Donald Trump’s vow on immigrants during Turning Point Action rally in Michigan
Former US president Donald Trump has issued a chilling promise on what will happen if he is re-elected as he unleashes a new strategy to target a certain group of voters.
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Former US president Donald Trump has vowed that the largest deportation operation in American history will be conducted if he is re-elected to power.
Addressing a gathering of the controversial conservative group Turning Point Action in Detroit, the Republican presidential candidate blamed immigrants for stealing jobs and government resources as he courted hardcore conservatives as well as Black voters in the battleground state of Michigan.
“The people coming across the border — all those millions of people — they’re inflicting tremendous harm to our Black population and to our Hispanic population,” Mr Trump told a cheering crowd of thousands of conservative activists packed into a vast convention hall.
“They’re not human beings. They’re animals,” he said later in referencing members of violent immigrant gangs and echoing comments he has made previously.
At a separate appearance in Michigan, Mr Trump met with Black voters as he courted a community that largely supported his rival Joe Biden four years ago but has seen notable numbers of African-Americans shift allegiance ahead of November’s presidential rematch.
Speaking at the 180 Church in Detroit, Mr Trump suggested he may name a Black politician, Byron Donalds, as his running mate — a strategy aimed at peeling minority support away from Mr Biden in a tight race.
“Would you like to be VP?” he asked Mr Donalds after acknowledging the 45-year-old congressman from Florida was on his vice presidential shortlist.
“I think he would,” the 78-year-old Mr Trump said, turning to the cheering crowd of several hundred. “I tell you one thing, he’d be a good one. too.”
Trump’s roundtable with Black civic, religious and business leaders in Detroit came as his campaign announced a “Black Americans for Trump” coalition and suggested the Black community’s “landmark” gains under the Republican’s administration have retreated during the Biden presidency.
Mr Trump delivered the same message at the roundtable.
“We’ve done more for... the Black population than any president since Abraham Lincoln,” he said, citing what he called millions of people lifted out of poverty, an increase in Black home ownership, and passage of criminal justice reform during his four-year presidency.
“And crooked Joe Biden has done nothing for you except talk.”
The White House has been touting Mr Biden’s accomplishments for Hispanic and Black communities on home ownership and economic opportunity, lowering child poverty, and expanding voting rights and health care.
Polling shows Mr Trump has been making inroads with those groups, particularly younger voters increasingly disengaged from politics, and those who blame Mr Biden over a surge in migrant crossings at the southern border
During his speech, Mr Trump got the name of his doctor wrong after months of making fun of Mr Biden for his verbal gaffes.
Mr Trump told his audience that he had “aced” a cognitive test when he was in White House following advice from the then presidential physician, a Republican member of Congress whom he named as Ronny Johnson.
“Has anyone heard of Ronny Johnson, congressman from Texas?” he asked the crowd.
“He was the White House doctor, and he said I was the healthiest president, he feels, in history. So I liked him very much.”
The doctor was in fact Ronny Jackson, who represents Texas’s 13th congressional district and is a loyal supporter of Mr Trump.
BIDEN FREEZES, LED AWAY BY OBAMA
US President Joe Biden appeared to freeze on stage after giving remarks at a star-studded fundraiser in Los Angeles before Barack Obama took him by the arm and pulled him away.
The incident is the latest in a series of episodes that have plagued 81-year-old Mr Biden as he competes against Mr Trump in the race for the White House.
In the video, Mr Biden and Mr Obama are seen waving and smiling while receiving a standing ovation in the Peacock Theatre.
Mr Biden applauds but then he stops moving as he stares out over the crowd for several long seconds.
Mr Obama, still smiling and waving, takes Mr Biden by the wrist and the pair walk off stage as TV host Jimmy Kimmel trails behind.
It comes after an incident last week in which Mr Biden apparently wandered off from a group of G7 leaders. Mr Biden looked in another direction and began walking that way before being redirected by Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni.
The seemingly bizarre incident drew criticism from Mr Biden’s detractors who highlight his advancing years as he continues his campaign for re-election.
But British PM Rishi Sunak defended Mr Biden, insisting the Us President was merely showing his appreciation to a group of parachuters.
Just days earlier, the US president seemed to momentarily freeze during lively dancing at a White House Juneteenth concert.
As Vice President Kamala Harris and others danced to the energetic band, the US President appeared to stand almost completely still.
He was accompanied by Philonise Floyd, brother of the late George Floyd, who eventually noticed Mr Biden’s worrying pause and draped his arm over him as if to offer support.
TRUMP RETURNS TO CAPITOL HILL; CELEBRATES BIRTHDAY
Donald Trump has returned to Capitol Hill for the first time since his supporters stormed the area on January 6 in 2021.
The former president was treated to a rendition of “Happy Birthday” from conservative members of the House of Representatives ahead of turning 78 on Friday.
The meeting, followed by a separate afternoon get-together with the party’s senate contingent, was Mr Trump’s first on Capitol Hill since leaving the White House, and it was his first Washington trip since he was convicted last month on all 34 felony counts of falsifying business records.
“This was a great meeting. There’s tremendous unity in the Republican Party,” he said after addressing Senate Republicans, adding that he was running “to make America great again.”
“We’re a nation that’s in decline … We’re a nation that is being laughed at all over the world.
“We have a leader that’s being laughed at all over the world, and we’re going to turn it around. We’re going to turn it around fast.”
Mr Trump was even more ebullient at the earlier House meeting, according to US media citing people in the room, as he called out the Republicans who had voted to impeach him after the 2021 assault on the Capitol and called the Justice Department “dirty, no good b*****ds.”
US PRESIDENT SPEAKS OUT ON SON’S GUN CONVICTION
US President Joe Biden has vowed that his son Hunter’s conviction on federal gun charges will not alter his commitment to avoid using his presidential powers to pardon him.
Speaking for the first time since Hunter was found guilty, the President said he was “extremely proud” of him.
“He has overcome an addiction. He is one of the brightest, most decent men I know,” Mr Biden told reporters in Italy, where he is attending the G7 summit.
“I said I’d abide by the jury decision. I will do that, and I will not pardon him.”
After deliberating for three hours last week, a jury in Delaware found Hunter guilty of lying on a federal form about his drug addiction when he purchased a firearm six years ago.
The verdict capped an extraordinary trial that laid bare Hunter’s abuse of crack cocaine and the problems it caused for one of America’s most famous families, with three of his former partners – including his brother’s widow – called to give evidence against him.
Originally published as Donald Trump’s vow on immigrants during Turning Point Action rally in Michigan
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