Former President Donald Trump was greeted at a Wisconsin airport Wednesday by a “big, beautiful MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN Garbage Truck.”
The stunt comes one day after President Biden, 81, referred to Trump supporters as “garbage” on a campaign call at the White House, denouncing comments made by comic Tony Hinchcliffe, in which he called Puerto Rico a “floating island of garbage” at the Republican nominee’s Madison Square Garden rally on Sunday.
“The only garbage I see floating out there is his supporters. His demonization of Latinos is unconscionable, and it’s un-American,” Biden said during a call with Voto Latino Group, as Vice President Kamala Harris rallied at the nearby Ellipse in Washington, DC, stressing how the Democratic Party would unify the country.
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Republicans blasted the insult and drew immediate comparisons to then-Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton’s remark in 2016 that half of Trump’s supporters should be put into a “basket of deplorables.”
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Biden and the White House tried to temper the comment by editing the official transcript to put an apostrophe in “supporters” — suggesting the president was referring solely to Hinchcliffe.
The commander-in-chief also tried to walk back the jab on X, writing, “his demonizations of Latinos is unconscionable. That’s all I meant to say.”
The Harris-Walz campaign also rushed out an ad tying Hinchliffe’s comment to the aftermath of Hurricane Maria in 2017, in which Harris narrated: “I will never forget what Donald Trump did. He abandoned the island and offered nothing more than paper towels and insults.”
Trump has since distanced himself from Hinchcliffe, who drew widespread, bipartisan backlash after his opening.
When asked if he owes Puerto Rico an apology, Trump, while sitting in the garbage truck, claimed he didn’t know “anything about a comedian” and then professed his “love” for the Caribbean island, an unincorporated territory of the United States.
“Nobody has done more for Puerto Rico than me. I took care of them when they had the big hurricanes. Nobody gets along better with Puerto Rico and the Puerto Rican people than me. They love me and I love them,” he said.
“I don’t know anything about the comedian. I don’t know who he is. I heard he made a statement but it’s a statement that he made. He’s a comedian. What can I tell you? You put comedians up, and I guess he went on early in the show.”
Hinchcliffe has since defended his controversial remark, insisting it was a joke.
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