Rightwing humor at its edgiest

So Donald Trump has yet another scary conspiracy to warn us about: Illegal immigrants sneaking across the border to vote in American elections, probably while taking our jobs and raping or murdering us. Those people aren't just criminal masterminds, they're also demons for multitasking:

“They are letting people pour into this country so they can go and vote,” he said, according to reporters.

And you know it has to be true, because Trump said it after a meeting with Art Del Cueto, vice president of the National Border Control Council, the union for Border Patrol agents. He ought to know! Just look at all the overwhelming evidence, which consists of Mr. Del Cueto Saying So:

Del Cueto: I spoke to several agents in my sector who are in charge of processing. And the problem that we’re seeing reflected though us as a voice is that some of these individuals that we’ve apprehended with criminal records, they’re not, they’re checking their records, they see that they have criminal records, but they're setting them aside because at this point they are saying immigration is so tied up with trying to get the people who are on the waiting list to hurry up and get them their immigration status corrected.

Trump: Why?

Del Cueto: So they can go ahead and vote before the election.

Trump: Big statement, fellas. [He motions to the press pool.] You’re not going to write it. That’s huge. But they’re letting people pour into the country so they can go and vote.

Del Cueto: They want to hurry up and fast track them so they can go ahead and vote in the election.

Trump: And these are the professionals. You hear a thing like that, and it’s a disgrace. Well, it will be a lot different if I get elected.

But now he can't because of all the illegals voting to put taco trucks on every corner. It's true because a guy said it, you know.

Think Progress dutifully asserts something entirely different:

There is no evidence that immigrants are illegally crossing the U.S. border in order to cast a ballot in November. Anyone who did would run the risk of multiple felonies, including entering the country without documents and committing voter fraud.

But there is evidence! The VP of the Border Patrol union, who is allied with Donald Trump, just said it! If that's not evidence, then we may as well not trust ANYTHING we read on the internet, which was invented by Charles Babbage, Ada Lovelace, and Alan Turing shortly after Jesus got off a dinosaur and handed the Declaration of Independence to Ronald Reagan. Duh.

Oh, there isone small problem with Mr. Trump's assertion that "they're letting people pour into the country so they can go and vote," according to the Associated Press:

[U]nion spokesman Shawn Moran, who was in New York with Del Cueto, said later in a telephone interview that several issues were conflated during the round table discussion.

Border Patrol agents have indeed seen an increase in attempts to cross the U.S.-Mexico border illegally, Moran said. But Moran did not say any border agents had been ordered to let those immigrants in so they could vote in November.

The two issues are sometimes linked in a misleading fashion, and the brief exchange between Del Cueto and Trump underscored that.

Oh. A Moran says "conflated," we say "lied like a lying liar with lying liarpants on lying fire." Thanks for the correction, Moran! And hey, the guy who spoke at the meeting happened to be an uninformed bullshitter, while the spokesman who actually knew stuff had to issue a correction after the meeting. You'd think Mr. Moran, the spokesman, could have been the one speaking. He should really get a brain.

Gosh, Yr Wonkette wonders if Donald Trump will continue to say the Border Patrol union told him tons of undocumented immigrants will be allowed to vote. Since there's been a correction, he surely wouldn't continue stating a falsehood, would he? We're also quite certain no paranoid Trump supporters will harass or beat up Hispanics because of this latest conflation of facts.

And while the specter of undocumented immigrants (and dead people) voting in droves is mostly the stuff of pure bullshit emails from your rightwing uncle, there is one reality that should worry the Trumpers: the prospect of having the chance to vote in this election has in fact led to a whole lot of legal residents to apply for citizenship so they can vote for Trump, cleverly exploiting American law so they can pursue the completely legal process of influencing the outcome of the election. So sneaky!

[Think Progress / Associated Press / NYT]