Politics

DNC Airs Debunked Claim Trump Called Asylum Seekers ‘Animals’

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An edited video montage played during the Democratic National Convention Wednesday showed President Donald Trump referring to MS-13 gang members “animals,” but spliced it between videos of asylum seekers and children held in detention centers.

The DNC’s video on the third night of the convention showed children held in immigration detention centers, and the voice of a young girl said children had been orphaned “because of” Trump.

“These aren’t people,” Trump said in one clip in the DNC’s video. “I don’t want them in our country. They’re animals,” Trump said in several video clips said when added together.

WATCH:

The #DemocraticConvention tonight repeated the lie that President Trump called asylum seekers animals. Both times he was referring to members of the MS-13 gang.

Here is the DNC’s selectively edited video along with the full versions. pic.twitter.com/CB4viFYqxS

— Daily Caller (@DailyCaller) August 20, 2020

Trump referred to MS-13 gang members as “animals” in a White House briefing in May 2018, PolitiFact reported. Multiple fact checkers debunked that Trump called asylum seekers animals.

The quotation used in the DNC video left out the context of a comment made by Fresno County Sheriff Margaret Mims to Trump about the challenges of reporting illegal immigrants who are members of MS-13, the Washington Examiner reported.

“We have people coming into the country or trying to come in, we’re stopping a lot of them, but we’re taking people out of the country,” Trump responded. “You wouldn’t believe how bad these people are. These aren’t people. These are animals,” he said.

The edited video went viral on Twitter, nearly a year after the briefing, in April of 2019.