GREEN BAY: Donald Trump pulled an election stunt with a garbage truck on Wednesday as the White House campaign was forced off-piste by muddled remarks from President Joe Biden about the Republican's supporters that caused a headache for Democratic candidate Kamala Harris.
Harris had hoped to spend the day expanding on the final week "closing argument" she made at a huge Washington rally the night before — but found herself instead disavowing Biden's remark that appeared to label Trump supporters "garbage."
Trump -- who, unlike Harris, has recently called his political opponents "garbage" in public — was on hand to exploit the misstep with a photo op, climbing into a garbage truck at an airport in Wisconsin and answering questions from reporters.
The row started over the weekend when a warm-up speaker at a Trump rally called the US territory of Puerto Rico "a floating island of garbage," in remarks that initially put the Republican campaign on the defensive.
Yet Biden's gaffe provided Trump the opportunity to play the victim.
"How do you like my garbage truck? This truck is in honour of Kamala and Joe Biden," Trump said from the cabin of the vehicle.
"You can't be president if you hate the American people, which I believe they do," Trump added later at his rally in Green Bay, still wearing his high-visibility jacket.
But as Republicans voiced outrage over Biden's remarks, anti-Trump political group The Lincoln Project shared a video from the Republican's September 7 rally in Mosinee, Wisconsin in which he called "the people that surround" the vice-president "garbage."
Trump had just attacked Harris over employment figures before he said: "And it's not her, it's the people that surround her. They're scum. They're scum, and they want to take down our country. They are absolute garbage."
Harris meanwhile was forced to fend off questions about Biden's gaffe, which came when the president reacted to a comedian at a Trump rally referring to Puerto Rico as "a floating island of garbage."
"The only garbage I see floating out there is his supporters," Biden said, before the White House sought to clarify that he was referring to Trump's rhetoric, not to his supporters.
"Let me be clear, I strongly disagree with any criticism of people based on who they vote for," said Harris, Biden's vice president. — Reuters
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