Political candidates across across the country are busy this week delivering their final messages to voters, and on Wednesday morning, a large group of Connecticut Democratic officials allowed former President Donald Trump’s campaign to make their argument for them.
Statewide elected officials, several members of Connecticut’s Congressional delegation and the leaders of the state legislature’s Black and Puerto Rican Caucus all met in the east end of Bridgeport to draw attention to a disparaging comment that was made about Puerto Rico at Trump’s rally in New York City last weekend.
“I don’t know if you guys know this, but there is literally a floating island of garbage in the middle of the ocean right now,” Tony Hinchcliffe, a comedian who was invited to speak at Trump’s rally at Madison Square Garden, said. “I think it’s called Puerto Rico.”
That comment, as well as others that were focused on Hispanics, African Americans, Jews and Palestinians, quickly created a backlash that caused Trump’s campaign to issue a statement seeking to distance the presidential candidate from the comedian.
It also prompted numerous Republican candidates in states with significant Puerto Rican populations to denounce the remarks, including George Logan, who is challenging Democratic incumbent Jahana Hayes in Connecticut’s 5th Congressional District.
“Sadly, we continue to experience racist, degrading comments — across the political spectrum — and they must be called out and shut down,” Logan said in a statement, without citing any other instance outside of Trump’s rally where Puerto Rico was the subject of such remarks.
Connecticut Democrats are seizing on the derogatory reference to Puerto Rico in the final days before the election in an effort to further press their electoral advantages in the state, which has the largest Puerto Rican population per capita of anywhere in the country, outside the island territory.
Many of Connecticut’s largest cities, including Hartford, Waterbury, New Britain, New Haven and Bridgeport, are home to tens of thousands of people with Puerto Rican ancestry and connections to the island.
The Democratic political figures who spoke at a senior center in Bridgeport on Wednesday encouraged the state’s Puerto Rican residents to take the remarks from Trump’s rally seriously.
Sen. Jorge Cabrera, D-Hamden, whose father moved from Puerto Rico to Bridgeport in the 1960s, said voters should not brush off the remarks as just another joke.
“This is who this man and the people around him are,” Cabrera said of Trump and his campaign. “Let’s believe it. And then let’s do something about it.”
U.S. Sen. Chris Murphy, D-Conn., and U.S. Rep. Jim Himes, D-4th District, both of whom are up for reelection this year, shared similar sentiments, arguing the remarks about Puerto Rico were evidence that Trump and his campaign do not view Puerto Ricans as full U.S. citizens, which they are.
“Let me tell you what this is, because I see it every day from Lauren Boebert, from Marjorie Taylor Greene, from Paul Gosar,” Himes said, naming several of his Republican colleagues in the U.S. House of Representatives. “If you don’t look like Donald Trump, or Donald Trump Jr., you are not an American in full, and you are not entitled to the privileges and respect of an American in full. That’s what is going on.”
“At some level, I’m just glad they are telling us what they think,” Murphy added. “I mean, it’s hard to hear that, but at least they aren’t hiding their agenda. At least they aren’t hiding what they think of our Puerto Rican communities.”
Other speakers at the Democratic press conference, including Bridgeport’s city council chairwoman Aidee Nieves and state representatives Christopher Rosario, D-Bridgeport; Antonio Felipe, D-Bridgeport; and Juan Candelaria, D-New Haven, highlighted the contributions that Puerto Ricans have made to the country, including serving in the U.S. Armed Forces in multiple wars.
And they pointed out that some of the people serving in the highest ranks of the federal government are of Puerto Rican descent, including U.S. Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor and President Joe Biden’s education secretary Miguel Cardona.
“The Puerto Rican community has been an integral contributor to the United States’ progress,” Nieves said.
Ben Proto, the chairman of the Connecticut Republican Party, dismissed the remarks about Puerto Rico and instead pointed to comments that Democratic leaders have made about Trump’s supporters, including a remark that President Joe Biden made this week, when he said: “The only garbage I see floating out there is his supporter’s.”
The White House later said Biden was referring specifically to Hinchcliffe, the comedian, but the comment has been used by Republicans to argue that Democrats demean every Trump supporter.
“Are these the same members of the Democratic Party whose president called half the country garbage, or who Hillary Clinton calls deplorable,” Proto said.
Proto also accused the Democratic Party of encouraging the two assassination attempts that Trump was the target of this year.
“The ones who are spewing hate, the ones who have caused two assassination attempts, are the Democrats,” Proto said.
Matt Corey, Murphy’s Republican opponent, described the Democratic press conference as “contrived outrage.” And in a press release, he accused Democrats of not helping the Puerto Rican community in Connecticut.
“The bad joke here is the Democratic Party’s inattention to the Puerto Rican community. They have ignored this community for decades but suddenly decide to whip up outrage before an election,” said Corey, who was at the Trump rally in Madison Square Garden.
It’s unclear how the highly publicized remarks about Puerto Rico might affect this year’s elections, especially since many people have already cast a ballot via absentee or early in-person voting.
Rep. Geraldo Reyes Jr., D-Waterbury, believes a large portion of the Puerto Rican community had already decided how they were going to vote before Trump’s rally last weekend.
But Reyes believes the remarks that were made at the Trump event could be an animating force for some voters who were on the fence or may not have been motivated to cast a ballot.
Reyes hopes that additional turnout in cities like Waterbury and Philadelphia, which also has a substantial Puerto Rican population, will deliver victories for Democratic congressional candidates and Vice President Kamala Harris.
Proto, the Republican chairman, said he did not believe Connecticut voters would be voting based on a single comment from a rally.
“I think the population and the voters are a lot smarter than the politicians are,” Proto said.
“I think at the end of the day, they are voting in what is their best interest, and it has surely not been the Democrats, Kamala Harris and Tim Walz,” Proto added.