Karine Jean-Pierre, the White House press secretary, reportedly engaged in a contentious exchange on Wednesday when she denied that President Joe Biden had reportedly referred to individuals who were in favor of Republican nominee Donald Trump as “garbage.”
In response to comedian Tony Hinchcliffe’s description of Puerto Rico as a “floating island of garbage” at a rally on Sunday, Biden appeared to refer to Trump supporters as “garbage” during a Zoom call on Tuesday.
The press secretary engaged in a heated exchange with Aamer Madhani of The Associated Press, denying that the president had made any reference to Trump supporters in spite of direct video evidence to the contrary.
“Just to clarify, he was not calling Trump supporters garbage which is why he put out, this is why he wanted to make sure that we put out a statement that clarified what he meant and what he was trying to say … He was regarding to the comedian, and I quote ‘I refer to the hateful rhetoric about Puerto Rico by Trump’s supporter at his Madison Square Garden rally as garbage, which is the only word I can think of to describe it,’” Jean-Pierre remarked.
“‘His demonization of Latinos is unconscionable, that’s all I meant to say. The comments do not reflect who we are as a nation.’ To your other question that you asked, no, he does not view Trump supporters or anybody who supports Trump as garbage. That is not what he views.”She maintained that the president had only made reference to Hinchcliffe’s jest and “hateful rhetoric.” she continued.
The press secretary stated that Biden will not tolerate and will publicly condemn “hateful rhetoric.”
Madhani then inquired of Jean-Pierre whether the president harbors any remorse for not articulating his thoughts more plainly and for expressing them during Vice President Kamala Harris’s concluding remarks to the nation on Tuesday evening at the National Mall.
“Does he have any regret for not being more, his language was not specific. If you were listening to that video … if you were any sort of normal person listening to that video or looking at the clips online, you can come to the conclusion that he was calling, at minimum this one man garbage, or if not, all Trump supporters garbage. Does he regret not being more precise with his language? … Does he have any regret for how this shadowed Vice President Harris’ campaign?” Madhani inquired.
“So a couple of things there, there’s a lot that you laid out. Look, the president wanted to clarify because he understood that what he was saying was being taken out of context. So he wanted to be very clear about what he was trying to say. And I just read that out once over, you all have the tweet or the statement that’s on X … and he was talking about hateful rhetoric, and we’ve called out hateful rhetoric from here. We have. Obviously, this hateful rhetoric was about a particular community, the Puerto Rican community, they are Americans, this is a community that he respects and he wanted to make sure that he called that out.” Jean-Pierre said in response.
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