Former Fox News host Geraldo Rivera lashed out at Donald Trump for claiming that migrants are ‘poisoning the blood of our country’, expressing his shock at the ‘extraordinary, hateful, Hitler-esque quote’.
Trump drew surprised backlash from critics after making the comment in a recent video interview, where he repeated his previous claims that migrants are criminals, insane, terrorists and sick.
‘No one has any idea where these people come from. We know they come from mental institutions and insane asylums. We know they are terrorists,’ Trump said the interview with The National Pulse, a right-leaning website.
‘It poisons the blood of our country. It’s so bad, and people come in with sickness. People come in with every possible thing you can have,’ he said.
Rivera, a veteran journalist and commentator, called the comment “disgusting” in a post on X, adding: “Not only does it harken back to the Nazi era, it’s also part of the shameful, vile, centuries-old tradition of falsely claiming that immigrants carry diseases.’
Former Fox News host Geraldo Rivera lashed out at Donald Trump for claiming migrants are ‘poisoning the blood of our country’, calling the comment ‘Hitler-esque’.
In a video post, Rivera continued: ‘This is a quote – an extraordinary, hateful Hitler-like quote from the former president of the United States. This is shocking. This is outrageous.
‘It goes back to the mid-19th century, when the Irish immigrants were accused of bringing all sorts of diseases from Europe to the United States.
‘This is one of the reasons why they were hated by people, and then every successive wave of immigrants: the Italians, the Chinese, the Jewish, the Eastern Europeans.
‘Now the Latin Americans are always accused of bringing diseases, a fact that is absolutely not true. In fact, if you look at the people, the largely Latino people who come to this country undocumented, they walk fifteen hundred miles.
‘How many Americans could walk fifteen hundred miles, could walk through the jungles and cross rivers, and so on in search of a better life for themselves and their children?
‘To just – and to think that this guy was my friend. This is shocking. I’m so shy. President Trump, former president, can say something like “poisoning the blood of our country”. It is absolutely indefensible. It’s disgusting.’
Trump spokesman Steven Cheung hit back at critics in a statement, saying: ‘This is a normal phrase used in everyday life – in books, television, movies and in news articles.
“For anyone to think this is racist or xenophobic is living in an alternate reality consumed with senseless outrage.”
The League of United Latin American Citizens (LULAC), the nation’s oldest Latino civil rights organization, also criticized Trump’s words as reminiscent of Hitler, the genocidal dictator who led the slaughter of millions during World War II.
“With their overtly divisive and biased undertones, Trump’s words bear an alarming resemblance to the phrasing used by Adolf Hitler during Germany’s Third Reich, where he accused Jewish people and migrants of causing a ‘blood poisoning’ of Germany ,” the group said. statement.
‘And to think that this guy was my friend. This is shocking. I’m so ashamed,” said Rivera, a one-time conservative commentator whose views have turned against Trump in recent years.
‘No one has any idea where these people come from. We know they come from prisons. We know they come from spiritual institutions. You know, they’re terrorists,’ Trump said
Migrants cross the Rio Grande River border from Piedras Negras, Mexico, into the United States, stepping ashore on the Texas side on September 27
Migrants, mostly from Venezuela, wait on the banks of the US side of the river until Border Patrol arrives to cut open the razor wire installed by the Texas National Guard on September 27.
Jonathan Greenblatt, national director of the Anti-Defamation League, said Trump’s comments ‘echoed nativist talking points’
Domingo Garcia, national president of LULAC, said the comments would “unleash unprecedented hatred towards desperate, mostly Latino asylum seekers he is targeting for political gain.”
‘The use of the words ‘blood poisoning’ was deliberately calculated to create fear and scapegoat Christian refugees. His use of the Nazi code talk is grand politics unworthy of a presidential candidate,’ Garcia said.
In fact, Hitler frequently used the phrase ‘blood poisoning’ to refer to the perceived threat posed by other ethnic groups.
The Nazi leader wrote in his memoirs Mein Kampf: ‘All great cultures of the past perished only because the originally creative race died out of blood poisoning.’
Trump’s latest comments about “blood poisoning” also drew a stern rebuke from the Anti-Defamation League, which pointed to similar language used by mass shooters.
‘Insinuating that immigrants are ‘poisoning the blood of our country’ echoes nativist talking points and has the potential to cause real danger and violence. We’ve seen this kind of toxic rhetoric inspire real violence in places like Pittsburgh and El Paso before. It should have no place in our politics,” said ADL CEO Jonathan Greenblatt.
He called the language ‘racist, xenophobic and despicable’.
“And when someone has a big platform, they have to be careful with their voice, but when you’re the former president of the United States, you absolutely have to admit your responsibility, because this kind of rhetoric is explosive and has to stop completely, Greenblatt said.
The controversial National Pulse interview was labeled a Trump interview that ‘the fake news doesn’t show you.’
The Trump interview, which was shot at Mar-a-Lago, went down last week but has since gained notice.
The reaction to the clip echoed the furor Trump made at the start of his 2016 campaign, when he spoke of Mexican “rapists” coming into the country.
‘They bring crime. They are rapists. And some, I suppose, are good people.’ he said.
Illegal immigration has risen to the top of the list of concerns of American voters, with more than 10,000 migrants on their way to the border every day, according to Mexico’s president.
Amid the concern, President Joe Biden is facing pressure to demonstrate that he is working to stem the influx. This week, the administration revealed it would resume construction of a portion of the border wall, although the White House claimed the action was required by a Trump-era law.