US election: ‘Garbage’ comment not aimed at Donald Trump supporters, Joe Biden says

United States President Joe Biden’s attempt to call out racist remarks by a speaker at a campaign rally for presidential candidate Donald Trump backfired when Trump and other Republicans accused him of calling their supporters “garbage”.

Biden was responding yesterday to comedian Tony Hinchcliffe, who called Puerto Rico a “floating island of garbage” at the rally on Monday NZT and also disparaged black Americans, Jewish people, Palestinians, and Latinos.

Trump’s campaign distanced itself from the Puerto Rico comment at the event where other Trump allies also made vulgar and racist remarks. Trump himself, who has made a series of inflammatory and racist statements on the campaign trail, yesterday called his rally “an absolute lovefest”.

Speaking during a fundraising Zoom call with Voto Latino, an organisation that encourages young Latino Americans to register to vote, Biden said, “The only garbage I see floating out there is his supporter’s – his – his demonisation of Latinos is unconscionable and it’s un-American”, according to a transcript posted on X by a White House spokesperson.

The White House transcript included an apostrophe, suggesting the President was referring to one supporter, Hinchcliffe. It was unclear from the sound of the video clip of the call whether Biden meant the plural “supporters” as both words sound exactly the same.

Biden sought to clarify his remark soon after it became public.

“Earlier today I referred to the hateful rhetoric about Puerto Rico spewed by Trump’s supporters at his Madison Square Garden rally as garbage – which is the only word I can think of to describe it,” Biden posted on X.

“His demonisation of Latinos is unconscionable. That’s all I meant to say. The comments at that rally don’t reflect who we are as a nation.”

Meanwhile, action movie star and former Republican California governor Arnold Schwarzenegger threw his support behind Democratic candidate Vice-President Kamala Harris, saying “I will always be an American before I am a Republican”.

Joe Biden has been forced to backtrack after accidentally calling Trump supporters 'garbage'. Photo / Getty Images

The Terminator star said he was offended by Republicans who refused to concede that Donald Trump lost the 2020 election and the Republican nominee’s remark that America was “like a garbage can for the rest of the world”.

As governor, Schwarzenegger said, he learned to “love policy and hate politics” and added: “I hate politics more than ever”.

He also said “I don’t like either party right now”, arguing that neither would tackle US budget deficits, and that some Democrats’ policies were leading to increased crime.

“I want to tune out,” Schwarzenegger wrote. “But I can’t.

“Because rejecting the results of an election is as un-American as it gets.”