Former President Donald Trump was criticized after telling conservative radio host Hugh Hewitt that immigrants are murderers who are bringing "a lot of bad genes" into the country.
During a Monday interview with Hewitt, Trump shifted a question about Kamala Harris’ plan to provide funds to homebuilders into a tirade against immigrants entering the U.S.
Trump claimed that the Biden administration’s policies have allowed 13,000 murderers—many of whom he alleged had “murdered far more than one person”—to enter the country and stated, “they’re now happily living in the United States.”
Trump—who once again took an opportunity to spread disinformation about Vice President Kamala Harris regarding the humanitarian crisis at the southern border—said:
“When you look at the things that she proposes, they’re so far off she has no clue. How about allowing people to come to an open border, 13,000 of which were murderers. Many of them murdered far more than one person, and they’re now happily living in the United States."
"You know, now a murderer, I believe this, it’s in their genes. And we got a lot of bad genes in our country right now. They left, they had 425,000 people come into our country that shouldn’t be here, that are criminals.”
You can hear what Trump said in the video below.
Trump's remarks were harshly condemned.
Immigration remains a focal point for the 2024 election and Trump's remarks continue to draw both ridicule and criticism.
Trump has vowed to take a tough stance on immigration, promising significant measures if he were to return to the White House, including what he's termed "the largest domestic deportation operation in American history."
Trump has continued to garner criticism for praising authoritarian leaders and repeating anti-immigrant and racist language.
In December 2023 he notoriously claimed that immigrants are "poisoning the blood of our country," echoing fascists like genocidal Nazi Party leader Adolf Hitler, who wrote about "blood poisoning" in his book Mein Kampf.
Trump has ramped up his violent and inflammatory rhetoric in recent months, telling a crowd in November that his political opponents are "vermin" that he must "root out," a declaration that angered people on both sides of the aisle to say nothing of historians who've sounded the alarm about what the 2024 election could signal for the future of American democracy.
@ElizLanders/X