Framing the Border as a National Security Threat: Fox News Immigration Coverage in the 2016 and 2024 Election Cycles

1. Introduction and Background

Immigration has been an integral feature of U.S. politics for a considerable period, serving as an ongoing political issue that periodically surfaces, especially in election politics. Political arguments concerning the U.S.-Mexico border often center on crime, sovereignty, economic security, and identity, making the politics of immigration particularly salient. Under these circumstances, the role of mass media is critical not only for conveying news about the border but also for influencing public understanding of these events. Among all other U.S. media organizations, Fox News occupies a position that holds special significance, especially for its conservative audience, and it is for that reason that it has emerged as an arena for constructing immigration politics.

This paper examines how Fox News discusses and frames issues surrounding the U.S.-Mexico border and immigration policy during the 2016 and 2024 U.S. presidential election cycles. Indeed, these events mark two critical moments in modern U.S. politics, characterized by extreme polarization, the use of populist rhetoric, and the increasing salience of immigration as a defining campaign theme. Prior scholarly research has examined the existence of ideological bias and audience effects associated with right-wing media outlets. However, there is a relative lack of research on how specific outlets strategically frame immigration policy and employ national security/threat rhetoric. This paper argues that Fox News frames immigration as a national security threat and that this occurs most intensely during U.S. presidential election cycles.

2. Literature Review and Theoretical Frame

2.1. Media Framing and Partisan Interpretation

The term “media framing” refers to the mechanisms by which media channels present or highlight particular aspects of reality that foster specific interpretations. The term “frame” does not merely refer to the way information is offered; rather, it is concerned with the very definition of the issue or the problem at hand, the attribution of blame, as well as the manner of response to the said issue. This demonstrates the pivotal role that framing plays in the comprehension of complex matters, such as immigration, which may be perceived as abstract or distant.

This process is also significantly affected by the role of partisan media outlets. Instead of functioning as purely neutral conduits for information dissemination, partisan media often rely on various sources of secondhand information, as well as expert commentary and storylines that fit a particular ideological profile. This creates the agenda for the audience they serve, not only in the selection of issues but also in how those issues are understood or interpreted. Conservative media systems are known to rely on outrage-based narratives to engage their audiences.

2.2. Securitization and the Construct of Threat

Media framing can be defined as "the process by which news organizations choose, highlight, or otherwise make salient certain aspects of reality and via this process influence the public salience of those issues. This means that framing is not just about the reporting of information, since frames can shape an individual’s comprehension of a particular problem, assign a problem, attribute responsibility for the problem, and provide a solution to a problem. As such, framing could have a significant influence on a person’s comprehension of a particular problem, particularly when the problem is perceived to be abstract, distant, or emotionally salient, such as an issue pertaining to immigration.

Perhaps the most impactful framing device used in the context of immigration has been securitization, whereby a social or political phenomenon is constructed as a threat, a threat that is existential in nature. When the policy of immigration is securitized and framed in the context of national security, it ceases to become a policy issue with trade-offs and becomes a crisis defined in terms of danger, invasion, and loss of control. In the conservative media literature, researchers have identified the significance of threat perception in influencing media consumption.

2.3. Election Cycles and Threat Spikes

As election seasons are upon us, the focus of political storytelling shifts to crisis. Presidential campaigns are particularly susceptible to this phenomenon, especially when governance is portrayed in more dramatic and critical tones. According to existing literature on political communication and framing effects, threat-based frames are particularly potent during campaigns and tend to increase voter turnout. Immigration is particularly susceptible to this kind of framing. As it intersects with crime, economic security, demographics, and national sovereignty, it is easily subject to threat-based frames. This becomes more pronounced when campaigns amplify existing partisanship and create clear lines of differentiation between parties. As the concept of threat spikes suggests, it is possible to identify when language becomes more prevalent and more intense in framing immigration in more dramatic and critical tones.

