Alabama Senator Tommy Tuberville expressed his disappointment on Tuesday that Donald Trump’s comments accusing migrants of “poisoning the blood of our country” weren’t even more xenophobic.
During a rally in New Hampshire on Saturday, Trump told a crowd of supporters that migrants are “poisoning the blood of our country … That’s what they’ve done. They’ve poisoned mental institutions and prisons all over the world — not just in South America, not just the three or four countries that we think about, but all over the world. They’re coming into our country, from Africa, from Asia — all over the world. They’re pouring into our country.”
While President Joe Biden’s campaign pointed out similarities between Trump’s comments and the writings of Nazi dictator Adolf Hitler, Republicans were quick to excuse the screed. Tuberville took things a step further by complaining to reporters that Trump’s comments weren’t harsh enough.
“I’m mad he wasn’t tougher than that,” Tuberville said Tuesday when asked about Trump comparing immigrants to blood poisoning. “Because have you seen what’s happening at the border? We’re being overrun. They’re taking us over. So a little bit disappointed it wasn’t tougher.”
Republicans have for years relied on racist and xenophobic tropes to buttress their draconian anti-immigration policies and vision. Trump himself has promised a harsh crackdown on immigrants should he retake the presidency in 2024, one that includes mass deportations and a network of migrant detainment camps. While the former president’s rhetoric on race and immigration is outright authoritarian, Tuberville’s own track record is not to be ignored.
In October of last year, Tuberville drew widespread criticism after delivering a racist, anti-Black screed during a Trump rally in Nevada. “[Democrats are] not soft on crime. They’re pro-crime. They want crime. They want crime because they want to take over what you got. They want to control what you have. They want reparations because they think the people that do the crime are owed that. Bullshit!” Tuberville told the crowd of Trump supporters. In November, the Alabama senator claimed that the Biden administration’s border policies would result in “a 9/11 attack every few weeks if we don’t watch it.”
Earlier this year, Tuberville found himself in the center of a firestorm of backlash after he explicitly defended white nationalists and white supremacists. “They call them that,” the senator told an NPR affiliate. “I call them Americans.” During the same interview, Tuberville accused the Biden administration of “destroying” the U.S. military by working to remove individuals affiliated with extremist movements from the armed services.
After weeks of controversy, and criticism from his own Republican colleagues, Tuberville begrudgingly admitted that “white nationalists are racists.”
Considering how hard it was for him to admit that racists are racist, it’s no surprise that Tuberville considers comparing migrants to poison in the nation’s bloodstream to be a mild take.