Now We Know: Those 'Spontaneous' Anti-Trump Airport Protests Weren't Spontaneous At All Investor's Business Daily, Feb 3, 2017, John Merline
There was always something fishy about the outbreak of "spontaneous" protests at airports around the country in the immediate wake of President Trump's executive order pausing visas and refugees from terror-prone countries.
Not that you'd suspect anything from the way they were covered. Nearly every story published over that weekend stated without equivocation that the protests were an unplanned and visceral reaction to Trump's executive order. Examples:
"Spontaneous Protests Hit Airports Across America Following Trump's Executive Order"
"Protest Grows 'Out of Nowhere' at Kennedy Airport"
"The senseless cruelty of the executive order has led to spontaneous protests at many of America's major airports."
"Word of the spontaneous demonstration was spread across social media."
But these protests weren't spontaneous at all. They were, in fact, the result of months of careful planning by hard-core left-wing activist groups.
"News reports and TV broadcasts about the week's protests described the events as 'spontaneous protests' mounted in response to the Trump administration's travel and immigration executive order," author Asawin Suebsaeng writes at the liberal leaning Daily Beast. "But to Make the Road New York, and the groups like it across the country, there was nothing 'spontaneous' about it."
Suebsaeng notes that "professional organizers had been waiting and planning for this type of mass, direct action — ready-made to go viral on social media — even since, well Nov. 9." These professional organizers, he says have been "anticipating and mapping out their battle plans for Trump's orders on deportations, bans, and detention."
The executive director of the Arab American Action Network told Suebsaeng that "we had been laying the groundwork for this for a long, long time."
Since Trump had made clear that he planned — on day one, in fact — to issue a temporary ban on visas and refugees from terror prone countries, all these groups had to do was wait until he made good on that pledge to spring into action.
What's amazing isn't the planning or the execution of these protests, but the fact that the media acted as though it was all happening without any planning or coordination at all.
This was important because making the protests appear spontaneous gave them a sense of urgency and legitimacy they otherwise wouldn't have had.
Read more:
http://www.investors.com/politics/commentary/now-we-know-those-spontaneous-anti-trump-airport-protests-werent-spontaneous-at-all/
