A majority of Republicans view former President Donald Trump‘s statement about Haitian immigrants “eating the pets” during his Tuesday debate with Vice President Kamala Harris as “weird,” new polling shows.
Trump’s remark was based on social media rumors, which lack evidence, that Haitian immigrants in Springfield, Ohio, are eating pets. City officials have discredited these claims, saying there are no reports of any immigrants in the community killing or eating pets as alleged.
Regardless, many Republicans, including Trump and his running mate Ohio Senator JD Vance, have promoted the claims. The former president repeated the claim during Tuesday night’s debate, leading to a fact-check from the ABC News moderators.
“In Springfield, they’re eating the dogs—the people that came in,” Trump claimed about Haitian immigrants. “They’re eating the cats. They’re eating the pets of the people that live there, and this is what’s happening in our country, and it’s a shame.”
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What the Poll Shows
New polling by Data for Progress published on Friday shows that a clear majority of voters viewed the statement as “weird.” That included majorities of Democrats, Republicans and independents.
Among GOP respondents, 44 percent said the comment was “very weird” while an additional 25 percent said it was “somewhat weird”—for a total of 69 precent describing the statement as “weird.” Among Democrats, the total was 91 percent and among independents it was 77 percent.
Looking at all voters combined, 64 percent described the remark as “very weird” and 16 percent said “somewhat weird,” for a total of 80 percent. The survey was conducted from September 11 to 12 and included 1,283 likely U.S. voters with a margin of error of plus or minus 3 percentage points.
Newsweek reached out to the Trump campaign on Saturday afternoon via email for comment.
How Did the Rumors Start?
Erika Lee, a woman from Springfield, who initially made a Facebook post…
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