US Election Live Blog: Joe Biden calls Trump supporters ‘garbage’

US President Joe Biden has disastrously undermined Kamala Harris’s campaign for election by appearing to call Donald Trump’s supporters “garbage”. Follow updates.

US President Joe Biden has disastrously undermined Kamala Harris’s campaign for election by appearing to call Donald Trump’s supporters “garbage”, less than a week out from polling day.

Speaking during a fundraising call, Mr Biden made the remark in a jumbled bid to ram home an attack on Mr Trump over a speaker at his weekend rally in New York who called Puerto Rico a “floating island of garbage”.

“The only garbage I see floating out there is his supporters, his, his demonisation of Latinos is unconscionable and it’sun-American,” the President said.

His comments were immediately likened to an infamous moment in the 2016 campaign, when then Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton described half of Mr Trump’s supporters as a “basket of deplorables”.

Mr Biden later argued in a statement that he was referring to “the hateful rhetoric about Puerto Rico spewed by Trump’s supporterat his Madison Square Garden rally”.

“His demonisation of Latinos is unconscionable. That’s all I meant to say,” he said.

Mr Trump’s running mate JD Vance accused him of “attacking half the country”.

“This is disgusting … There’s no excuse for this,” he said.

Other key moments in the campaign today include:

*Analysis: Harris final pitch ‘an act of hope’

*Polling for Ms Harris and Mr Trump has become even tighter

*Former first lady Melania Trump delivered a rare interview to confirm her husband is not a Nazi

*Analysis: Eight reasons why Mr Trump can win the election  

FOLLOW UPDATES BELOW:

Originally published as US Election Live Blog: Joe Biden calls Trump supporters ‘garbage’