Trump says the U.S. is ‘like a garbage can for the world’ as he dials up immigration rhetoric
The former president has increasingly turned his focus to the border and undocumented immigrants in the closing stretch of the election.
Donald Trump said Thursday the U.S. is “like a garbage can” for the rest of the world because of its border policies during an immigration-focused rally in Tempe, Arizona, less than two weeks out from Election Day.
“They unleashed an army of migrant gangs waging a campaign of violence,” said Trump, who regularly uses dehumanizing language when he talks about undocumented immigrants. “We’re a dumping ground. We’re like a garbage can for the world.”
Immigration has been a major focus for Trump throughout the campaign, when he has highlighted stories about undocumented immigrants committing crimes and blamed them for a surge in violence.
Former President Donald Trump speaks Thursday at a rally in Tempe, Ariz.Anna Moneymaker / Getty Images
Border crossings are at the lowest levels since President Joe Biden took office in 2021. In September, Border Patrol agents made fewer than 54,000 apprehensions of immigrants trying to cross the U.S., the fewest since August 2020, when Trump was still in the White House.
In battleground Arizona on Thursday, Trump also repeated his promise to end sanctuary cities, his call for the death penalty if an undocumented immigrant kills a U.S. citizen, his plan to ask Congress for 10,000 new border patrol agents, and his pledge to resurrect his so-called Stay in Mexico policy, which required migrants to remain in Mexico while they awaited asylum hearings. Biden’s administration ended the policy.
“You got millions of people pouring in,” Trump said. “And we are just not going to let it all happen.”
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