Donald Trump’s presidential campaign was in damage control Monday after backlash against comedian Tony Hinchcliffe’s “garbage island” joke about Puerto Rico at Sunday’s rally at Madison Square Garden.
‘It was a diverse group of people. “The joke backfired,” campaign spokesperson Karoline Leavitt said in an appearance on ‘Fox & Friends,’ where she answered a direct question about the controversy.
She appeared after the campaign took the unusual step of distancing itself from comments by one of the speakers at Trump’s big rally at Madison Square Garden on Sunday, in contrast to Trump’s typical mantra of “fight, fight, fight.” “.
Co-host Steve Doocy asked Leavitt about the comments and called them offensive.
‘You know, this morning, the mainstream media picked up on the comedian’s comments, which were offensive, and they have been reported by the campaign and everyone else. What happened to that?
Leavitt did not discuss how the jokes came to be on the show or whether they were vetted, responding, “Look, it was a comedian who made a tasteless joke.”
Donald Trump’s campaign continued trying to clean up a joke comedian Tony Hinchcliffe made at his Madison Square Garden rally calling Puerto Rico a ‘floating island of garbage.’
‘Obviously, that joke does not reflect the views of President Trump or our campaign. And I think it’s sad that the media picks up on a joke made by a comedian, instead of the truths shared by the phenomenal lineup of speakers we had,” he added, blaming the media, which Trump called the “enemy of the people” in his own comments.
‘And the crowd didn’t care, did they?’ she said. ‘Again, it was a diverse group of people. The prank fell flat, but the crowd was there because they know who President Trump is and they know he wants to be a president for all Americans.
There is an estimated population of more than 400,000 Puerto Ricans in battleground Pennsylvania, as Trump’s critics were quick to point out Sunday night. (Residents of Puerto Rico and other US territories cannot vote in US presidential elections.)
“I don’t know if you know this, but there’s literally a floating island of trash in the middle of the ocean right now,” Hinchcliffe said in his onstage joke. “I think it’s called Puerto Rico.”
“This joke does not reflect the views of President Trump or the campaign,” Trump campaign senior adviser Danielle Alvarez said Sunday as the controversy escalated.
Hinchcliffe, who has a popular podcast, had been included in the official event schedule at an event carefully organized by the campaign just over a week before Election Day.
‘And the crowd didn’t care, did they? Again, this was a diverse group of people. “The joke backfired,” said Trump campaign spokeswoman Karoline Leavitt, as the campaign attempted to clean up the comment to avoid potential backlash.
Donald Trump’s campaign continued to distance itself from comedian Tony Hinchcliffe’s comments at Trump’s Madison Square Garden rally on Sunday.
Former Fox host Tucker Carlson mocked Harris’ ethnicity even as he suggested she couldn’t possibly win in a race that polls show is close.
“It’s going to be pretty hard to look at us and say, ‘You know what? “Kamala Harris, she got 85 million votes because she’s so impressive as the first low-IQ Samoan-Malaysian former California prosecutor to be elected president,” he said.
Another speaker called Vice President Kamala Harris “the antichrist.”
Leavitt also defended the overall tone of the rally when he appeared on camera early Monday morning.
“It was happiness and joy. And there was such a diverse group of people in that sold-out stadium. There was not an empty seat. “There were black Americans, Latin Americans, Jewish Americans, men and women of all ages who supported President Trump and were not afraid to show it,” he said.
Another comment from Hinchcliffe began: ‘These Latinos love having babies too. Just know that they do. Then he added: “There is no way to withdraw. They don’t do that. They come in, just as they did with our country.
“Republicans are the party with a good sense of humor,” he said after that observation.
Another speaker, businessman Grant Cardone, said Harris “and her pimps will destroy our country.”
At one point, Hinchliffe referred to a “black guy with a thing on his head” in the crowd. ‘That’s one of my friends.
‘That’s one of my friends. Last night he had a Halloween party. We had fun. We cut watermelons together. It was incredible.’
Republicans were quick to condemn the comments. Senator Rick Scott of Florida, who is fighting former Representative Debbie Mucarsel-Powell, wrote: ‘This joke backfired for a reason. It’s not funny and it’s not true. Puerto Ricans are amazing people and amazing Americans!’
Racist comments at the rally drew opprobrium from the media, with the New York Times headline “Grievances, Misogyny and Racism.”
Even before it began, Democrats had tried to link Trump’s return to his former hometown to a Nazi rally at the Garden in 1939.
“Donald Trump has organized this huge rally at Madison Square Garden,” Harris’ running mate Tim Walz said Sunday in Nevada. “There’s a direct parallel to a big rally that took place in the mid-1930s at Madison Square Garden. And don’t think he doesn’t know exactly what they’re doing there for a second,” he said.