Look, nobody expects Fox News to host a good-faith debate on immigration issues in the wee morning hours, when a certain Very Important Viewer might be tuning in. There's only a couple of Fox anchors who will break with the Trumpian line on anything, and they're far away from Fox & Friends First.

But that show played host Monday morning to a genuine anti-Trump Democrat who excoriated the president's policy of family separation at the border—until the frantic hosts cut her off and the control room cut her feed.

Apparently, someone at Fox booked the wrong Democrat by mistake:

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This is incredible. @FoxFriendsFirst thought they booked pro-ICE Dem Ann Kirkpatrick on show, but accidentally booked Barbara L'Italien

(@teambarbara) instead.



L'Italien delivers personal message to Trump saying "we must stop abducting children... stop putting kids in cages." pic.twitter.com/OnVAdBVjJB — Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) July 23, 2018

It's amazing to watch the hosts acknowledge fairly simply that their program, which purports to be a news service with the goal of making viewers more informed, would never purposefully invite on someone who criticizes the president this way.

Part of the Trump Era is watching some people abandon all the pretense and just get down to the real business, shamelessly and out in the open. We're here to reinforce your support for the president, these News Anchors essentially tell the audience. We just wanted to use this Democrat as a pro-ICE prop! And then the very temporary dissident disappeared, scrubbed from the Fox information matrix as the hosts threw to what was surely a MyPillow commercial.

Update (5:24 p.m.): Fox & Friends First Executive Producer Desiree Dunne addressed this morning's mishap in a statement, suggesting the production team was deceived in the lead-up to the segment:



This morning we invited Congresswoman Ann Kirkpatrick to appear on Fox & Friends First through her press contact on file Joe Katz, who accepted the invitation on Kirkpatrick’s behalf. Katz followed with an email confirming the segment, which also included background information and a campaign logo for Ann Kirkpatrick. During the actual segment, Barbara L’Italien, appeared on camera instead of Kirkpatrick. Despite speaking to producers prior to the interview, L’Italien did not identify herself as anything other than Kirkpatrick until she was live on air, at which point we ended the interview.

Jack Holmes Politics Editor Jack Holmes is the Politics Editor at Esquire, where he writes daily and edits the Politics Blog with Charles P Pierce.

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