The joke about "Puerto Rico is a garbage island" the US campaign inflames

Hardly the comedian Tony Hinchcliffe he could imagine unleashing a landslide in the US election campaign with a joke. At a Trump rally, the comedian called Puerto Rico, an American territory in the Caribbean, “a floating island of garbage.” An insult whose echo was also felt in the Puerto Rican diaspora, which according to the Pew Research Center has six million people in the 50 American states.

US President Joe Biden is under attack for calling supporters of White House candidate and former Republican President Donald Trump “garbage“.

“The only garbage I see floating around here are his supporters,” the president of the United States said during an election video call: his was a comment on the racist statements of a comedian, who spoke at a Trump rally in New York had compared Puerto Rico to a “floating island of garbage.”

“Joe Biden and Kamala Harris hate America and don’t deserve another four years,” Karoline Leavitt, spokeswoman for the Republican candidate, said in a statement to the White House. “Kamala must answer for this shameful attack on tens of millions of Americans.”

“It’s terrible to say something like that,” Donald Trump said at a campaign rally in Allentown, Pennsylvania, with his running mate J.D. Vance calling Joe Biden’s comments “disgusting.” Interviewed on Fox News Tuesday night, Donald Trump distanced himself from the comedian’s comments, claiming not to know who he is and stating that he shouldn’t have been on stage.

Joke poorly digested by Puerto Rican citizens, who contested Trump in Pennsylvania. “Immigrants make America great”: outside an election meeting of the Republican candidate, around fifty protesters took up the former president’s slogan to express their anger. Also yelling “Trump, fuera!” (“Trump, out!”), these protesters protested the arrival of the billionaire in Allentown, a city with a Hispanic majority in the key state in the electoral race for the White House.