Here Are All the Dumb Ways Conservatives Are Freaking Out About Ebola in the US

Ebola strain: CDC/Wikimedia Commons, Huckabee: J. Scott Applewhite/AP, photoillustration by Alex Park

Fight disinformation: Sign up for the free Mother Jones Daily newsletter and follow the news that matters.


When a Texas hospital confirmed last week that it was treating a patient for Ebola, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention dispatched teams to trace any people the patient had contact with, vowing to stop the disease “in its tracks.” But conservative politicians rushed to overreact. Here are a few of the lowlights:

Mike Huckabee, former governor of Arkansas and current host of Huckabee: “When the government says it can’t keep people out of the US, it means it won’t keep people out. And why should we be surprised? We’ve seen our borders routinely ignored, so if someone with Ebola really wants to come to the US, just get to Mexico, and walk right in.”

Bill O’Reilly, host, The O’Reilly Factor: “Thinking ahead, and taking precautions is simply responsible policy. Time and again, the Obama administration has failed to do that…There is no reason on earth, on this earth, that right now we should be accepting anyone in this country with a West African passport.”

Donald Trump, conservative gadfly: “Let’s not kid ourselves. I mean with the five billion dollar website for Obamacare, which is still not working, frankly, and it’s a disaster. And so many other things: Benghazi, wars…IRS.”

Rush Limbaugh, host, The Rush Limbaugh Show: “The people in Liberia only went there because they had to get out of here ’cause they were slaves…Therefore if Ebola ends up here, it’s only payback, folks…Unfortunately we have elected people in positions of leadership who think this way. The president is one of them.”

Mark Levin, host, The Mark Levin Show: “Of course we should profile! It doesn’t have to be based on race or anything of that sort. We have a right as a people in this country— it’s our right…our country! We have a right to say ‘No’ temporarily— or permanently— to people coming into this country from certain parts of the world, so that our families, our children, our grandchildren, our society, isn’t at risk. That’s just natural…and yet the opposite goes on here.” 

Michael Savage, host, Savage Nation: “There is not a sane reason to bring infected children into a nation other than to infect the nation. There is not a sane reason to take three or four thousand troops into a hot Ebola zone, without expecting at least one of them to come back with Ebola, unless you want to infect the nation with Ebola…. This actually exceeds any level of treason that I’ve ever seen.”

Michelle Malkin, syndicated columnist: “In the wake of the Ebola scare (not to mention renewed jihadi threats from abroad), worried Americans are heading to the drugstore to stock up on face masks, hand sanitizer, and gloves. New vaccines are in the works for emerging global contagions. Unfortunately, there is no antidote for our government’s blind and deadly diversity worship. Political correctness is a plague on us all.”

Glenn Beck, host, The Glenn Beck Program: “You want a reason to have food storage? You want a reason to have gold? You want a reason to have guns? You want a reason to have God? It’s called ‘Ebola.'”

AN IMPORTANT UPDATE

We’re falling behind our online fundraising goals and we can’t sustain coming up short on donations month after month. Perhaps you’ve heard? It is impossibly hard in the news business right now, with layoffs intensifying and fancy new startups and funding going kaput.

The crisis facing journalism and democracy isn’t going away anytime soon. And neither is Mother Jones, our readers, or our unique way of doing in-depth reporting that exists to bring about change.

Which is exactly why, despite the challenges we face, we just took a big gulp and joined forces with The Center for Investigative Reporting, a team of ace journalists who create the amazing podcast and public radio show Reveal.

If you can part with even just a few bucks, please help us pick up the pace of donations. We simply can’t afford to keep falling behind on our fundraising targets month after month.

Editor-in-Chief Clara Jeffery said it well to our team recently, and that team 100 percent includes readers like you who make it all possible: “This is a year to prove that we can pull off this merger, grow our audiences and impact, attract more funding and keep growing. More broadly, it’s a year when the very future of both journalism and democracy is on the line. We have to go for every important story, every reader/listener/viewer, and leave it all on the field. I’m very proud of all the hard work that’s gotten us to this moment, and confident that we can meet it.”

Let’s do this. If you can right now, please support Mother Jones and investigative journalism with an urgently needed donation today.

payment methods

AN IMPORTANT UPDATE

We’re falling behind our online fundraising goals and we can’t sustain coming up short on donations month after month. Perhaps you’ve heard? It is impossibly hard in the news business right now, with layoffs intensifying and fancy new startups and funding going kaput.

The crisis facing journalism and democracy isn’t going away anytime soon. And neither is Mother Jones, our readers, or our unique way of doing in-depth reporting that exists to bring about change.

Which is exactly why, despite the challenges we face, we just took a big gulp and joined forces with The Center for Investigative Reporting, a team of ace journalists who create the amazing podcast and public radio show Reveal.

If you can part with even just a few bucks, please help us pick up the pace of donations. We simply can’t afford to keep falling behind on our fundraising targets month after month.

Editor-in-Chief Clara Jeffery said it well to our team recently, and that team 100 percent includes readers like you who make it all possible: “This is a year to prove that we can pull off this merger, grow our audiences and impact, attract more funding and keep growing. More broadly, it’s a year when the very future of both journalism and democracy is on the line. We have to go for every important story, every reader/listener/viewer, and leave it all on the field. I’m very proud of all the hard work that’s gotten us to this moment, and confident that we can meet it.”

Let’s do this. If you can right now, please support Mother Jones and investigative journalism with an urgently needed donation today.

payment methods

We Recommend

Latest

Sign up for our free newsletter

Subscribe to the Mother Jones Daily to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox.

Get our award-winning magazine

Save big on a full year of investigations, ideas, and insights.

Subscribe

Support our journalism

Help Mother Jones' reporters dig deep with a tax-deductible donation.

Donate