- Former press secretary and current MSNBC host Jen Psaki mocked Virginia voters on Tuesday for saying their top voting issue is immigration
- She and fellow host Rachel Maddow joked that the real danger facing the state comes from neighboring West Virginia
- In response, Senator Ted Cruz demanded that Psaki apologize to the family of a boy who was killed by an illegal immigrant near her home in Virginia.
Sen. Ted Cruz demanded that MSNBC host Jen Psaki apologize to the family of the 2-year-old boy allegedly killed by an illegal migrant after mocking voters over their concerns about immigration.
After exit polls on Super Tuesday in Virginia showed that voters are primarily concerned about immigration in this election, Psaki, a Virginia resident, was incredulous.
The former press secretary and her fellow MSNBC host Rachel Maddow joked that the real threat facing Virginia voters comes from West Virginia, not illegal immigrants.
“Jen Psaki and Rachel Maddow owe the family of Jeremy Poou-Caceres an apology,” the Texas Republican wrote on X.
“He was a 2-year-old who was just murdered by an illegal alien less than a 30-minute drive from Psaki’s $1.7 million home in Arlington, Virginia.”
Cruz was referring to the high-profile killing of two-year-old Jeremy Poou-Caceres, who police say was shot and killed in the US illegally by a migrant while walking with his mother in the DC suburbs.
Jeremy and his mother were both shot on Feb. 8 in a Maryland neighborhood outside D.C. — close to Psaki’s home in Virginia — killing the boy and wounding the mother, police said.
Authorities later announced that the suspects involved in the case are in the country illegally and that Jeremy and his mother were not the intended targets.
One of the suspects, Nilson Trejo-Granados, a 25-year-old from El Salvador, has been charged with first-degree murder in the case.
According to Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) records, he has previously been arrested multiple times in the US.
In March of last year, he was charged by the Montgomery County Police Department (MCPD) with theft. That arrest prompted ICE to file an immigration detainer complaint against the criminal.
However, local police refused to honor the detainee and subsequently released Trejo-Granados back into the public.
In September 2023, he was arrested again by the MCPD. He was charged with theft and attempted obstruction and nuisance.
ICE again unsuccessfully filed an immigration detainer that was not honored.
Even before that, a DOJ immigration judge in Newark, New Jersey, ordered the man’s removal from the United States in November 2022.
“I live in Virginia. Immigration was the number one issue,” Psaki said Tuesday, in apparent surprise.
Maddow responded, “Well, Virginia does have a border with West Virginia.”
Another MSNBC host chimed in: “Build the wall!”
The toddler was walking in the park with his mother when he was shot dead in February
Nilson Trejo-Granados, 25, – an illegal El Salvadoran migrant – was charged this week by Prince George County police with first-degree murder and second-degree murder
Despite the pundits’ jokes about immigration, voters don’t think this is a joke.
Exit polls in North Carolina, Virginia and California all showed immigration as one of voters’ top priorities.
Furthermore, exit polls showed that Trump’s immigration policies in Virginia are broadly acceptable, with 64 percent of voters trusting the former president more on border security.
Americans now say immigration is the most important issue facing the country — with 28 percent of voters calling it their top concern, ahead of the state of the government and economy.
Additionally, a recent poll released this week found that a majority of American voters now want a barricade along the U.S.-Mexico border, the first time in history that a majority of voters wanted a physical barrier.