'Weird and desperate': Critics laugh as Trump rides in MAGA-branded garbage truck
Former President Donald Trump engaged in a bizarre stunt ahead of his rally in Wisconsin on Wednesday: riding around in a garbage truck with his campaign logo printed on the side of it.
The truck was meant to draw attention to the campaign's grievance over President Joe Biden supposedly referring to Trump's supporters as "garbage" on a campaign call Tuesday evening. There is some dispute over what he said, and the White House has sought to clarify the "garbage" he referred to was the rhetoric of right-wing comedian Tony Hinchcliffe, who called Puerto Rico a "floating island of garbage" at Trump's Madison Square Garden rally. The joke outraged many and sent the GOP into panic mode.
Trump delighted in his exhibition, speaking to reporters as he played with the truck while dressed in an orange safety vest.
“250 million people are not garbage,” he said. It's unclear where he got that number, which is more than three times the number of people who voted for him in 2020.
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MAGA commentators on social media loved the stunt, proclaiming Trump a genius — but commenters on the left laughed at Trump and wondered why he insisted on dragging out a controversy that appeared to be hurting him.
"Hold the f--- on… did Donald Trump actually cosplay as a garbage man, in an actual f---ing garbage truck, while taking questions from the press about the speaker at HIS rally, who said Puerto Rico was garbage?" wrote political commentator "JoJoFromJerz."
"As Americans are outraged by someone at his rally who compared Puerto Rico to garbage, Trump thought it would be cute to take questions from a gigantic garbage truck," wrote progressive reporter Aaron Rupar.
"It takes some real 'let’s just do it and be legends' thinking to stick Trump in a damn garbage truck," wrote national security attorney Bradley Moss. He added, "I’m sorry, everyone else saw him straight up miss the door handle and nearly fall over, right?"
"Donald Trump, in an orange vest sitting in a garbage truck (?), says he doesn't know anything about Tony Hinchcliffe, the comedian who told horribly racist jokes at his disastrous rally at Madison Square Garden. All of this is super weird & desperate," wrote commentator Art Candee.
"Trump, shortly before calling Kamala Harris unwell, nearly busted his ass while trying to get in a garbage truck," wrote "Right Wing Cope," an account dedicated to compiling embarrassing moments for the GOP. "The stable genius is stable geniusing again."
Watch a video of the rally below or at this link.