Former President Donald Trump called for forgiveness toward President Biden after the president criticized Trump supporters in relation to comments made about Puerto Rico at a recent rally, Fox News reported Tuesday.
Speaking to a packed crowd at the PPL Center in Allentown, Pennsylvania on Tuesday, Trump referenced Biden's comments while drawing parallels to Hillary Clinton's "deplorable" remarks from the 2016 campaign, according to Fox News reporting.
"Wow. That's terrible," Trump said at the rally. "And then she said irredeemable. That didn't work out." The exchange began after comments about Puerto Rico were made at Trump's Madison Square Garden rally on Sunday. Biden later responded by saying, "The only garbage I see floating out there is his supporters," adding that Trump's "demonization of Latinos is unconscionable and it's un-American," Fox News reported.
Trump urged his supporters to show clemency toward Biden. "Garbage, I think, is worse," Trump said in comments reported by Fox News. "But he doesn't know. You have to please forgive him." The former president suggested that Biden was unaware of what he was saying: "Please forgive him for not knowing what he said," Trump told the crowd, according to Fox News. "These people are terrible, terrible, terrible to say a thing like that. But he really doesn't know. He really honestly, he doesn't. And I'm convinced that he likes me more than he likes Kamala. But that's a terrible thing."
Biden's original comments came as he defended Puerto Ricans, stating, "I don't know the Puerto Rican that I know... or Puerto Rico where I'm – in my home state of Delaware – they're good, decent, honorable people," Fox News reported. After receiving swift backlash, Biden took to X to clarify his remarks: "Earlier today I referred to the hateful rhetoric about Puerto Rico spewed by Trump's supporters at his Madison Square Garden rally as garbage – which is the only word I can think of to describe it," he posted. "His demonization of Latinos is unconscionable. That's all I meant to say. The comments at that rally don't reflect who we are as a nation." White House spokesperson Andrew Bates told Fox News' Jacqui Heinrich that Biden was specifically "referring to the hateful rhetoric at the Madison Square Garden rally as 'garbage.'" Bates explained that the president was responding to a joke by comedian Tony Hinchcliffe, who had compared Puerto Rico to an island of floating "garbage" in the middle of the ocean. The heated exchange occurred just as Vice President Kamala Harris was preparing to take the stage for a major rally in Washington, DC.
