThe people who should be looked at are those sitting on the board of Donald Rumsfeld’s corp. It hoolds the patent on Tamiflu and are making out like bandits just like in 2005 with the Avian flu. By the way has anyone heard the nasty rumor about Baxter International experimenting with this same strain in Europe years ago? It got loose and killed the lab workers and that part is true. Is this another urban Legend albeit from Europe?
April 30th, 2009 at 6:49 pmOh and by the way hanshiro, the link I pasted above was as of TODAY April 30, 2009.
April 30th, 2009 at 6:50 pmI think the right wing is just PO’d that there’s a disease named after them.
April 30th, 2009 at 6:50 pmElBruce Says:
I think the right wing is just PO’d that there’s a disease named after them.
lol
April 30th, 2009 at 6:52 pmThis is just ridiculous…I guess I shouldn’t be as angry because by now I should be used to their rhetoric.
At the same time, the fact that they continue to spread their hatred and racism makes me oppose anyone who’s apathetic.
It’s nothing new that a right-winger is blaming Mexicans, or immigrants, but nobody should be just used to it.
Keep up the good work TP.
April 30th, 2009 at 6:57 pmRep. Braun is way off base. He needs to lay blame on companies that move their operations to Mexico because they’re trying to bypass sanitation laws in America.
April 30th, 2009 at 7:00 pmlinkwray Says:
The people who should be looked at are those sitting on the board of Donald Rumsfeld’s corp. It hoolds the patent on Tamiflu and are making out like bandits just like in 2005 with the Avian flu.
A teenaged girl in NYC reported that the flu made her so nauseous that she just threw up the tamiflu pill they gave her. She started getting better a couple of days later (without taking any more tamiflu).
April 30th, 2009 at 7:00 pmPlus, of course, it never occurs to the moronic Rheichwhiners that modern medical science enabled us to identify the problem and “over react” in the first place. They’ll just keep on with their “we don’t need no atheists teachin’ our kids about evilution“.
April 30th, 2009 at 7:01 pmA friend sent me this which is relevant to swine flu and border states:
http://newspapertree.com/opinion/3738-swine-flu-border-security-and-public-priorities
April 30th, 2009 at 7:02 pm24. hormiga brava chavez Says: I do believe there is a connection whether it be in 1997 or 2009. Smithfield has been cited in Virginia before. I was just trying to make a point that there may be a connection. No need to be an a$$hole by calling me an idiot!
Okay, I fully believe you’re an idiot. My belief carries all the evidentiary weight that yours does. More, in fact since there is more causation for my conclusion than yours.
26. hormiga brava chavez Says: Oh and by the way hanshiro, the link I pasted above was as of TODAY April 30, 2009.
Your Bay Journal article from #18 says clearly September 1997.
Idiot.
April 30th, 2009 at 7:03 pmThe baby who died was an illegal alien? Oh, well, then, it’s no big deal, is it, Broun? You sick shit. These reichwing hemmorhoids are getting more and more disgusting by the day. These spewings need to be broadcast loudly over every media outlet, until enough citizens get outraged enough to ride them out of town on a rail. Tar and feathers would look real good on them. Make ‘em all resemble the flock of chickenshits that they are.
April 30th, 2009 at 7:06 pmYou can tell a Georgia Republicans IQ by measuring how deep a peach cobbler pan is and dividing it by the stars and bars.
April 30th, 2009 at 7:06 pmWhile there is an internet trail and the incidences surrounding La Gloria, the evidence is still inconclusive. Just because you want to believe it doesn’t make it true.
Don’t look foolish by spreading stories that haven’t been nailed down yet.
And they haven’t been. Q.E.D.
April 30th, 2009 at 7:08 pmIf it had been a fetus that died from swine flu, the Reps would have been just devastated. Since it was an actual born child, and a Mexican to boot, no big deal.
April 30th, 2009 at 7:14 pmrepugs are proof that Briton did get rid of their undesirables.