During these spikes, words such as invasion, disorder, lawlessness, and crisis are more likely to feature in campaign discourse. Rather than focusing on the policy and ethical dimensions of immigration, it becomes portrayed in more dramatic and critical tones. This phenomenon does not occur in isolation but is part of a larger array of storytelling and framing of immigration and other instability and threats to governance and society. Election seasons are likely to amplify these existing frames and make them more defining characteristics of the campaigns. This research seeks to identify whether this intensification of threat-based frames in immigration discourse is evident in the 2016 and 2024 presidential campaigns and whether the framing of immigration in more critical and dramatic tones in the two campaigns differs from each other. By examining the language and policy focus of these campaigns and identifying whether immigration is portrayed in more dramatic and critical tones during the campaigns and whether it differs in the two campaigns.

2.4. Existing Research

Existing research on the impact of Fox News has largely focused on its audience effects, including its relationship to media consumption and political attitudes or behavioral outcomes. For instance, Hoewe et al. (2020) show that Fox News is significantly related to issue salience, partisan polarization, and perceptions of threats across a range of issues, including immigration and national security issues. The research places Fox News at the center of agenda-setting within the current landscape of political communication. Nevertheless, although important for understanding Fox’s measurable political impact, such research has largely conceptualized Fox News as an independent variable within models of audience response, rather than as a media organization actively engaged in the production of discourse.

In parallel, a considerable body of research has examined media representations of the U.S.-Mexico border as a symbolic and metaphorical space of contestation. For example, Fleuriet & Castellano (2020) argue that media representations of the U.S.-Mexico border during the ascension of Trump to U.S. leadership were part of a process of place-making that constructed the border space as chaotic, dangerous, and racially charged. Through concept-metaphors such as invasion and disorder, the border space was constructed not merely as a geographical space but also as a space of national crisis.

However, although Fleuriet and Castellano (2020) shed light on the symbolic construction of the border, and although Hoewe et al. (2020) examine the attitudinal consequences of Fox News, no research has systematically examined the ways in which a national level partisan cable news organization contributes to the securitization of immigration discourse across multiple presidential election cycles. While the current body of research largely examines the audience consequences or symbolic representation of the border, no work has examined the ways in which Fox News, as an institutional actor, contributes to the securitization of immigration discourse across multiple presidential election cycles. What is largely unexplored is the ways in which Fox News, as an institutional actor, uses recurring language, structure of authority, tone, and visual grammar to construct immigration as a national-level existential threat to security within flagship partisan cable news programs across multiple presidential election cycles. This paper, therefore, addresses the theoretical and methodological shortcomings of the current body of research by shifting the focus from the consequences of media exposure to the ways in which Fox News, as an institutional actor, constructs immigration as an existential threat to national level security within the 2016 and 2024 presidential election cycles. By means of this cross-cycle approach to institutions, the present research extends the existing literature by showing that it is not only the case that Fox News is associated with increased perceptions of threat, but also that this threat is discursively constructed, made normal, and amplified in electoral contexts.

3. Case Selection and Methodology

3.1. Why Fox News?

Fox News was chosen as the focus for this research because previous studies have established that Fox News is a uniquely important media outlet for conservative audiences, and that its content is strongly connected to Republican issue salience and attitudes. Specifically, previous research has established that Fox News is a significant outlet for conservative attitudes, especially regarding issues such as immigration, and that its audience is uniquely clustered around the network compared to the audiences for other major cable news networks. Further, previous studies have established that the content of Fox News is significantly related to conservative attitudes regarding issues such as the construction of a border wall, and that its audience is uniquely clustered around the network compared to the audiences for other major cable news networks.

Because this is a study of securitization, and because previous studies have established that if a particular issue is repeatedly framed as a crisis rather than a policy issue, then Fox News is one of the most important sites for that issue-framing, normalization, and amplification. As Hoewe, Brownell, and Wiemer note, Fox News is a uniquely important media outlet because it has established a uniquely close relationship with conservative audiences, and because it has a long history of promoting an “outrage-based” style of political discourse. Unlike previous studies, this research treats Fox News as a discourse producer, rather than focusing on its effects on audiences. This is because, as noted, previous studies have established that Fox News is an important media outlet, but have not addressed the question of how Fox News itself constructs the issue of immigration as a national security threat, and does so repeatedly over multiple election cycles.

