EL PASO, Texas (Border Report) – Social media disinformation played a significant role in Vice President Harris’ November 5 defeat to Donald Trump, her campaign co-chair said on Thursday.
U.S. Rep. Veronica Escobar, D-Texas, said she witnessed widespread misconceptions as she campaigned for Harris in the battleground states of Arizona, Nevada, Georgia, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin this fall.
“One thing that was shocking to me was the amount of disinformation voters were sharing at the door or over the phone,” Escobar said. “I’m not talking about a difference of opinion about the economy, (but) factually inaccurate things like the January 6 insurrection was a Deep State, insider effort by the FBI or that crime was skyrocketing all over the country, […] believing the things like people were eating the dogs, eating the cats.”
The latter refers to Trump’s claim during a September 10 debate with Harris that Haitian immigrants in Ohio were eating dogs and other pets. The Associated Press and other national news outlets said local authorities had no credible reports of such events.
“What was clear to me was that a lot of voters are getting their information not from traditional news sources but they’re getting their information from TikTok, YouTube, through social media, Facebook, etc., where it’s a lot easier for disinformation and misinformation to spread,” Escobar told reporters during a post-election online briefing.“
She said the Democratic Party and its candidates must learn to fight such misinformation. However, she said that was not the lone culprit.
“That was alarming, but that doesn’t discount the fact that we have a lot of introspection to do as a party, the fact that working class and families in economically disadvantaged neighborhoods felt we were not delivering for them,” Harris’ campaign co-chair said.
The introspection – and some denial – has already started among ethnic and civil rights groups that always saw Trump as a threat.
In multiple teleconferences this week, the advocates for immigration, social services, the environment, and public schools said they would lobby sympathetic lawmakers to resist Trump and for President Biden to enact protection for their causes before he leaves office in January.
Border communities may lose funding, trade jobs
Along those lines, Escobar said she will forego leadership assignments for her party in the next Congress to be closer to an El Paso community, which she says will bear the brunt of Trump’s trickle-down economic agenda.
Escobar is co-chair of the Immigration Task Force of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus and of the Women’s Working Group on Immigration Reform. She is also a deputy whip for the Congressional Progressive Caucus.
“I want to focus on the community more. I think we will have a harrowing and difficult two years. We are going to be on the defensive almost, nearly, every day,” Escobar said. “The cuts that the Republicans on Capitol Hill are working on enacting will be painful to the community.”
Her main concerns are cuts to school funding for disadvantaged and special needs students, health spending, and funding for community programs. She is also worried about Trump making good on tariffs on imports that will make consumer products more expensive and jeopardize jobs in a border region that depends heavily on trade with Mexico.
Much like the social activists, Escobar urged undocumented migrants to seek legal assistance in case Trump makes good on a campaign promise of mass deportations.
“I think it’s going to be important for every family that is a mixed-status family or an undocumented family or even a family that has legal permanent residents; you have to have a plan. You have to connect with advocates and lawyers,” she said.
Escobar warned that a mass uprooting of productive migrants already in the workforce would cause a recession in the U.S., but she hopes that Trump will not be as extreme a president as he was a candidate.
“You never know. Maybe his people will change his mind. Maybe he will have a change of heart. Maybe it won’t be as draconian as he told his voters it would be. So, we gotta wait and see,” she said.
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