Trump boards garbage truck in GB to draw attention to Biden remark
GREEN BAY, Wis. (AP) — Donald Trump walked down the steps of the Boeing 757 that bears his name, walked across a rain-soaked tarmac and, after twice missing the handle, climbed into the passenger seat of a white garbage truck that also carried his name.
The former president, once a reality TV star known for his showmanship, wanted to draw attention to a remark made a day earlier by his successor, Democratic President Joe Biden, that seemed to suggest Trump’s supporters were garbage. Trump has used the remark as a cudgel against his Democratic rival, Vice President Kamala Harris.
“How do you like my garbage truck?” Trump said, wearing an orange and yellow safety vest over his white dress shirt and red tie. “This is in honor of Kamala and Joe Biden.”
Trump and other Republicans were facing pushback of their own for comments by a comedian at a weekend Trump rally who disparaged Puerto Rico as a “floating island of garbage.” Trump then seized on a comment Biden made on a late Wednesday call that “The only garbage I see floating out there is his supporters.”
The president tried to clarify the comment afterward, saying he had intended to say Trump’s demonization of Latinos was unconscionable. But it was too late.
On Wednesday, after arriving in Green Bay, for an evening rally, Trump climbed into the garbage truck, carrying on a brief discussion with reporters while looking out the window — similar to what he did earlier this month during a photo opportunity he staged at a Pennsylvania McDonalds.
He again tried to distance himself from comedian Tony Hinchcliffe, whose joke had set off the firestorm, but Trump did not denounce it. He also said he did not need to apologize to Puerto Ricans.
“I don’t know anything about the comedian,” Trump said. “I don’t know who he is. I’ve never seen him. I heard he made a statement, but it was a statement that he made. He’s a comedian, what can I tell you. I know nothing about him.”
A spokesperson for Trump said the joke doesn’t reflect his views, but the former president has not addressed it himself.
“I love Puerto Rico and Puerto Rico loves me,” Trump said from the garbage truck.
He ended the brief appearance by telling reporters: “I hope you enjoyed this garbage truck. Thank you very much.”
Trump later showered former NFL star Brett Favre with praise at the evening rally where the former Packers quarterback campaigned for the Republican presidential nominee.
“Thank you, Brett. What a great honor. What a great champion,” Trump said shortly after taking the stage at the Resch Center. Describing Favre’s fingers as “like sausages,” he said, “No wonder he could throw the ball.”
“I’m a little upset because I think he got bigger applause than me, and I’m not happy,” the former president went on, joking about the ovation Favre received in a county that Trump narrowly won in 2020.
Trump, who appeared onstage in the orange safety vest he wore in the garbage truck, rallied alongside the football icon in the critical battleground state with just six days until the election. In a sign of the importance of the state, Trump’s Democratic opponent, Vice President Kamala Harris, was campaigning simultaneously in overwhelmingly Democratic-voting Madison, roughly a 2 1/2-hour drive away.
Favre, who won three NFL Most Valuable Player awards and a Super Bowl for Green Bay in the 1990s, praised Trump before the former president arrived, telling the crowd, “Much like the Packer organization, Donald Trump and his organization was a winner.”
“The United States of America won with his leadership,” Favre said.
In relying on Favre, Trump is tapping into the state’s deep and loyal support for the Packers and the team’s onetime star quarterback. But Favre also comes with increased baggage after becoming enmeshed in Mississippi’s welfare spending scandal.
Favre, 55, is not facing any criminal charges, but he is among more than three dozen people or groups being sued as the state tries to recover misspent money. Favre has repaid just over $1 million he received in speaking fees funded by the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families program. Mississippi Auditor Shad White, a Republican, has said Favre never showed up for the speaking engagements. White also said Favre still owes nearly $730,000 in interest.
Mississippi has ranked among the poorest states for decades, but only a fraction of its federal welfare money has been going to families. Instead, the Mississippi Department of Human Services allowed well-connected people to waste tens of millions of welfare dollars from 2016 to 2019, according to White and state and federal prosecutors.
A nonprofit group called the Mississippi Community Education Center made two payments of welfare money to Favre Enterprises, the athlete’s business: $500,000 in December 2017 and $600,000 in June 2018. The TANF money was to go toward a volleyball arena at the University of Southern Mississippi. Favre agreed to lead fundraising efforts for the facility at his alma mater, where his daughter started playing on the volleyball team in 2017.
The Mississippi Community Education Center director, Nancy New, pleaded guilty in April 2022 to charges of misspending welfare money, as did her son Zachary New, who helped run the nonprofit. They await sentencing and have agreed to testify against others.
Favre appeared in September before a Republican-led congressional committee that was examining how states are falling short on using welfare to help families in need. U.S. House Republicans have said a Mississippi welfare misspending scandal involving Favre and others points to the need for “serious reform” in the TANF program.
Favre told the congressional committee that he was diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease in January.
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Wagster Pettus reported from Jackson, Mississippi. Beaumont reported from Des Moines, Iowa.