April 30th, 2009 at 7:16 pmhanshiro, your entitled to your opinion. I don’t care if you don’t agree. My point is that it’s interesting that the same company fined millions for dumping pig waste in the Pagan River in VA during 1997 is suspected of causing the infection of swine flu in Mexico in 2009. I believe the residents of La Gloria. Money buys silence.
April 30th, 2009 at 7:19 pm24.hormiga brava chavez Says: I do believe there is a connection whether it be in 1997 or 2009.
That’s not, in fact what you said, you stated it as a fact:
18. hormiga brava chavez Says: They need to stop blaming this on the citizens of Mexico or illegal aliens when Smithfield, an American company, is the root cause for the illness and polution.
That’s what makes you an idiot. You’re stating something as fact that isn’t supported by any documentation you’ve presented. While it may turn out to be true eventually, claiming it as proven is irresponsible.
April 30th, 2009 at 7:22 pmThank God that stupidity isn’t contagious.
April 30th, 2009 at 7:24 pmYou really just have to sit back and marvel at the abject cruelty and bigotry that permeates the mentality of the right-wingers. From them we get nothing approaching constructive input to the conversation of how to deal with this public health issue in a sane, rational and fair manner. Instead, their vile rantings give the overt impression that if they had their way they’d drop a few nukes on Mexico’s major cities, incinerating all and voila! – two problems solved — no more virus, no more wetbacks. There is something terribly, nauseatingly wrong with these people.
Just saying . . .
April 30th, 2009 at 7:30 pmWell hanshiro, I’m not an idiot. Excuse me everyone for not being more specific when making my point – I SUSPECT THAT SMITHFIELD’S PIG FARM HAS CAUSED PEOPLE TO BECOME SICK WITH SWINE FLU. I SUSPECT THIS BECAUSE THEY WERE BUSTED AND FINED FOR DUMPING PIG WASTE IN 1997.
How’s that?
April 30th, 2009 at 7:32 pmIf I were a thinking teabagging repug I would find a correlation between teabaggers teabagging and swine flu.
It makes just as much sense.
teabaggers, do you ever think things out? Ever?
Is being stupid that pleasurable/comfortable?
Stupid is like meth and sex to you teabaggers.
April 30th, 2009 at 7:34 pm45. hormiga brava chavez Says: How’s that?
Better, and more accurate. Best check that stuck capslock though; it doesn’t give any added weight to your claim…
April 30th, 2009 at 7:38 pmWhat I’m getting from Broun’s last statement is an admission that while Repubs scream and rile up the base over immigration, they don’t really want to do anything about it for economic reasons. That should come as quite a suprise to their base.
April 30th, 2009 at 7:40 pmThe ignorant own and operate the republican party.
April 30th, 2009 at 7:48 pmBring on comprehensive immigration efforts! The GOP will hang themselves for sure!
April 30th, 2009 at 8:00 pm“This Child” is obviously an Alien/Human hybrid!
April 30th, 2009 at 8:17 pmAs a followup, hormiga brava chavez, here’s some information I ran across early on (via boingboing.net), including the Grist theory of the pig-farm flu origin:
April 30th, 2009 at 8:20 pm
There’s no evidence where the strain originated so stop using a flu outbreak to pedal environmental issues that aren’t related.
I read somewhere that they think they found the original carrier. I’ll try find where I read that.
April 30th, 2009 at 8:22 pmI found the article.
April 30th, 2009 at 8:25 pmThen there’s this:
There’s a host of information out there and, unfortunately, not always concurring with factual data. This needs to be collated and presented from a strictly scientific viewpoint.
April 30th, 2009 at 9:11 pmThe comment I made in an earlier post re: Rep. Broun applies here as well:
You really just have to sit back and marvel at the abject cruelty and bigotry that permeates the mentality of the right-wingers. From them we get nothing approaching constructive input to the conversation of how to deal with this public health issue in a sane, rational and fair manner. Instead, their vile rantings give the overt impression that if they had their way they’d drop a few nukes on Mexico’s major cities, incinerating all and voila! – two problems solved — no more virus, no more wetbacks. There is something terribly, nauseatingly wrong with these people.