3.2. Sampling Strategy

This study follows a comparative qualitative sampling approach, with an emphasis on two presidential electoral cycles, 2016 and 2024. The two electoral cycles have been selected because they have taken place in two highly polarized contexts, and the salience of the issue of immigration was high in the campaign rhetoric of the two electoral cycles. The earlier sections of the paper have argued that the electoral cycles are the times when threat spikes are most visible, as the campaigns heighten the dramatic rhetoric around crisis, disorder, invasion, and loss of control. By examining the 2016 and 2024 electoral cycles, the analysis is able to assess the continuity and change in the Fox News framing. The sample is designed around the flagship Fox News programs that are most relevant to the discourse on the border and immigration. The analysis focuses on the Hannity and Fox & Friends programs, as they are most relevant to the ideological rhetoric and repeatedly feature the themes of the electoral campaigns. The focus is consistent with the earlier studies that have found Fox News programs and their hosts have been most visible in the construction and propagation of immigration and other related issues and the construction of conservative political discourse.

The analysis is designed to examine the episodes that are part of the campaign periods when the issues of immigration and the border are most salient. Rather than examining the entire campaign period, the analysis is focused on the window of the electoral cycle to capture the moments when the threat rhetoric is most likely to spike. The analysis is designed to include the episodes when the issues of immigration, the U.S. -Mexico border, asylum, migrant crossing, border crime, cartel violence, deportation, and the border wall are discussed as primary issues. The sampling strategy is designed to keep the analysis focused on the discourse most relevant to the question being asked in the paper.

3.3. Unit of Analysis

The basic building block of analysis will be the segment of an episode that deals with issues of immigration, borders, asylum, migrant crossings, and similar issues. The segment will be considered a self-contained unit if there is a coherent discussion or debate about one or more of these issues. The segment will be considered more appropriate than analyzing entire episodes because an episode could potentially have several political issues, some or all of which will be completely unrelated, while the framing mechanisms will be concentrated in one or more of the relevant discussions.

The analysis will be qualitative, and content analysis will be employed. The content will be concerned with several prominent features, including whether there was a framing of immigration as a crisis or threat, whether there was criminalization, whether there was an appeal to authority, whether blame was attributed to political entities, and what policy interventions were proposed as necessary. The approach will be similar to previous research into media framing, including research that has shown how border issues tend to be addressed through concept-metaphors such as invasion, disorder, and lawlessness. Fleuriet and Castellano, for instance, have shown how media discourses around the U.S. -Mexico border tend to construct the border, rather than just being a geographical location, as a symbolic location that represents threat, danger, and national crisis.

The analysis will be extended to include rhetorical devices, including visuals and tone, where relevant, because, as previous research has shown, the border will not only be constructed through what is said, but also through what is visually repeated, including symbolic and rhetorical devices that construct fear, threat, and national vulnerability.

4 . Findings Part 1: The Border as a National Security Threat (2016)

4.1. Crisis Construction

Fox News coverage during the 2016 election cycle consistently framed immigration and the U.S.-Mexico border as an immediate national crisis. Programs such as Hannity and Fox & Friends repeatedly used language emphasizing “chaos,” “lawlessness,” “invasion,” and “loss of control” to portray migration as an existential threat to American sovereignty. Immigration was rarely discussed as a humanitarian or administrative issue; instead, it was framed as evidence of state failure and governmental weakness.

This framing aligned closely with Donald Trump’s campaign rhetoric, particularly the argument that the United States had “lost control” of its border. Through repeated references to migrant caravans, unauthorized crossings, and border instability, Fox News constructed a sense of urgency designed to elevate immigration into a defining campaign issue.

4.2. Criminalization

A central feature of Fox News’ 2016 framing was the criminalization of migrants and asylum seekers. Coverage frequently connected immigration to gang violence, drug trafficking, terrorism, and violent crime. Although discussions occasionally acknowledged humanitarian dimensions, the dominant narrative associated migrants with danger and disorder. This criminalization process reflected broader patterns identified in prior scholarship, particularly the use of “invasion” and “threat” metaphors in conservative media discourse. Rather than presenting migrants as individuals responding to economic hardship or political instability, Fox News frequently portrayed them as risks to public safety and national identity.

