Trump doubles down on migrant pet-eating claims, vows to scuttle overtime taxes

TUCSON, Arizona — Donald Trump attacked Kamala Harris as a “communist,” promised to remove taxes from overtime pay and doubled down on unfounded, dramatic claims of migrant crime during lengthy remarks at an event in Tucson.

The former Republican president held his first post-debate campaign event Thursday, where he recapped his recent debate against Harris and unveiled his latest proposal aimed at addressing voter frustrations with the economy.

"It's time for the working man and woman to finally catch a break and that's what we're doing," Trump said. "If you're an overtime worker, if you're past 40 hours a week ... your overtime hours will be tax free."

The event at Linda Ronstadt Music Hall marked Trump’s second visit to battleground Arizona in the past month. Second gentleman Doug Emhoff held a competing political event down the street in Tucson on the same day.

Tuesday’s debate was top of mind for Trump, the Republican former president who faced criticism from members of his own party for his lackluster performance against the Democratic vice president.

Trump is under fire for repeating false claims that migrants are stealing and eating house pets in Ohio, but he doubled down on those claims from the stage in Tucson.

“Twenty-thousand illegal Haitian immigrants have descended on a town of 58,000 people, destroying their way of life. This was a beautiful community, now it’s ah —” Trump said. “Residents are reporting that the migrants are walking off with the town’s geese. They're taking the geese. You know where the geese are, in the park. And even walking off with their pets.”

The Arizona Republican Party got in on the controversy this week, putting up a billboard message in Phoenix that read "Eat Less Kittens. Vote Republican!" and that has been condemned as racist.

Trump also sought to soften his image on abortion, countering Harris’ debate stage claim that Republicans want to monitor pregnancies. He complained that the moderators didn't correct Harris when she linked him to the Heritage Foundation's Project 2025 agenda, which he said he hasn't read and has disavowed.

“I don’t want to do that,” Trump said. “Women, I won’t be following you around to the hospital.”

The debate on Tuesday could be the last time Trump and Harris meet on stage before Election Day. The Harris campaign is seeking a second debate, but Trump rejected the invitation on stage in Tucson.

“There will be no third debate,” Trump said, to applause. "It's too late anyway. The voting's already begun."

Many of his supporters attending Thursday’s rally justified Trump’s debate performance by criticizing the ABC News moderators who fact-checked the former president several times but not for Harris.

“I was hoping he would do better, but he had three people coming at him,” Anne Moore of Tucson said.

Trump billed his appearance in Tucson as a speech focused on housing and the economy, but he spent nearly an hour talking about immigration and the debate before turning to pocketbook issues.

When he did address the economy, Trump blamed the nation’s economic state on the Biden administration’s policies at the southern border. He claimed that “millions of criminals and deranged people are coming into the USA” and said he’d “ban all mortgages for illegal aliens.”

Trump pledged to "rapidly reduce inflation by slashing energy costs." He promised to bring mortgage rates down to 2% and cut energy costs in Arizona by 50% in the first year of his second term.

The most recent data from Customs and Border Protection shows that the number of migrants encountered by agents crossing the southern border illegally has declined significantly in recent months. CBP reported the fewest migrant encounters this past July since February 2021.

However, Trump claims that the data collected by CBP under the Biden administration does not account for migrants coming into the country by airplane. He asserted that Harris is responsible for flying out migrants.

That’s a reference to the CHNV humanitarian parole program the Biden administration recently paused, which allows the federal government to screen migrants from Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua and Venezuela, instead of having to travel to the U.S.-Mexico border.

“They fly them in by the tens of thousands,” Trump said. “It really means we have 50 border states.”

Trump doubled down on his claim that the country is under invasion, being conquered and occupied by a “foreign element.” He went on to list off several unfounded incidents of migrant crime that have gone viral online and have since been debunked.

