GOP officials in small swing state town slam Trump’s 'Third World hell hole' claim: report

03 November 2024

In September, Donald Trump, JD Vance, and MAGA allies publicly pushed the debunked claim that Haitian migrants in the town of Springfield, Ohio — population 57,910 — are eating people's pets.

According to a Sunday, November 3 Politico report, the former president has recently taken aim at an even smaller town: Whitewater, Wisconsin.

With a population of approximately "15,000 in the southeastern part of the Badger state," Politico reports, "Trump said the price of housing in Whitewater had 'soared,' 'diseases are spreading like wildfire' and 'police can’t handle the surge in crime' after being 'flooded … with an estimated 2,000 migrants from Venezuela and Nicaragua, very tough ones, very tough people in that group.'"

Per the report, "local officials, many of whom are nonpartisan or Republicans, have refuted his characterizations and slammed the former president for rhetoric they say distracts from the real problems they are facing" — repeatedly.

"If Kamala is reelected, your town and every town just like it all across Wisconsin and all across our country — the heartland, the coast, it doesn’t matter — will be transformed into a Third World hell hole,'" the MAGA hopeful emphasized during a rally in the nearby city of Prairie du Chien.

"I mean this in all respect to everyone in their beliefs and where they’re at," Whitewater city manager John Weidl told Politico, "but it’s like regular people wandering around Whitewater. It’s all very normal. And sure, there’s more people who speak Spanish, but we had people who spoke Spanish before."

Another city official, Whitewater police chief Dan Meyer, according to the report, "refuted Trump’s claim that there had been a crime surge in the town. While the influx of about 1,000 migrants has posed challenges to the 24 police officers there, he said, it’s mainly been due to unlicensed drivers and a lack of translators. The immigrant 'population, generally speaking, is no more likely to commit a crime than any other [member of] the existing population we have here,' he said."

Politico reports:

Trump and his allies first jumped on Whitewater after Meyer and Weidl sent a letter to President Joe Biden last year requesting federal resources to address challenges the city faced due to the quick demographic change. 'None of this information is shared as a means of denigrating or vilifying this group of people,' Meyer wrote, adding: 'In fact, we see great value in the increasing diversity that this group brings to our community.' Days later, the right-wing outlet Breitbart ran an article with the headline 'Biden floods small Wisconsin town with 1,000 migrants.'

Meyer emphasized, "I really think the vast majority of people are supportive' of the immigrant population, and those who aren’t probably haven’t had a whole lot of interactions, or have had a few interactions that weren’t all that positive. But it’s not based on anything other than perception."

27-year-old Keylin Sarahi told Politico that she eventually arrived to Whitewater after fleeing threats of violence in Nicaragua.

"It’s a very peaceful place, very pretty," Sarahi said.

Politico's full report is available at this link.

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