4.3. Policy solutions

Fox News also emphasized hardline policy responses as necessary solutions to the perceived border crisis. Border wall construction, increased surveillance, expanded deportation efforts, and stronger law enforcement presence were framed as practical and urgent responses to disorder. Importantly, these policies were not presented as one option among many but rather as the only realistic means of restoring national security. This narrowed the policy debate by portraying compromise or reform-oriented approaches as signs of weakness.

4.4. Guests and Authority

The programs analyzed frequently relied on Republican politicians, border patrol officials, law enforcement representatives, and conservative commentators as primary sources of authority. These guests reinforced the securitized framing of immigration by emphasizing crime statistics, border instability, and governmental failure. Voices representing migrants, immigration advocates, or humanitarian organizations appeared far less frequently, contributing to a relatively one-sided narrative environment. The repeated use of ideologically aligned guests strengthened the perception that immigration represented a unified national threat requiring immediate action.

4.5. Visual Language

Visual framing reinforced the narrative of crisis. Segments often included footage of border fencing, migrant crossings, armed patrol agents, crowded detention centers, and maps highlighting the southern border. Such visuals amplified the perception of instability and danger even when statistical or contextual information was limited. The repetition of these images normalized the association between immigration and insecurity, reinforcing the broader securitization narrative identified throughout the analysis.

5 . Findings Part 2: The Border as a National Security Threat (2024)

5.1. Continuities from 2016

Many of the central framing patterns identified in 2016 remained visible during the 2024 election cycle. Fox News continued to portray immigration as a threat to sovereignty, law enforcement, and national stability. The themes of crisis, invasion, and governmental failure remained central to coverage. Programs continued to rely heavily on emotionally charged rhetoric and fear-based framing devices. Border crossings were repeatedly presented as evidence of systemic collapse, and immigration remained one of the defining campaign issues in conservative political discourse.

5.2. Intensification and Evolution

Although the core framing remained consistent, the rhetoric in 2024 became more intensified and emotionally charged. Compared to 2016, there was greater emphasis on systemic collapse, urban disorder, and the idea that the border crisis had spread into the American interior. Terms such as “open border,” “national emergency,” and “invasion” appeared with greater frequency and intensity. The framing increasingly suggested that immigration threatened not only border communities but also the broader social and political order of the United States.

5.3. Partisan Attribution

In 2024, Fox News placed significantly greater emphasis on assigning blame directly to Democratic leadership, particularly the Biden administration. Immigration was framed not simply as a policy failure but as the intentional consequence of weak or negligent governance. This partisan attribution transformed immigration into a symbolic marker of broader political decline. Border insecurity became linked to inflation, crime, cultural instability, and distrust in federal institutions.

5.4. Guest Ecosystem Shifts

The 2024 cycle also demonstrated changes in the guest ecosystem appearing on Fox News. While law enforcement and Republican politicians remained prominent, the programs increasingly featured activists, state governors, and media personalities associated with populist nationalist movements. This shift contributed to a more ideologically consolidated discourse environment in which competing interpretations of immigration policy were largely absent.

5.5. Visual Escalation

Visual framing in 2024 became more dramatic than in 2016. Programs increasingly used drone footage, large crowd images, surveillance clips, and emergency-style graphics to emphasize perceptions of disorder. The visual presentation often mirrored the language of crisis reporting, contributing to an atmosphere of urgency and instability. This escalation reinforced the emotional intensity of the coverage and amplified threat perception among viewers.

6. Comparative Analysis: What Changes Between 2016 and 2024, and What Stays the Same

6.1. Continuity

Across both the 2016 and 2024 election cycles, Fox News consistently framed immigration and the U.S.-Mexico border as issues of national security rather than humanitarian policy. In both periods, flagship programs such as Hannity and Fox & Friends repeatedly emphasized themes of invasion, lawlessness, cartel violence, and governmental failure. Immigration was rarely discussed primarily through the lens of asylum law, labor economics, or humanitarian responsibility. Instead, migrants were often portrayed as symbols of instability and threats to American sovereignty.

