Caitlin Dickerson

inflate the numbers and kind of claim victory and success before there's evidence to support it.

It really is all about messaging more than it is substance.

I mentioned they're claiming that 1.9 million people have self-deported.

Experts have looked into that number.

It seems to be based on

census report that was done with a very small sample size, not taking into account that it's not very likely immigrants are going to be fully forthright or even participate in any kind of a census count right now, given the environment of fear that we're in.

And so they extrapolated from this very small census and declared that 1.9 million people had left the country, which does not seem true.

So the administration said this operation in Minneapolis had to take place because of rampant fraud there.

And there is a longstanding federal investigation going on about COVID-19 relief funds and fraud in Minnesota.

But really, Trump seems to have latched onto this video that was posted online by Nick Shirley.

He's this young right-wing politician.

social media video influencer who went around Minneapolis to daycare sites claiming that they were fraudulent, that they had no children inside, when in fact, of course, a strange man who's showing up outside of a daycare videoing what's going on is probably not going to let that person inside to see children, if there are children there.

You probably don't want to let that guy in.

And we don't know.

You know, there is active investigation going on in Minnesota about legitimate fraud.

Exactly.

But the administration took it and ran with it and launched what they're calling the largest immigration enforcement operation in the country as a result of it.

There are so many things to talk about with sort of what's going wrong in Minnesota.

One thing to point out, though, is that fraud, again, even if it's happening, is a white-collar crime.

And so the idea that it deserves a response that involves weapons and officers in the street and stopping people at random...