“I’m angry at Venezuelan gangs taking over Aurora, Colorado,” he said. “And illegal Haitian migrants taking over a beautiful place — Springfield, Ohio. I’m angry about young American girls being raped and sodomized and murdered by savage, criminal aliens.”

Trump also claimed without evidence that the CBP One app, which is the only guaranteed way that migrants can seek asylum at ports of entry along the Southwest border, is being used by Mexican cartels to funnel people into the country.

He told the crowd he had fixed the border during his time as president, but had been undone by President Joe Biden, describing it as a “tenth of what it was.” While in office, Trump had instituted a number of programs that decreased crossings, but the biggest drops in migrant encounters happened because of pandemic-era lockdowns worldwide.

Trump vowed to close the border and follow through with his promise of mass deportations of undocumented migrants, prompting a standing ovation by his supporters who chanted “USA!”

Trump’s campaign had billed Thursday’s rally in Tucson as a play for Latino voters in Arizona, which make up one quarter of the state’s electorate. Trump made inroads with Latino men in 2020 and is hoping to build on those gains and to suppress support for Democrats among Latino voters.

Danny de la Torre of San Manuel voted for President Joe Biden in 2020, but this year will be voting for Trump. He wore a “Latinos for Trump” shirt as he waited to enter the hall for the rally, and said he was disappointed with Biden’s handling of the economy, immigration and abortion.

“Slowly, paying attention to what the Democrats say, what they believe in, what they’re trying to put on the citizens of this country, I just don’t agree with it anymore,” he said.

But his message, especially on immigration, has turned off some Latino Republican voters such as Olivia Troye. She served as former Vice President Mike Pence’s adviser and is now campaigning as part of the Republicans for Harris efforts in Arizona.

“There was a party that actually used to care about immigrants, used to actually accept me as a Latina in the party,” she told The Arizona Republic. “And I think it's just been very upsetting to see that kind of trajectory sort of take a different turn to become this party that pushes hate and anti-immigrant sentiment.”

Troye, who was born in El Paso and identifies as Mexican-American, said this type of rhetoric was responsible for the shooting in her hometown in 2019. She also blamed Trump for inciting more division and credited him for the attacks that she has continued to receive from his supporters ever since she addressed the Democratic National Convention.

“They see me as a traitor,” Troye said. “I get a lot of messages saying that, like, Mike Pence and I need to be hung.”

The race for the White House has tightened in Arizona since Harris took over the top of the Democratic ticket, polls show. As a result, the presidential candidates and their top campaign surrogates have started coming to the state on a near-weekly basis.

Trump and Harris held large-scale rallies at Desert Diamond Arena in Glendale last month and Trump even took a trip to the Arizona-Mexico border in Cochise County. Harris’ running mate, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, spent the leadup to the debate campaigning in the Phoenix area. Trump running mate JD Vance was in the state last week, and held additional events at the beginning of August.

The first time Trump took his campaign to Tucson in 2016, the rally turned violent. A protester was punched and kicked while being escorted out of the event eight years ago. Trump came to the city again in 2020 for another campaign rally.

Tucson has long been a bastion for Democrats and progressive leaders in Arizona. On Wednesday, Tucson-born superstar Linda Ronstadt, whose name is on the hall where Trump's event was held, criticized the former president and endorsed his rival, Harris.

Ahead of Trump’s speech, Republican Senate nominee Kari Lake painted a dark picture of Tucson. She decried “horrible city leadership,” an apparent reference to the city’s Democratic mayor. The crowd booed when she mentioned U.S. Rep. Ruben Gallego, D-Ariz., her Democratic opponent in the Senate race, along with Biden and Harris.

“Tucson is tired of being put on the back burner. Tucson is tired of the crime and tired of the homeless crisis. This town is so ripe for success that I can feel it in the air every time I come down here. And sadly it’s one of those cases where you can see what bad leadership brings you,” Lake said.

This article originally appeared on Arizona Republic: Trump doubles down on migrant pet-eating claims, vows to scuttle overtime taxes