AP Europe describes migration 'crisis' facing Spain, despite wire service avoiding term for US border surge

AP Europe used the word “crisis” on Twitter on Tuesday to describe, despite the Associated Press deciding not to use the term to describe the overwhelming influx of migrants on the U.S.-Mexico border.

"The sudden influx of migrants has fueled the diplomatic spat between Rabat and Madrid over the disputed Western Sahara region and created a humanitarian crisis for Ceuta, the Spanish city of 85,000 in North Africa on the Mediterranean Sea, separated from Morocco by a double-wide, 10-meter (32-feet) fence," the AP's Enata Brito and Aritz Parra reported from Ceuta, a Spanish autonomous city on the North African coast. The tweet from AP Europe was published the same day the Washington Free Beacon filed a report on how the wire service has continually downplayed the surge on the U.S.-Mexico border. In March alone, border patrol encountered 172,000 migrants, thousands of whom were unaccompanied children. But in a memo to reporters in late March, the AP concluded the situation on the U.S. border "does not fit the classic dictionary definition of a crisis." They instructed reporters to only use "accurate and neutral" terms in reporting on the increase — and to "avoid hyperbole in calling anything a crisis or an emergency."