President Joe Biden moved to clarify his remarks about the Donald Trump rally at Madison Square Garden on Sunday after Republicans pounced on a comment they said demeaned supporters of the former president.
Biden participated in a call with Voto Latino on Tuesday night in which he lambasted comedian Tony Hinchcliffe’s racist set at the New York City rally. Hinchcliffe had called Puerto Rico an “island of garbage” and made other racist and antisemitic remarks. Biden, speaking about the comedy set, defended Puerto Ricans before seeming to call Trump’s supporters garbage themselves.
“In my home state of Delaware, they’re good, decent honourable people,” Biden said of Puerto Ricans. “The only garbage I see floating out there is his supporters… his demonisation of Latinos is unconscionable, and it’s un-American.”
“It’s totally contrary to everything we’ve done, everything we’ve been,” Biden added.
Andrew Bates, a senior deputy press secretary at the White House, clarified that Biden was referring to the overarching rhetoric at the Manhattan rally as “garbage,” not the people there to support Trump. He released a transcript that included an apostrophe in the president’s remarks ― “his supporter’s demonisation” ― to note the president was criticising Hinchcliffe’s words.
Biden later released a statement elaborating on his remarks, saying the comments at Trump’s rally did not reflect “who we are as a nation.”
“Earlier today I referred to the hateful rhetoric about Puerto Rico spewed by Trump’s supporter at his Madison Square Garden rally as garbage — which is the only word I can think of to describe it,” the president said. “His demonization of Latinos is unconscionable. That’s all I meant to say.”
The comments were quickly seized upon by Trump’s allies and his running mate, Senator JD Vance of Ohio.
“Just moments ago, Joe Biden stated that our supporters are garbage,” Senator Marco Rubio (Republican, Florida) said at Trump’s rally in Allentown, Pennsylvania, on Tuesday night, drawing boos from the crowd. “He’s talking about the Border Patrol, he’s talking about nurses … he’s talking about everyday Americans.”
“I hope their campaign is about to apologise for what Joe Biden just said,” Rubio went on. “We are not garbage. We are patriots who love America.”
Trump had a terse reply on stage after hearing the news onstage, calling Biden’s comments “terrible” and comparing them to his 2016 rival Hillary Clinton’s remark that half of Trump’s base could be put into a “basket of deplorables.”
“Remember Hillary, she said ‘deplorable,’” Trump recalled. “That didn’t work out.… Garbage I think is worse?”
“Please forgive him,” Trump added of Biden. “Because he not knoweth what he said.”
Vance circulated a video of Biden’s remarks on X, formerly Twitter, and challenged media networks that “obsessively covered a joke from a comedian” to do the same for the president.
“Will they even report honestly on this disgusting behavior from our present leadership?” the senator asked.
On Monday, Vance said he was “so over” people getting offended at “every little thing” when asked about Hinchcliffe’s racist remarks, saying he hadn’t even heard them.