NBC spreads blatant lie that ICE used a 5-year-old as bait to lure her father out

NBC News has been caught smearing U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents with a blatant lie.

To hear NBC News originally tell it, with their sensationalist headlines, ICE agents kidnapped a 5-year-old autistic girl and held her against her will so as to use her as bait to lure out her illegal alien father.

@NBCNews why did you delete this? pic.twitter.com/NyhSGdaBhe

— AmErican (@Flipper628) September 24, 2025

Horrifying, right? But while there are some snippets of truth in the above headline that’s since been deleted, the basic narrative is a lie.

If you dig deep into the actual story seen here, NBC News eventually reveals the true story, which is that the girl’s father abandoned her in a car, at which point ICE agents came to her rescue with some water.

But let’s rewind a little bit.

The autistic girl’s mother told Telemundo that her illegal alien husband, Edward Hip Mejia, called her while he was driving home with their daughter and complained that he was being followed.

Once he arrived home, he “managed to run back into the parking lot of my house,” the girl’s mother added.

So he basically fled into the house, leaving his autistic 5-year-old daughter outside in the car all by herself.

Luckily for her, when the ICE agents, who it turns out had been trying to pull over her father, arrived at the house, they approached her, gave her a bottle of water, and then sat with her.

Homeland Security Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin explained everything in the tweet below:

Absolutely not. ICE agents NEVER used a 5-year-old girl as “bait”—what a disgusting smear. The criminal illegal alien target —with previous arrests for domestic abuse and strangulation, among other charges—ABANDONED his own child in a car.

The target, Edwards Hip Mejia,…

— Tricia McLaughlin (@TriciaOhio) September 23, 2025

“The target, Edwards Hip Mejia, ignored law enforcement emergency lights to pull over and drove back to his house,” she wrote. “He fled from the car, gave officers the double middle finger, and darted inside his house. He abandoned his 5-year-old daughter in the car. Officers helped rescue the child and called local police to report the abandonment.”

When local police arrived, they returned the girl to her family. ICE, meanwhile, returned to the home two days later and detained her father.

“Officers came out behind my house, arrested him, took him away,” his wife reportedly said. “We are not criminals.”

She may not be, but her husband certainly was — and in more ways than just one.

NBC News, meanwhile, is now facing stern backlash, including from the Department of Homeland Security, over its sensationalist reporting.

Look:

I would love to see @DHSgov file a complaint against their FCC license to have it revoked for blatant smear campaigns.

— John Bigbooty (@DaveNewellPhoto) September 23, 2025

NBC trying to smear ICE for rescuing and protecting an abandoned child from the father that left her in the car. Why they get to have a hundred billion dollar public FCC license for free?

— JoeFWall (@JoeFWall) September 23, 2025

@nbc censor yourselves.

If you side with criminal illegal aliens that commit a felony every day and smear US citizens, you are unworthy of the benefits gained from having a platform on the public airwaves @NBCNews @MSNBC @NBCPolitics

— zrod10 (@zrod10) September 23, 2025

@BrendanCarrFCC here is NBC pushing more fake news in an effort to smear our president and his administration. Aren’t these campaign contributions?! Lying over public airways about a political party to benefit Democrats?! They are once again not acting in the public’s interest

— Dawn (@Dawn0966) September 24, 2025

.@NBCNews — these smears are SICK.

Our ICE agents NEVER used a 5-year-old girl as ‘bait.’

The criminal illegal alien target of the operation—with previous arrests for domestic abuse, strangulation, and vandalizing property—ABANDONED HIS OWN CHILD in a car.

Edwards Hip Mejia, a… pic.twitter.com/p0Bedk5p6Q

— Homeland Security (@DHSgov) September 23, 2025

This wasn’t the first instance of NBC News muddying up the news, and it likely won’t be the last.

In May, the network ran a story about an American citizen who was briefly detained at a job site in Alabama but released after his identification was verified.

But to hear NBC News tell it, said citizen was the traumatized victim of an authoritarian government on a racist tirade against all brown people.

Senior Staff Writer
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V. Saxena is a staff writer for BizPac Review with a decade of experience as a professional writer, and a lifetime of experience as an avid news junkie. He holds a degree in computer technology from Purdue University.

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