Sen. Tommy Tuberville (R-Ala.) welcomed former President Donald Trump’s xenophobic comments about migrants “poisoning the blood” of the U.S. — but said he was disappointed that they didn’t go far enough.
“I’m mad he wasn’t even tougher than that,” the Trump ally told The Independent’s Eric Garcia on Tuesday. “When you see what’s happening at the border? We’re being overrun. They’re taking us over.”
At a Saturday rally in New Hampshire, Trump had declared that people coming to the U.S. are “poisoning the blood of our country” — language that has been compared to that of dictators such as Adolf Hitler and Benito Mussolini. He used similar language in an interview earlier this year, saying at the time that people are coming to the U.S. “with disease.”
In recent weeks, Trump has also referred to his political foes as “vermin,” vowing to “root” them out, and pledged to be a “dictator” only on “day one” if he retakes the White House.
President Joe Biden’s reelection campaign criticized Trump in a Saturday statement, saying that he had “parroted Adolf Hitler” while “running for president on a promise to rule as a dictator and threaten American democracy.”
On Capitol Hill, most Republicans declined to respond to questions about Trump’s latest outburst or simply claimed that they hadn’t yet reviewed it.
“I got nothing for you,” Sen. John Kennedy (R-La.) told reporters Monday.
Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), another loyal Trump ally, downplayed the former president’s remarks during a Sunday interview on NBC’s “Meet the Press.”
“You know, we’re talking about language? I could care less what language people use as long as we get it right,” Graham said, referring to the influx of migrants at the U.S.-Mexico border and the resulting negotiations in Washington over tougher immigration and border policy.
However, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), who rarely answers questions about Trump, offered a rare retort on Tuesday.
“It strikes me that it didn’t bother him when he appointed Elaine Chao Secretary of Transportation,” McConnell said of the ex-president, whom he has left the door open to supporting in the 2024 presidential election.
McConnell and Chao, who are married, are both frequent targets of Trump’s attacks. Last year, Trump hurled racist insults at Chao, referring to her as McConnell’s “China loving wife, Coco Chow!”
Democrats, meanwhile, offered more direct criticism of Trump. Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) called Trump’s comments “despicable” while Sen. Ben Ray Luján (D-N.M.) said Trump “continues to remind the American people why he’s unfit to be president.”