By Gram Slattery
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump said on Monday there are “a lot of bad genes” in the United States as he discussed killings allegedly committed by immigrants living in the United States illegally.
“How about letting people come to an open border, 13,000 of them murderers,” Trump said in an interview with conservative commentator Hugh Hewitt, as he blasted the immigration policies of his Democratic opponent in the Nov. 5 election, vice president Kamala Harris, discussed. .
“Many of them have killed a lot more than one person, and they’re now living happily in the United States. You know, now a murderer, I believe this, it’s in their genes. And we have a lot of bad genes in our country right now .”
Trump appeared to refer to a letter from Immigration and Customs Enforcement to Republican Rep. Tony Gonzales, released last month, that showed 13,099 people convicted of murder and on ICE’s “non-detainee docket.” That role includes different types of immigrants who entered the country legally and illegally.
Many people in this category are not in the custody of immigration authorities because they are in state or federal prison. In some cases, the crimes for which they were convicted occurred years or decades ago.
In a statement, the Trump campaign defended his comments, saying he was only talking about murderers, not immigrants.
“President Trump was clearly referring to murderers, not migrants,” said Karoline Leavitt, Trump campaign press secretary. “It’s pretty disgusting that the media is always so quick to defend murderers, rapists and illegal criminals if it means writing a bad headline about President Trump.”
The former president frequently attacked migrants during his campaign, especially those involved in crimes. At times he has used dehumanizing language, and increasingly he has turned to extremely graphic depictions of the crimes.
While there is little data on the immigration status of criminals, academic researchers say immigrants in the country illegally are no more likely to commit crimes than U.S.-born or naturalized Americans.
The White House condemned Trump’s comments.
“This type of language is hateful, disgusting, inappropriate and has no place in our country,” White House spokesperson Karine Jean-Pierre said.
(Reporting by Gram Slattery in Washington, additional reporting by Kristina Cooke and Jarrett Renshaw, Editing by Ross Colvin and Rod Nickel)
