Puerto Rican rapper Bad Bunny signaled his support for Vice President Kamala Harris Sunday, sharing a video clip of Harris’ plans for the island moments after a speaker at a Trump rally called Puerto Rico “a floating island of garbage.”
“I will never forget what Donald Trump did and what he did not do when Puerto Rico needed a caring and a competent leader,” Harris also said in the video, referring to then-President Trump’s response after Hurricane Maria barreled through Puerto Rico in 2017. Trump drew criticism when he visited the island to survey the damage and tossed paper towels into a crowd, a gesture many viewed as insensitive.
“He abandoned the island, tried to block aid after back-to-back devastating hurricanes and offered nothing more than paper towels and insults,” Harris said.
Comedian Tony Hinchcliffe drew outrage Sunday when he made disparaging comments about Puerto Rico at Trump’s rally in Madison Square Garden.
“I don’t know if you know this, but there’s literally a floating island of garbage in the middle of the ocean right now,” Hinchcliffe said. “I think it’s called Puerto Rico.”
Hinchcliffe also drew on racist stereotypes in his speech. “These Latinos,” he said, “they love making babies.”
On Monday, Trump spokeswoman Karoline Leavitt downplayed the Puerto Rico comment on “Fox & Friends.”
“Look, it was a comedian who made a joke in poor taste,” Leavitt said. “Obviously that joke does not reflect the views of President Trump or our campaign. And I think it is sad that the media will pick up on one joke that was made by a comedian rather than the truths that were shared by the phenomenal list of speakers that we had.”
Leading Latino members of Congress on Monday rebuked Hinchcliffe’s remarks at Trump’s rally.
“Hateful rhetoric has real-world consequences,” Rep. Nanette Diaz Barragán (D-San Pedro), the chair of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus, said in a statement. “When political leaders, influencers, and those with a large social platform choose language that dehumanizes communities, families get hurt, and hate crimes rise.”
She added: “The shameful rhetoric displayed by Donald Trump and his allies at Madison Square Garden — where Puerto Ricans, migrants, and Democratic leaders were openly vilified — is not only divisive but dangerous.”
Hinchcliffe defended his remarks after the rally, mocking vice presidential nominee Tim Walz’s criticism of his Puerto Rican comments in a video with Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.).
“These people have no sense of humor,” Hinchcliffe wrote on X. “Wild that a vice presidential candidate would take time out of his ‘busy schedule’ to analyze a joke taken out of context to make it seem racist.”
Adding that he loved Puerto Rico, Hinchcliffe and vacationed there, Hinchcliffe said he made fun of everyone. “Watch the whole set,” he wrote.
Other Puerto Rican stars who have previously expressed support for Harris, including singer-songwriter and actor Ricky Martin and singer and actress Jennifer Lopez, doubled down on their support.
Sunday’s controversy at Madison Square Garden came as Democrats and Republicans compete for Puerto Rican votes in pivotal battleground states. Pennsylvania is home to about half a million Puerto Ricans and Philadelphia has the second-largest stateside Puerto Rican population after New York City.
On Sunday, Harris traveled to Freddy and Tony’s Restaurant, a casual family-style Puerto Rican eatery in Philadelphia, to tout her “opportunity economy task force for Puerto Rico.” The plan involves modernizing the island’s energy grid, lowering housing costs and promoting economic opportunity.
“It’s about giving people access to opportunity, knowing that the people in all communities — in our community — they want, yes, a job, but they want to be able to build wealth,” Harris told the crowd. “They want to be able to build intergenerational wealth, home ownership, small business growth.”
Harris condemned Trump’s rally as “fanning the fuel of division in the country.” Asked about the Puerto Rico comments Monday morning, Harris said according to pool reports: “it’s more of the same and maybe more vivid than usual.”
“That’s why people are exhausted with him,” Harris said.
