 "This combination photo shows Republican presidential candidate former President Donald Trump speaking during a presidential debate, June 27, 2024, in Atlanta, left, and Sen. Kamala Harris, D-Calif., speaking during a Democratic presidential primary debates, July 31, 2019, in Detroit. AP")
One of the key issues discussed during the first presidential debate between former US President Donald Trump and Vice President Kamala Harris was the issue of immigration. Trump raised the issue of the border crisis frequently during the clash with Harris.
While attacking Harris, the former President unleashed a barrage of attacks and made some factually incorrect claims. One of the most bizarre moments of the debate was when Trump repeated an unsubstantiated claim that immigrants are eating pets in an Ohio town.
“In Springfield, they’re eating the dogs, the people that came in, 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,” the former president said.
The story was initially circulated by right-wing media and was repeated by Trump’s running mate and Ohio Senator JD Vance. Trump also claimed that migrants are arriving in the US from prisons and mental institutions. “We have millions of people pouring into our country from prisons and jails, from mental institutions and insane asylums,” Trump claimed. Trump called Harris “the border czar” — a frequent name he calls the vice president to attack her stance on immigration.
Fact-check
Shortly after Trump narrated the Ohio story, Moderator David Muir offered a fact check over his proclamation. “We checked with the city manager,” Muir said, saying officials in Springfield, Ohio found no evidence supporting the allegations of immigrants eating pets. Harris appeared to laugh as Trump screamed “They’re eating the dogs!”
Impact Shorts
More Shorts“I saw people on television talking about it,” Trump insisted after Muir pushed back on all his claims regarding the incident. The former president was also factually incorrect when he claimed that immigrants are “taking over the towns… They’re going in violently.”
However, the claim is factually incorrect. While some US cities have seen an influx of immigrants, most of them arrived in the United States legally, with work permits or with authorization to stay while their cases are worked out in the courts. According to a study by the Cato Institute, trump is less likely to commit crimes than the US-born.