‘Spewing lies’: Harris lashes out at Trump after pet claims force lockdowns

Washington: US Vice President Kamala Harris has lashed out at former president Donald Trump for “spewing lies” about immigrants eating pets, which has led to dozens of bomb threats forcing schools and buildings in a small US city to be evacuated or placed in lockdown.

One week after her first presidential debate against Trump, the Democratic candidate gave her lengthiest views yet on Trump’s bizarre rant about Haitian immigrants stealing and eating cats and dogs in Springfield, Ohio.

Democratic presidential nominee Vice President Kamala Harris is interviewed by members of the National Association of Black Journalists.Credit: AP

Since Trump fuelled those conspiracy theories on the debate stage last week, some government buildings have temporarily closed, a number of classes have been conducted virtually after schools and colleges were evacuated, and a cultural festival has been postponed.

Tensions have risen to such an extent that Ohio’s Republican governor, Mike DeWine, said this week he would send three dozen state troopers to provide added security to schools as a precaution after a “series of unfounded bomb threats”. Thirty-three threats were made, he said, but all had been hoaxes and many had come from overseas.

The beefed-up security came after members of the far-right group the Proud Boys descended on Springfield amid reports that the Ku Klux Klan had been distributing recruitment leaflets across the region.

Asked about Springfield during a panel interview on Tuesday, Harris took aim at Trump for “spewing lies that are grounded in tropes that are age-old”.

Donald Trump speaks to supporters during a town hall event at the Dort Financial Centre in Flint, Michigan. Credit: AP

“When you are bestowed with a microphone that big, there is a profound responsibility that comes with that … especially when you have been, and seek to be again, president of the United States of America,” Harris said.

“It’s a crying shame, literally, what’s happening to those families, those children,” she added, referring to one evacuation that took place on what was meant to be school photo day.

“You say you care about law enforcement? Well, law enforcement is being put into this because of these serious threats that are being issued against a community that was living a productive, good life before this happened.”

Harris made her comments at the National Association of Black Journalists – the group Trump was addressing last month when he questioned her racial identity.

The interview came as both candidates returned to the campaign trail for the first time since the apparent attempted assassination of Trump on Sunday (Monday AEST), the second one in as many months.

Harris revealed she had called Trump on Tuesday (Washington time), “to see if he was OK, and I told him what I said publicly: there is no place for political violence in our country”.

Trump, however, has blamed President Joe Biden and Harris for the latest incident, saying that their rhetoric – which casts him as a threat to democracy – was inciting people who wanted to kill him.

“Their rhetoric is causing me to be shot at, when I am the one who is going to save the country, and they are the ones that are destroying the country – both from the inside and out,” he told Fox News.

Trump’s running mate, J.D. Vance, also weighed in, telling a Faith and Freedom Coalition event that “the big difference between conservatives and liberals is that no one has tried to kill Kamala Harris in the last couple of months, and two people now have tried to kill Donald Trump”.

The White House swiftly condemned Vance’s language.

“When you make comments like that, all it does is create or opens an opportunity for people to listen to you and potentially take you very seriously, and so it’s dangerous to have that type of rhetoric out there,” White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said.

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