Editor, News-Register:

The Intelligencer published a joint editorial very recently by Dave Cantrell, a WV political candidate and Vincent DeGeorge, president of the WALS Foundation titled “Bethany, West Liberty Students Deserve Praise for Demonstrating.”

First let me say that I agree with the premise of their editorial — that student demonstrations should be allowed, encouraged and commended. However, Cantrell and DeGeorge made two strikingly inaccurate claims as the main pillars of their support for these demonstrations which, frankly, diminishes their overall credibility.

These claims include: 1) that international students at West Liberty and Bethany colleges represent “nearly half” the entire student population; and 2) that our country’s ongoing mass deportations are “unprecedented.”

While a simple Google search could have swiftly nuked that first claim, I took it a step further and called West Liberty’s Office of International Students and Bethany’s Admissions office. I was told that West Liberty’s international student population is 2% while Bethany’s is “15% or less.” Out of a total population of 2,150 students, there are 52 international students at West Liberty and 100 out of a total population of 700 at Bethany. It took me less than 15 minutes to gather this information.

Then there’s the claim of “unprecedented mass deportations.” These identical statistics (which I obtained in under 10 minutes) on the issue of deportations are readily available online from multiple sources, including the Cato Institute and the New York Times.

According to the Cato Institute, President Trump’s per year deportations (which, in the interest of full disclosure, are only available and calculated through his first term) are at 275,725 while President Obama’s were 383,307. Strikingly however, were the calculations of deportations for administrations beginning with our nation’s first President all the way through to President Trump, which show that Democrat presidents have removed about 4.6 million while Republican presidents about 3.7 million. So much for President Trump’s “unprecedented” deportations.

Just as an aside, despite the implication in their editorial, none of the students at either college could possibly be in fear of deportation because, by law, neither college is permitted to admit anyone either undocumented or illegally in the United States.

So shame on DeGeorge and Cantrell for not doing their homework because, if the Facebook comments on their editorial are any indication, they have further contributed to the miseducation of the body politic.

Diana Mey

Wheeling