Former US President Donald Trump has announced that he will visit Springfield, Ohio, which is at the centre of a rumour — widely discredited as baseless — about Haitian immigrants killing and eating local residents' pets. According to AFP, the Republican presidential nominee told supporters at a rally in Long Island, New York, that he would visit Springfield "in the next two weeks”. He also said he would visit Aurora, Colorado, another city targetted by Trump in his aggressive attacks on the immigration policy under the Biden-Harris administration. In his presidential debate last week, Trump mentioned Aurora as he claimed that immigrants were "violently... taking over cities, taking over buildings". Trump and his supporters have been accused of making "grossly exaggerated" claims about the city being overrun by Venezuelan gangs.
"I'm going to Springfield and I'm going to Aurora," Trump said in his speech on Wednesday. “You may never see me again, but that’s okay,” he added, to chuckles from the audience.
His Long Island speech was filled with relentless attacks on illegal immigrants, where he described them as "animals", "terrorists", and "gang members who are destroying Americans' way of life". Such hardline rhetoric has become central to Trump’s campaign against Democratic nominee Kamala Harris, as he seeks to portray her as lenient on immigration. He has accused Harris of allowing millions of people into the US illegally. "We have massive numbers of terrorists coming into our country," he said during his speech, according to AFP. If he comes back to power, he added, he will “ship them back to their country”. If immigrants come back, they will “pay a hell of a price”, he added.
Meanwhile, Harris, in a speech at the Congressional Hispanic Caucus Institute annual leadership conference, said on Wednesday that the nation can find both a pathway to citizenship for those who want to come and at the same time secure the border. “We can do both, and we must do both,” she said.
According to an Associated Press report, Trump has an advantage over Harris in opinion polls on whom voters trust to better handle the issue.