It may seem like months ago now in this crazy news cycle, but it was just eight days ago that Mohamed Soliman allegedly attacked Jews at a "Run for Their Lives" event in Boulder, Colorado as they were there in support of the hostages that Hamas terrorists captured on October 7, 2023. On Tuesday, Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Secretary Kristi Noem announced that Soliman's family would be deported--a move that a U.S. district judge quickly blocked--and the media was out in full force with disastrous narratives. This includes USA Today. As it turns out, though, they had troubling takes on other major news stories as well.
USA Today thought it fitting to put out a piece, which was heavily ratioed over X and also mocked with screenshots, sympathizing with Soliman's daughter, Habiba Soliman. They ended up adding another writer and "more context," but it didn't come off as any better. The piece that the outlet did do on one of the suspect terrorist's victims, who is also a Holocaust survivor, came far later and garnered far less attention.
Boulder suspect’s daughter dreamed of studying medicine. Now she faces deportation. https://t.co/UrQnKvEzYw
— USA TODAY (@USATODAY) June 4, 2025
Holocaust survivor burned in Boulder speaks after attack: 'We are better than this' https://t.co/LykpcZgfeL
— USA TODAY (@USATODAY) June 6, 2025
Other news from last week included the return of Kilmar Abrego Garcia to the United States after he had been deported to El Salvador.
While Democrats and the mainstream media have put out quite the narrative about the return of this "Maryland man," or "Maryland father," as USA Today describes him, the return has been facilitated so that Abrego Garcia can face charges for some pretty serious crimes, including against children. The post, also ratioed over X, says nothing of the sort, and in fact looks to portray Abrego Garcia as a victim.
Kilmar Abrego Garcia has become the face of Trump's immigration policies after courts said he was wrongfully removed from the US. Now, the Maryland father is on his way back to the country. https://t.co/dLxY6fCFyK
— USA TODAY (@USATODAY) June 6, 2025
As the piece mentioned:
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The indictment was a dramatic turnabout for Abrego Garcia's supporters, who have portrayed him as an innocent man turned political pawn amid Trump's mass deportation program.
To the contrary, Bondi said, Abrego Garcia "traded the innocence of minor children for profit."
The excerpts above come from a "recap" piece of sorts, though it's hardly a full "recap," given how much is left out, especially as it pertains to Abrego Garcia's alleged criminal history.
There's also a live update of sorts from various contributors to the site. Much of the piece looks to portray Abrego Garcia in a further sympathetic, with statements from those in support, as the subheadlines alone indicate:
Advocates push for fair trial
Advocates and attorneys for Abrego Garcia said they do not know if he is aware of the charges against him and urged the government to allow him to communicate with his lawyers and family.
“Kilmar is back. As the fight for Kilmar continues − the fight for justice, for his actual release," said Ama Frimpong, legal director of the CASA immigration rights organization. "Let him talk to his wife, let him talk to his children; his family has suffered enough.”
“We will be looking forward to Kilmar getting a fair trial, because he certainly has not gotten a fair trial in the court of public opinion,” said Chris Newman, Legal Director at the National Day Laborer Organizing Network Newman.
...
Lawyer slams the charges
“The government disappeared Kilmar to a foreign prison in violation of a court order. Now, after months of delay and secrecy, they’re bringing him back, not to correct their error but to prosecute him," Abrego Garcia's attorney, Simon Sandoval-Moshenberg, said.
"Due process means the chance to defend yourself before you're punished, not after. This is an abuse of power, not justice,” Sandoval-Moshenberg said. “The government should give him a full and fair trial in front of the same immigration judge who heard the case in 2019."
It is not until the third to last paragraph that Abrego Garcia's suspected MS-13 gang affiliation, which the Trump administration produced documents relating to such evidence back in April when Sen. Chris Van Hollen (D-MD) had traveled to El Salvador to meet with the deported illegal immigrant. "The indictment alleges Abrego Garcia is a member and associate of the MS-13 gang, a claim his family has denied," is all the piece mentions.
