Former President Donald Trump hit back hard on Tuesday, moments after being informed that President Joe Biden had referred to Trump supporters as “garbage.”
At a campaign rally in Allentown, Pennsylvania, a week to the day before the Nov. 5 election, Trump stood by as Florida Sen. Marco Rubio delivered the news to a packed house.
Then Trump responded by slamming Biden, and his would-be successor, Vice President Kamala Harris.
WATCH: Sen. Marco Rubio breaks news that Joe Biden called Trump supporters “GARBAGE” at rally in Allentown, PA pic.twitter.com/e7hsKQOFSM
— RSBN 🇺🇸 (@RSBNetwork) October 30, 2024
“I have breaking news for you, Mr. President. You may not have heard this, but just moments ago, Joe Biden stated that our supporters are garbage,” Rubio said on the stage with Trump in Allentown’s PPL Center as the crowd erupted in boos.
“He’s talking about the Border Patrol, he’s talking about nurses, he’s talking about teachers, he’s talking about everyday Americans who love their country and want to dream big again and support you, Mr. President.
“We are not garbage. We’re patriots who love America. Thank you for running, Mr. President.”
Trump then took the microphone to compare the comment to former Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton’s remark in the 2016 election that Trump supporters were in a “basket of deplorables.”
“That didn’t work out,” he said. “Garbage, I think, is worse, right?”
He then mocked Biden’s now-legendary cognitive decline — “please forgive him, for he knoweth not what he said” — then got serious.
“But he really doesn’t know, honestly, he doesn’t,” Trump said. “And I’m convinced that he likes me more than he likes Kamala.”
Biden was commenting on an ill-received joke at Trump’s rally Sunday in New York’s Madison Square Garden, where the punchline referred to Puerto Rico as a “floating island of garbage.”
It’s a line Democrats have tried to turn into a controversy, and Biden’s line was just another attempt to rally leftist supporters. In that, it likely failed as much as anything else — as everything else — in the Biden presidency.
Trump’s answer Tuesday was an off-the-cuff response that both highlighted the mental decline of Joe Biden — the man who’s still the president of the United States — and the unsuitability of the woman Democrats have put in Biden’s place on the ticket.
It also framed the stakes in the election perfectly.
But in a later response on the social media platform X, Trump went even further.
While I am running a campaign of positive solutions to save America, Kamala Harris is running a campaign of hate. She has spent all week comparing her political opponents to the most evil mass murderers in history. Now, on top of everything, Joe Biden calls our supporters…
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) October 30, 2024
“You can’t lead America if you don’t love the American People. Kamala Harris and Joe Biden have shown they are both unfit to be President of the United States,” he wrote.
“I am proud to lead the biggest, broadest, and most important political coalition in American history. We are welcoming historic numbers of Latinos, African Americans, Asian Americans, and citizens of every race, religion, color, and creed. It is my desire to be the President of all the people.”
