Later Thursday, “aliens.gov” and “alien.gov” went live, redirecting to a page on the official White House website. Maintaining the “alien” motif with a graphic design reminiscent of The X-Files and other sci-fi works, the website invited visitors to scroll down to read grandiose text.

“They walk among us,” the text scroll begins. “For 60 years, the U.S. government has kept a closely guarded secret. Aliens have been walking among us, living in our neighborhoods, and interacting with us in our daily lives. They’ve shopped in the same stores, attended the same classes as our children, and lived seemingly normal human existences. With one exception — they do not belong here.”

Eventually, the website drops the pretense and reveals itself as a tool of President Trump’s hard-line immigration policies, with “aliens” referring to undocumented immigrants. The website includes a ticker counting the number of “encounters” with unauthorized immigrants that have occurred during an unspecified time frame, as well as an interactive map of the United States documenting arrests and detentions made by Immigration and Customs Enforcement. The website also includes a link visitors can use to send ICE tips concerning “suspicious aliens.”

Disappointment, anger and ridicule for ‘alien’ site launch

Given the Trump administration’s focus on targeting and demonizing undocumented immigrants, and the president’s shaky relationship with the truth, it is not surprising that “aliens.gov” was a bait-and-switch campaign for an ICE-affiliated webpage. Nevertheless, the stunt has drawn negative reactions online.

“This is disgraceful! I literally do not have words!! And this comment is not a political statement!” read one reaction post. “Dehumanizing illegal immigrants and equating them to extraterrestrials is reprehensible. The White House spent all this time and money just for this alien marketing campaign, all this BS about the UFO files just to do this!!”

Many people looking for information about life from other worlds were disappointed and angry about the fakeout. “I gotta be honest – I f***ing hate this,” one comment read. “There is clearly something going on with UAP (should have never changed from UFO) and conflating “illegal aliens” with “aliens/extraterrestrials” is f***ing stupid.”

Others accused the White House of attempting to distract Americans from quality-of-life issues like affordable housing and health care.