This article presents moral dilemmas that arise when expressing an argument persuades citizens to support rights for migrants, but also persuades citizens to support rights for some migrants and not others. We draw upon an original survey experiment to illustrate versions of these dilemmas.

Causal mechanisms' portability and their predictions in sometimes counterfactual settings point to the value of studies with details of interactions and/or convenience samples that depart from those in the proximate contexts of the phenomena of interest. The proper role of such contexts must be construed within an explanatory framework attentive to the nature and properties of relevant causal mechanisms.