Just saying . . .
April 30th, 2009 at 10:43 pmhormiga brava chavez Says:
I SUSPECT THAT SMITHFIELD’S PIG FARM HAS CAUSED PEOPLE TO BECOME SICK WITH SWINE FLU. I SUSPECT THIS BECAUSE THEY WERE BUSTED AND FINED FOR DUMPING PIG WASTE IN 1997.
Lots of companies have been fined for that. I recall an anecdote about a giant pig-shit fountain in Nebraska that gives off fountain plumes high into the air because of gases fermenting underneath.
This news item would be a great opportunity to shine a light at the multiple horrific practices involved in unsustainable, centralized factory farming. It has poor controls, is environmentally devastating, and is a major factor in the demise of the traditional family farm in the United States. However, to do that we’d have to fudge some facts, make others up, and try to draw a connection that just doesn’t exist. And when we start playing that way, we end up becoming Republicans. Sure, you can win for a while like that eventually then you end up in the position they’re in now, discredited and crazy.
So until we hear from the CDC about the origin (and does it really matter?) we’ll take a pass.
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May 2nd, 2009 at 12:50 amI think the pig lobby screamed so much they changed the name of that overblown swine flu. Give it a few days, the swine flu nonsense will blow over. The media will be on to a new scare tactic, hoping you that new scare tactic to drive up ratings, revenues and profits. Nothing really new here. Yawn.
May 2nd, 2009 at 2:27 pmkellykinsel Says:
“THIS IS WHERE THE IDIOTS LIBERALS ARE TOLD HOW TO THINK.”
“BUT WHAT CAN I EXPECT, ALL LIBERALS ARE TOO STUPID TO THINK FOR THEMSELVES”
Kellykinsel, I don’t think you should sit in the glass house that cheney and bush jr. built and throw rocks and insults at the people outside. It wasn’t the “idiot liberals” who invaded the wrong country after 9-11. It was your president bush jr. and his corporate sidekick DICK cheney.
As liberals, we do think for ourselves and opposed the war in Iraq even before the invasion. It was your heros: Karl Rove & Rush Limbaugh publicly stating that we were “traitors.” If your party had one intellectual rather than a bunch of sheep, maybe the worst strategic blunder in U.S. history and the deaths and injuries to thousands upon thousands upon thousands of American soldiers and innocent Iraqis could have been prevented.
You’re a just another Chickenhawk with no brain. There isn’t a dime bit of difference between and bush jr. If you thought he was wonderful, send your savings (or what’s left of it) to his library in Texas.
May 2nd, 2009 at 4:05 pmWell, kellykinsel, you sure told me! Read this very carefully.Post 6: For the record, even though I am a liberal, I am completely able to think for myself. Not everything that Obama does do I believe in. I don’t agree with the bank bailouts and I think they should stop. However, I don’t delude myself into thinking that Obama will stop them, even though they were started during the BUSH administration. I do, however, believe a bailout in the auto industry is necessary. Post 8: I personally am against abortion. Many lierals are. But I also think we need to take care of them when their born. I can remember a few years back when a 15 year old girl had the first baby of the new year, in my home city, the conservatives on the local stations were attacking this girl. The same ones condemned abortion. Also, don’t you find it just a bit odd that while we and many others are suffering a health crisis, we have to pussyfoot around with a Health and Human Services Secratary because she is pro-choice? Post 10: Everything you speak of here was inherited from George W Bush. But you and your friends keep going to the right and you will lose every election including 2012. Post 16: The Joe Biden clip was on every news network including the demon NBC. You would know that if your television wasn’t broke and only received the Fox News Channel. In conclusion kellykinsel I’m just curious about one of your Fearless Leaders from Fox, Is Hannity EVER going to be waterboarded?
May 3rd, 2009 at 1:38 pmpssstt I meant liberals
May 3rd, 2009 at 1:40 pm