US President Joe Biden came under fire on Tuesday for appearing to refer to Republican Donald Trump’s supporters as “garbage” during an election campaign call.
Speaking in a video call with the nonprofit VotoLatino, Biden addressed the controversy that erupted after one of Trump’s warm-up speakers at a New York rally on Sunday referred to Puerto Rico as a “floating island of garbage.”
“The only garbage I see floating out there is his supporters,” said Biden. “His, his, his demonization of Latinos is unconscionable and it’s un-American.”
In a statement, the White House said Biden was referring to Trump’s rhetoric, not to his supporters.
“The President referred to the hateful rhetoric at the Madison Square Garden rally as ‘garbage,’” said White House spokesperson Andrew Bates.
Biden’s vice president, Kamala Harris, is locked in a too-close-to-call race against Trump for the White House, with Election Day just one week away.
The comments were seized upon by Trump’s campaign, with the Republican presidential hopeful calling them “terrible.”
“These people. Terrible, terrible — terrible to say a thing like that,” Trump said at a campaign rally in Pennsylvania.
He compared the comments to when Hillary Clinton — running against Trump for the presidency in 2016 — said half of the Republican’s supporters were “deplorables.”
