#TrumpRegrets and the Limits of Fact-Checking
There’s a growing cottage industry surrounding Trump-related schadenfreude. There are few things in life as satisfying as saying “I told you so” to an ideological opponent. In only two months on the job, President Donald Trump has given liberals a lot to feel smug about. Trump Regrets exists to amplify tweets from people who wish they could take back their vote. It seems like every week, a story like this one from the New York Times goes viral. That story profiles residents of a rural Illinois town where the beloved owner of a Mexican restaurant faces deportation. From the sound of it, Juan Carlos Hernandez Pacheco is a bang-up guy:
There was the pastor who described Mr. Hernandez helping at a funeral, the family that remembered him raising hundreds of dollars for its son’s hearing aid, the businessman who said that he was mostly a private person but that Mr. Hernandez was one of the few people he invites over for dinner.
The article describes Mr. Hernandez raising money for various non-profit organizations. He provides help to the fire and police departments. One thing is clear — everyone in this small town loves him.
Now, as Trump promised, he faces deportation. This town went 70% for Trump. They have some issues with that. The people interviewed aren’t against deportation. They’re against deporting their friend. Their objection is that they didn’t think ICE would deport people that they like.
“He wouldn’t lie about that.”
There’s another layer to this, though: The residents of this town didn’t vote for Trump because he promised deportation. They voted for Trump because he promised he would revitalize the coal industry.
Therein lies the problem. One of the main approaches liberals have taken in opposition to Trump is fact-checking. The assumption is that if they correct Trump’s statements of facts, his voters will make a shocking discovery — Trump lies! This is information that his voters are unaware of! Onward with this shocking discovery!
Here’s the thing: Trump voters know he lies. Aside from the devoted Trump cultists, they’re aware that he is peddling bullshit. They think that he’s lying about the things they don’t want to happen. The things that they want are, of course, the things that he’s telling the truth about. Everything else is to get votes.
“He said he was gonna!”
The common thread in all these tales of Trump schadenfreude is outrage that he is doing things he said he would do. The residents of this town never expected their friend to be deported. After all, the pundits speak often about the logistical difficulty of deporting 11 million people. Never mind the difficulties of revitalizing an economy based on a product that’s becoming obsolete. We don’t need to think about that part because we like that part.
Yes, Trump tells lies. But in this case, the devil is not in the details. When Trump says “3 million people voted illegally,” his supporters aren’t concerned with the number. They’re concerned with voter fraud. Presenting evidence that in-person voter fraud is almost unheard of doesn’t do much for them. Trump supporters don’t vote based on statistics. Few people do. We vote based on ideology. Liberals argue that there’s no evidence to support 3 million illegal votes. They miss a chance to argue in favor of making it easy to vote. They explain the logistical hurdles of deporting 11 million people. They miss the chance to argue for a simpler, more humane immigration process.
So wait…don’t fact-check?
None of this is to say that fact-checking is a bad thing. Journalists have a responsibility to hold people in power accountable. If they lie, the public should know it’s a lie. But when fact-checking becomes the predominant goal of the left, we cede other objections. If deporting 11 million people were easy, would liberals support it? Probably not — so why make the pragmatic concerns the primary objection in discourse? The person arguing in favor of a border wall isn’t concerned with the cost of the wall, or how to build it. They’re concerned with what they perceive to be a threat. Stories about people like Juan Carlos Hernandez Pacheco are important. They help to dispel that narrative. But as long as liberals are more concerned with the facts, they’re going to keep losing the battle of ideology.