This continuity reflects broader patterns identified in existing scholarship on conservative media systems. Hoewe, Brownell, and Wiemer (2020) argue that Fox News plays a major role in reinforcing perceptions of threat among conservative audiences, especially regarding immigration. Likewise, Fleuriet and Castellano (2020) demonstrate that media discourse surrounding the border frequently constructs the border not merely as a geographic location, but as a symbolic site of insecurity and crisis. Fox News coverage during both election cycles strongly reflected these broader patterns of securitization and threat construction.

Another major continuity was the repeated use of emotionally charged rhetoric. Terms such as “crisis,” “invasion,” “chaos,” “danger,” and “loss of control” appeared frequently throughout both election cycles. This rhetorical consistency contributed to the normalization of immigration as a national emergency requiring extraordinary policy responses.

6.2. Change

Although the core framing remained consistent, the rhetoric surrounding immigration intensified significantly between 2016 and 2024. During the 2016 election cycle, immigration was primarily framed as a growing border crisis associated with illegal crossings, cartel activity, and weak border enforcement. By 2024, however, Fox News increasingly portrayed immigration as evidence of broader national decline and institutional collapse.

Rather than presenting border insecurity as a regional issue limited to the southern border, the 2024 coverage connected immigration to crime, inflation, urban disorder, and cultural instability across the United States. Immigration became symbolic of a wider breakdown in governance and national identity. This represented a significant escalation from the 2016 framing, which focused more narrowly on border enforcement and physical security.

The emotional intensity of the rhetoric also increased in 2024. In 2016, immigration was often described as a serious problem requiring immediate action. In 2024, the rhetoric frequently suggested that the United States was already experiencing the consequences of an “open border” and that national sovereignty itself was under direct threat. This shift transformed the framing from warning-oriented discourse into discourse centered on collapse and emergency. Additionally, partisan attribution became far more explicit in 2024. Fox News increasingly framed immigration not simply as a policy failure but as the direct result of Democratic leadership and governmental incompetence. This strengthened the connection between immigration discourse and broader partisan polarization within American political communication.

6.3. Mechanisms

Several mechanisms contributed to the securitization of immigration across both election cycles. One major mechanism was repetition. Fox News repeatedly used threat-oriented language and recurring narratives concerning invasion, criminality, and disorder. This repetition normalized the perception of immigration as a national security crisis rather than a complex policy issue. Another important mechanism involved selective sourcing and authority structures. Fox News programs frequently relied on Republican politicians, border patrol officials, law enforcement representatives, and conservative commentators as primary voices of authority. These guests reinforced narratives emphasizing insecurity, governmental failure, and the need for stronger enforcement policies. Perspectives from migrants, humanitarian organizations, or immigration advocates appeared far less frequently.

Visual framing also played a critical role. Segments commonly included footage of migrant crossings, border fencing, law enforcement patrols, surveillance imagery, and crowded detention facilities. By 2024, visual presentation became even more dramatic, often using drone footage, flashing graphics, and emergency-style visuals to intensify perceptions of crisis and instability. Finally, partisan framing served as a major mechanism through which immigration became linked to broader political narratives. Fox News increasingly connected immigration to themes of national decline, institutional weakness, crime, and cultural instability. These framing strategies transformed immigration into a symbolic issue representing broader anxieties concerning sovereignty, identity, and political control.

7. Discussion: Why This Framing Matters

7.1. Public Perception and Policy Imagination

The repeated portrayal of immigration as a national crisis significantly shapes public perception and policy imagination. Threat-based framing encourages audiences to perceive immigration through fear-oriented narratives focused on danger, instability, and national vulnerability. This can increase public support for restrictive immigration policies such as expanded border enforcement, deportation measures, detention programs, and border wall construction.

At the same time, this framing narrows the range of policy solutions considered politically acceptable. Humanitarian or reform-oriented approaches may increasingly appear unrealistic or dangerous when immigration is consistently associated with invasion and disorder. The framing therefore influences not only public attitudes toward migrants but also broader assumptions about what kinds of immigration policies are possible or legitimate.

7.2. Political Communication and Electoral Mobilization

Threat-based framing is especially effective during presidential election cycles because it generates emotional engagement and political mobilization. Immigration intersects with issues of race, national identity, sovereignty, crime, and cultural change, making it particularly vulnerable to emotionally charged political narratives.