While the piece does mention Abrego Garcia's wife, there is no mention in the actual article of how his wife had previously alleged he abused her. This omission is even more glaring, given that USA Today had obtained such audio in early May of Jennifer Vasquez Sura asking a judge in 2020 for a temporary protective order against her husband.
"He slapped me three times." Audio depicts Jennifer Vasquez Sura, wife of Kilmar Abrego Garcia, pleading with a judge for temporary protection from her husband in 2020. pic.twitter.com/GnnxRjjcaQ
— USA TODAY Video (@usatodayvideo) May 2, 2025
Then there's the feud between Riley Gaines and Simone Biles that USA Today, with USA Today deciding to weigh in on taking the side of Biles through an opinion piece from Nancy Armour, a columnist for USA TODAY Sports.
Biles had gone after Gaines as "truly sick" and a "sore loser" after she dared to take issue with a Minnesota girls softball team becoming champions after they allowed a boy on their team to play as a pitcher. In the first of many posts between the two, Biles also accused Gaines of being a "bully."
@Riley_Gaines_ You’re truly sick, all of this campaigning because you lost a race. Straight up sore loser. You should be uplifting the trans community and perhaps finding a way to make sports inclusive OR creating a new avenue where trans feel safe in sports. Maybe a transgender… https://t.co/pjpzuZ0AlO
— Simone Biles (@Simone_Biles) June 6, 2025
The piece came off as nausea inducing from the start over its puffery of Biles, and only got worse from there:
Simone Biles is the GOAT in every sense of the word.
The seven-time Olympic champion stood up for transgender athletes Friday night, taking to X to chastise Riley Gaines for the relentless verbal abuse she directs at transgender girls and women.
...
There is no scientific evidence that transgender women athletes have a physical advantage over cisgender women athletes, but that hasn’t stopped Gaines from claiming they do. She insists they are “robbing” cisgender women of places on the podium, and she doesn’t care if it’s a 12- or 22-year-old that she’s putting in harm’s way in this overheated climate where ignorance and violence are celebrated equally.
...
Biles is the most decorated gymnast of all time, man or woman, with 11 medals at the Olympics — seven of them gold — and 30 at the world championships. She has five skills named after her, two each on vault and floor exercise and one on balance beam. She has taken the idea that women’s gymnastics was a sport reserved for the young and turned it on its head, still dominating in her late 20s.
That has not spared Biles from the venom of keyboard warriors like Gaines, however. She was criticized for withdrawing during the team finals at the Tokyo Olympics because of a case of “the twisties,” never minding that not knowing where she was in the air meant she very well could have landed on her neck instead of her feet. She’s taken heat for her hair, her marriage, even her self-confidence.
But you don’t accomplish what Biles has without being fearless, and her admonishment of Gaines on Friday night was yet another example.
...
Most of us could never do what Biles does as a gymnast. But we can do what she does as a human: Be kind. Defend the most marginalized.
And when you get the opportunity to stick up to a bully, do it at full throat.
In a world of Riley Gaineses, be a Simone Biles.
Armour linked to her own column from last December when it comes to their supposedly being a lack of "scientific evidence," the same sentence in which she refers to actual biological females as "cisgender women."
USA shared the post from Armour at least twice over X, which resulted in ratios both times and potentially even context from Community Notes.
Simone Biles shows her greatness again in standing up for transgender community | Opinion https://t.co/MTwdu8weSp
— USA TODAY (@USATODAY) June 7, 2025
Simone Biles shows her greatness again in standing up for transgender community | Opinion https://t.co/CBYrDpUvKI
— USA TODAY (@USATODAY) June 7, 2025
Although these are the most significant examples, there were other examples of ratios on USA Today's X feed. They were similarly to do with Abrego Garcia, as well as Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson. Still others have to do with June being Pride Month, with a piece on the matter to do with "What are the safest places for gay and trans people? See where your state ranks."
Sunday and Monday also already don't look to be looking too good for the outlet, as the outlet has also used the riots in Los Angeles to go after Noem.
DHS Sec. Noem praised Trump for sending National Guard. She opposed it when Biden for considered it https://t.co/rsELeCnUH5
— USA TODAY (@USATODAY) June 9, 2025
