


Fox News hosts Jesse Watters and Greg Guttfeld accused a colleague, Jessica Tarlov, of spending too much time speaking about deportations President Donald Trump has carried out under dubious pretenses, dismissing and joking about her due process concerns on Monday.
Last month, the Trump administration flew more than 200 Venezuelan men to a notoriously brutal prison in El Salvador under the Alien Enemies Act of 1798, accusing them of being members of the violent gang Tren de Aragua. Immigration officials reportedly use a checklist to determine whether an individual is a member of the gang; among the items on the list are tattoos of crowns.
“We now know of two separate cases of people who have tattoos that met that criteria. But it was just, for one of them, a crown that said ‘mom’ above it, and another one, another crown tattoo,” Tarlov said on “The Five.”
It is not clear precisely which individuals Tarlov was talking about. In a piece detailing how the migrants were mistreated upon arrival in El Salvador, Time magazine included quotes from one man who began sobbing when a guard pushed him to the floor.
“I’m not a gang member. I’m gay. I’m a barber,” the man said.
He was reportedly slapped as a guard shaved his head. The man’s sexuality is significant because members of the LGBTQ+ community can face greater odds of violence and persecution in El Salvador, Venezuela and nearby nations.
The New Yorker also reported details of a gay makeup artist who had been taken to the prison. It is not entirely clear whether the makeup artist is also the barber described by Time magazine, or if they are separate people.
At one point in her discussion of the migrants, Tarlov apparently perceived a lack of enthusiasm on the part of Watters.
She told her co-host: “Oh, am I boring you again? I’m sorry.”
“No,” Watters responded. “But you’ve been talking about this gay barber from El Salvador with some stupid tattoo for weeks. Weeks, Jessica.”
Guttfield then chimed in to add, “Yeah, come on.”
“It’s just a gay barber,” Watters said.
“He’s not into you,” Guttfield joked.
Watters went on: “He’s an innocent guy who got swept up in a deportation, and hopefully we get it figured out and straightened out. But a lot of people in this country, Jessica, get arrested for things that they didn’t do, get falsely accused, falsely convicted.”
“That doesn’t mean you just stop arresting people,” he added.
“I didn’t say that. I said just give people their due process,” Tarlov replied.
While a federal judge blocked the Trump administration from deporting more immigrants under the Alien Enemies Act, for now, officials have indicated that once that order is lifted, they will immediately resume the deportation flights.
The judge, James Boasberg, has indicated that many of the individuals deported under the rarely used 18th century law are likely entitled the chance to plead their case in court.
For their part, Trump administration officials have pushed back on the idea that any of the deportations were solely based on tattoos.
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The administration admitted this week, however, that the deportation of at least one man — a Maryland father — was done in error.