Donald Trump doubled down on a baseless story attacking Haitian immigrants on the debate stage on Tuesday.
ABC News debate moderator David Muir fact-checked the former president repeatedly, as Trump insisted that he had seen reports from “people on television” that family pets had been stolen by immigrants in Springfield, Ohio, for food, a claim that has been repeatedly debunked.
“ABC News did reach out to the city manager there,” Muir told Trump. “He told us there have been no credible reports of specific claims of pets being harmed, injured or abused by individuals within the immigrant community.”
When Trump interrupted to cast doubt on Muir’s fact-check, saying, “Maybe it’s a good thing to say for a city manager,” Muir repeated that there have been no actual incidents of this claim.
“I’m not taking this from television. I’m taking this from the city manager,” Muir said.
Trump’s running mate, Sen. JD Vance, elevated this story in a post on X earlier this week, inspiring a deluge of anti-immigrant cat and pet memes from prominent figures on the right, including many elected Republicans. Vance acknowledged that it was possibly false in another post on Tuesday ahead of the debate, but not without calling on his party to continue the social media campaign referencing the baseless claims.
Republicans have listened to Vance’s call to “keep the cat memes flowing,” despite also acknowledging that it’s not true, defending their decision to spread the false story by saying they still support the “underlying” anti-immigrant message.
“Some people are trying to blur the issue by saying this is ridiculous about cats and dogs,” Rep. Tom Tiffany, who posted “Cat Lives Matter” on Monday, told NOTUS. “But when you look at the underlying issue of a community like Springfield, Ohio, they’re being overrun at this point without the ability for people to assimilate into the community, and therein lies the problem with uncontrolled illegal immigration.”
Tiffany went as far as to say calling the attack on Haitians racist was “an argument by the weak who do not want to debate the issue at hand.”
Utah Republican Rep. Burgess Owens said he knew the pet-stealing narrative had been debunked but also defended repeating it, saying the influx of migrants in places like Springfield, Ohio, still presents a danger.
“When you have a system where it’s not only illegal but unvetted, people that literally hate our country are still being allowed in who just hurt Americans,” Owens said. “It has nothing to do with race. It has to do with being illegal.”
Meanwhile, Pennsylvania Republican Rep. Dan Meuser told NOTUS he had a different interpretation of Vance’s posts, saying that the vice presidential candidate was actually arguing that the U.S. needs to help improve the conditions in countries like Haiti.
“I don’t think he meant harm by it,” Meuser said. “Frankly, I think what he was trying to address was that poverty is not a reason for asylum. What we need to do is improve those areas, not say people can come here illegally.”
Vance’s post did not make any reference to U.S. policy toward Haiti.
Democrats leading the House Haiti Caucus said they were “disgusted” with Vance’s comments, calling it proof of his “unfitness to serve as vice president.”
“For him to have a mother and be married to a first-generation American, he knows how difficult it can be as an immigrant to leave everything and start over and come to this country,” Rep. Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick, who co-chairs the caucus, told NOTUS ahead of the debate. “Him deliberately starting to spread lies and his Republican minions continuing it is disgusting.”
“This rhetoric now is so prominent in every space in D.C. that they’re politicizing it. It’s a strategic attack to fearmonger before the election,” Cherfilus-McCormick added.
Haiti Caucus Co-Chair Yvette Clarke agreed, adding that at this point in the election, Vance “is willing to go beyond just dog whistles to blatant racism.”
Rep. Troy Carter, second vice chair of the Congressional Black Caucus, said that he knows members across the aisle who are fed up with Vance’s track record of controversial comments.
“The more reasonable Republicans are saying enough is enough,” Carter said. “Let’s talk about policy. Let’s talk about solutions. Let’s not talk about people and personality.”
“Everything from the childless cat lady to the ‘shithole countries,’ it’s forcing people to really take a look and ask the question, would you want your son or daughter to say or be a victim of that?” Carter said. “The answer is pretty clear, and the American people will have to make a decision, not between R and D, but between right and wrong.”
Republicans, however, are confident that the Biden-Harris record on immigration will work in the GOP’s favor in November. And Trump, who began his debate vilifying asylum seekers, has made the issue his defining message.
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Calen Razor is a NOTUS reporter and an Allbritton Journalism Institute fellow.