WATERLOO, Iowa (news agencies) — Former President Donald Trump on Tuesday defended his comments about migrants crossing the southern border “poisoning the blood” of America, and he reinforced the message while denying any similarities to fascist writings others had noted.
“I never read ‘Mein Kampf,’” Trump said at a campaign rally in Waterloo, Iowa, referencing Adolf Hitler’s fascist manifesto.
Immigrants in the U.S. illegally, Trump said Tuesday, are “destroying the blood of our country, they’re destroying the fabric of our country.”
In the speech to more than 1,000 supporters from a podium flanked by Christmas trees in red MAGA hats, Trump responded to mounting criticism about his anti-immigrant “blood” purity rhetoric over the weekend. Several politicians and extremism experts have noted his language echoed writings from Hitler about the “purity” of Aryan blood, which underpinned Nazi Germany’s systematic murder of millions of Jews and other “undesirables” before and during World War II.
As illegal border crossings surge, topping 10,000 some days in December, Trump continued to blast Biden for allowing migrants to “pour into our country.” He alleged, without offering evidence, that they bring crime and potentially disease with them.
“They come from Africa, they come from Asia, they come from South America,” he said, lamenting what he said was a “border catastrophe.”
Trump made no mention of the Colorado Supreme Court’s decision Tuesday to disqualify him from the state’s ballot under the U.S. Constitution’s insurrection clause, though his campaign blasted out a fundraising email about it during his speech.
The former president has long used inflammatory language about immigrants coming to the U.S., dating back to his campaign launch in 2015, when he said immigrants from Mexico are “bringing drugs, they’re bringing crime, they’re rapists.”
But Trump has espoused increasingly authoritarian messages in his third campaign, vowing to renew and add to his effort to bar citizens from certain Muslim-majority countries, and to expand “ ideological screening ” for people immigrating to the U.S. He said he would be a dictator on “day one” only, in order to close the border and increase drilling.
In Waterloo on Tuesday, Trump’s supporters in the crowd said his border policies were effective and necessary, even if he doesn’t always say the right thing.
“I don’t know if he says the right words all of the time,” said 63-year-old Marylee Geist, adding that just because “you’re not fortunate enough to be born in this country,” doesn’t mean “you don’t get to come here.”
“But it should all be done legally,” she added.
It’s about the volume of border crossings and national security, said her husband, John Geist, 68.
“America is the land of opportunity, however, the influx — it needs to be kept to a certain level,” he said. “The amount of undocumented immigrants that come through and you don’t know what you’re getting, things aren’t regulated properly.”
Alex Litterer and her dad, Tom, of Charles City said they were concerned about migrants crossing the southern border, especially because the U.S. doesn’t have the resources to support that influx. But the 22-year-old said she didn’t agree with Trump’s comments, adding that immigrants who come to the country legally contribute to the country’s character and bring different perspectives.
Polling shows most Americans agree, with two-thirds saying the country’s diverse population makes the U.S. stronger.
But Trump’s “blood” purity message might resonate with some voters.
About a third of Americans overall worry that more immigration is causing U.S.-born Americans to lose their economic, political and cultural influence, according to a late 2021 poll by The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research.
Jackie Malecek, 50, of Waterloo said she likes Trump for the reasons that many people don’t — how outspoken he is and “that he’s a little bit of a loose cannon.” But she thought Trump saying immigrants are “poisoning the blood” took it a little too far.
“I’m very much for cutting off what’s happening at the border now. There’s too many people pouring in here right now, I watch it every single day,” Malecek said. “But that wording is not what I would have chosen to say.”
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