Fox News coverage during both election cycles repeatedly emphasized these emotional dimensions. Rather than focusing primarily on technical policy discussions, the network frequently framed immigration as evidence of broader national decline and governmental failure. These narratives encouraged viewers to interpret immigration as one of the defining political crises facing the country. This dynamic reflects broader patterns within partisan political communication. Emotionally intense narratives concerning fear and insecurity can strengthen ideological loyalty, increase voter turnout, and deepen partisan polarization. Immigration therefore became not simply a policy issue but a symbolic issue central to electoral mobilization.

7.3. Commercial Incentives

The findings of this study also highlight the role of commercial incentives within partisan media systems. Outrage-driven coverage increases audience engagement by generating strong emotional reactions such as fear, anger, and anxiety. Fox News’ repeated emphasis on crisis narratives surrounding immigration reflects this broader commercial media logic.

Hoewe et al. (2020) describe Fox News as relying heavily on an “outrage-based” style of political discourse. Immigration is particularly effective within this framework because it can easily be connected to multiple forms of perceived instability, including crime, economic insecurity, and cultural change. Simplified narratives of invasion and crisis are often more emotionally engaging than nuanced policy discussions concerning asylum systems or labor markets.

As a result, immigration coverage may prioritize emotional intensity and audience engagement over complexity and contextualization. This contributes to the persistence and amplification of threat-based framing during election periods.

7.4. Limitations

This study has several limitations. First, the analysis focuses specifically on Fox News and therefore does not provide a systematic comparison with other cable news networks such as CNN or MSNBC. As a result, the study cannot fully assess the extent to which Fox News framing differs quantitatively or qualitatively from competing networks. Second, the study relies primarily on qualitative content analysis rather than large-scale quantitative coding. Although qualitative analysis allows for deeper examination of rhetoric, symbolism, and framing mechanisms, future research could strengthen these findings through broader statistical analysis of language patterns and framing frequency.

Finally, the study focuses primarily on selected flagship programs and election-related periods rather than the entirety of Fox News programming. While these programs are highly influential within conservative media discourse, they do not represent every dimension of immigration coverage across the network.

7.5. Future Research

Future research could expand this project in several ways. A larger quantitative study comparing immigration framing across multiple cable news networks would provide valuable comparative insight into partisan media dynamics. Researchers could also examine audience responses to threat-based framing through surveys or experimental studies measuring changes in political attitudes and policy preferences. Another important area for future research involves the relationship between television discourse and social media amplification. Immigration narratives originating on cable news are frequently circulated through digital political ecosystems, potentially increasing both their emotional intensity and political reach. Future scholarship could also explore how immigration framing differs across international contexts and how populist political movements in other countries use media narratives surrounding borders, migration, and national security.

8. Conclusion

This paper examined how Fox News framed immigration and the U.S.-Mexico border during the 2016 and 2024 presidential election cycles. Through qualitative analysis of flagship programs such as Hannity and Fox & Friends, the study found that Fox News consistently portrayed immigration as a national security threat and that this framing intensified during election periods.

Across both election cycles, immigration was framed through recurring narratives of invasion, criminality, disorder, and governmental failure. These narratives contributed to the securitization of immigration by presenting migration not as a policy issue involving humanitarian and economic complexity, but as an existential threat to national sovereignty and public safety.

Although the underlying framing remained relatively consistent, the rhetoric evolved significantly between 2016 and 2024. By 2024, threat narratives became more emotionally escalated and increasingly connected to broader themes of national decline and institutional collapse. Immigration was no longer framed solely as a border issue but as evidence of systemic political failure throughout the United States. Ultimately, this research demonstrates the important role partisan media organizations play in shaping political discourse and public understandings of immigration. Fox News functioned not merely as a passive transmitter of political information but as an active institutional actor involved in constructing and amplifying immigration-related threat narratives during periods of heightened electoral polarization.

Funding: This study received no funding.

Conflict of Interest: The authors declare no conflict of interest.

Informed Consent Statement/Ethics Approval: Not applicable.

Declaration of Generative AI and AI-assisted Technologies: This study has not used any generative AI tools or technologies in the preparation of this manuscript.