From the moment President Donald Trump returned to the Oval Office in January and began actually enforcing immigration law, the Left completely lost its collective mind. They simply cannot accept the basic reality that entering the United States illegally is—by definition—breaking the law. Instead, they retreat to the same tired talking points: these are just “poor people seeking a better life,” here to “do the jobs Americans won’t do.”
Recently, The New York Times took that nonsense to a new level, publishing what read like an It’s a Wonderful Life fantasy imagining America without immigration. And in trying to scare readers with this alternate reality, the paper recycled one of its favorite examples—an argument we’ve all heard before—that managed to be unintentionally hilarious all over again.
New York Times: We have a Shrubbery Crisis
Time to call in Roger the Shrubber.https://t.co/5h26QXgwYN
— TS the Deplorable (@TStheDeplorable) December 30, 2025
The Times went on to note that new home construction remains sluggish while wages in the building trades are rising—something the experts at the Grey Lady solemnly suggested could mean deportations are “hitting the construction industry hard.” But in a not-so-subtle attempt to tug at the heartstrings of its increasingly activist readership, the paper pivoted to an even more dramatic warning: landscaping could be next.
According to The New York Times, the real tragedy looming over America isn’t crime, fentanyl, or border chaos—it’s the lawn. Kim Hartmann, an executive at a Chicago landscaping company, fretted that landscaping crews, often heavily staffed by immigrants, are “easy deportation targets over the summer.” In other words, the Times’ latest horror story boils down to this: enforcing immigration law might make it harder to find someone to mow your grass.
How elistist, arrogant, and typically out of touch for the left-wing media.
Hartmann added: “It’s going to be much more competitive to find that individual who’s been a foreman or a supervisor and has years of experience. We know that drives costs up.”
No finely manicured shrubs? Oh no! The Times couldn’t resist piling on with more elistist, out-of-touch buffoonery, solemnly warning: “There are limits to how much customers will pay for decorative shrubs, and they may opt to go without.”
The horror. Americans might have to live with slightly less ornamental landscaping if immigration laws are enforced. If that’s the Left’s idea of a national crisis, it says far more about their priorities than it does about the supposed dangers of border enforcement.
No doubt, this is supposed to be proof positive for the upper-crust New York Times readership that Orange Man is, in fact, bad. Heaven forbid the azaleas suffer. But the whole performance is eerily reminiscent of a remark made by then–House Speaker Nancy Pelosi when she addressed Biden’s border crisis in September 2022: “Why are you shipping these immigrants up north? We need them to pick the crops down here.”
What follows from the The New York Times is the usual lineup of predictable sob stories: local festivals allegedly hollowed out, parents supposedly too frightened by deportation news to send their kids to school, and communities portrayed as teetering on collapse because immigration laws are being enforced.
Yet while the Times wrings its hands over labor shortages in construction and health care—industries it openly admits rely heavily on illegal immigrant labor—it also wades into the topic of “assimilation,” and this is where the paper truly disgraces itself. The Times zoomed in on Lancaster County, noting that its population is growing due to an influx of immigrants. Then, astonishingly, it pointed out that Lancaster County is home to the largest Amish community in the United States and sneered that they are “a community that has refused to assimilate.”
Are they serious?
The Amish haven’t “refused to assimilate” out of defiance or lawlessness. They live according to deeply held religious beliefs—beliefs they have every constitutional right to practice. They didn’t sneak into the country illegally. They aren’t draining public resources. They aren’t demanding the system bend to them. The comparison isn’t just wrong; it’s offensive.
None of what the Times has just published should surprise anyone. It’s the same left-wing, boo-hoo, sob story immgrant BS laced with a healthy dose of elitism that we’ve seen for years.
