Former President Donald Trump is facing backlash after referring to America as a “garbage can.”
Trump, the 2024 Republican nominee for president, compared the U.S. to a trash receptacle during a rally in Tempe, Arizona, on Thursday. The former president suggested that Vice President Kamala Harris, his Democratic election opponent, had filled the country with human “garbage” by orchestrating “an invasion of criminal migrants.”
“When Kamala came in, she dismantled our border and threw open the gates to an invasion of criminal migrants,” Trump said. “We’re a dumping ground. We’re like a garbage can for the world. That’s what’s happened. That’s what’s happened to our … We’re like a garbage can.”
“It’s the first time I’ve ever said that,” he continued. “Every time I come up and talk about what they’ve done to our country, I get angry and angrier. First time I’ve ever said garbage can, but you know what? It’s a very accurate description.”
Former President Donald Trump is pictured during a campaign rally in Tempe, Arizona, on October 24. Trump referred to America as a “garbage can” during the rally, quickly sparking outrage from many.
REBECCA NOBLE/AFP
Video clips of the former president calling the country that he once led—and wants to lead again—a trash can quickly spread on social media, including in a post by the Harris campaign quoting Trump on X, formerly Twitter.
In an email to Newsweek, Trump campaign communications director Steven Cheung defended the former president’s remarks while arguing that Harris was responsible for illegal migrants treating the country “with disdain.”
“Kamala Harris has allowed terrorists and criminals into our country and they have wreaked havoc on Americans and communities across the country,” Cheung wrote. “They have killed, raped, and terrorized citizens and have treated our country with disdain.”
Others argued on X that the remarks showed Trump, who often campaigns while using patriotic rhetoric and touting symbols like the American flag, has contempt for the country.
“More fascist Language,” former Trump administration official Anthony Scaramucci wrote on X. “America and Americans are too good to stand alongside of this.”
“This is the polar opposite of what America was formed to stand for, & what has built us into the greatest power & economy in the world,” wrote producer and author Melissa Jo Peltier. “Yet we stand to lose all this because too many MAGAs hate the idea of brown people.”
“Donald Trump hates America,” wrote actor Jon Cryer.
“I love this country,” podcaster Joanne “JoJoFromJerz” Carducci wrote. “And I believe that loving our country means seeing where it needs work, and then doing the work. We are indeed imperfect. But we have never been, we are not now and we will never be, a ‘garbage can for the world.’ Anyone who says we are, is welcome to leave.”
“A true American patriot makes his closing argument to America,” quipped Trump critic and former federal prosecutor Ron Filipkowski while sharing a clip of the former president’s remarks.
“1st presidential candidate to call USA ‘a garbage can,'” MSNBC host Lawrence O’Donnell wrote.
“Hitler-loving pile of filth is out here campaigning by calling OUR country ‘a garbage can for the world,'” wrote writer Polly Sigh. “F*** this a**hole.”
Bloomberg Business reporter Riley Ray Griffin, who attended the Arizona rally, wrote in a post to X that a woman seated behind her shouted “they’re eating the cats” after Trump made the “garbage can” remark—a reference to the ex-president falsely claiming that Haitian migrants are abducting and eating pet cats and dogs in Springfield, Ohio.
