DistantNews
Support us
🇻🇳 Vietnam /Crime & Justice

White House launches border games featuring migrant arrests and wall-building

From Tuổi Trẻ · () Vietnamese

Translated from Vietnamese and summarized by DistantNews. Read the original for the full story.

At a glance

News Named sources New plan
  • The White House launched games including “Rio Run,” which scores players for catching migrants, and “Build The Wall,” which uses a Tetris-style format.
  • Human rights groups criticized the games as trivializing immigration, while the administration presented them as a way to promote its priorities and contrast its politics with Democrats’ vision.

The White House has turned immigration enforcement into an arcade-style campaign tool. Its new online games let players catch migrants, build a border wall and collect money for a “Trump account.”

The most prominent game, Rio Run, draws on the classic Snake format. Players control an older white man in a blue tie as he patrols the Rio Grande and captures people crossing the U.S.-Mexico border. Scores rise according to the number of deportations. AFP reported that the character is modeled on Tom Homan, a senior Trump administration border official. Captured migrants appear in orange jumpsuits and line up behind him.

Can’t stop winning. Build the wall. Deport. Fund Trump accounts.

· White House promotional videoThe slogan accompanied the social media promotion for the games.

Another game, Build The Wall, borrows from Tetris. Players stack bricks to fortify a wall against what the game calls a zombie “border siege.” Other games feature a bald eagle flying around Washington’s National Mall or let players gather diamonds and cash for “Trump accounts,” an investment program for children born from 2025 through 2028.

playing games with human lives

· Amerika Garcia GrewalThe Frontera Federation co-director criticized the games’ treatment of immigration enforcement.

The White House promoted the games with a video on X featuring the slogan MAGA in a design modeled on a Sega logo. The accompanying message said: “Can’t stop winning. Build the wall. Deport. Fund Trump accounts.” A White House official said the project aimed to present the administration’s “fun, winning culture” against what it described as the Democrats’ “gloomy socialist future.”

Rights advocates objected. Amerika Garcia Grewal of the Frontera Federation said the administration was “playing games with human lives.” Adriana Jasso of AMIGOS San Diego Community said the games showed a “lack of seriousness” about immigration. The launch came as the administration expanded arrests and deportations of undocumented immigrants, and as online users questioned the White House’s priorities during the war with Iran and a rising cost of living.

lack of seriousness

· Adriana JassoThe AMIGOS San Diego Community representative criticized the administration’s approach to immigration.
About this summary

Originally published by Tuổi Trẻ in Vietnamese. Translated, summarized, and contextualized automatically by DistantNews, with a note on how the source frames the story. Not individually reviewed before publishing. How this works.

More Stories

From Our Blog