Donald Trump has claimed that Haitian immigrants are eating pets in Springfield, Ohio.
Asked about immigration during the television debate with Kamala Harris he said: “They’re eating the dogs, the people that came in, they’re eating the cats.
“They’re eating the pets of the people that live there, and this is what’s happening in our country, and it’s a shame.”
With Kamala Harris shaking her head in disbelief and laughed, he continued “People are saying their dog was eaten by people”.
David Muir, one of the debate moderators, says that the town manager of Springfield said there were no credible reports of animals being eaten.
Shortly before the debate, the Trump campaign put a post on social media , with a manufactured photograph of the former president shielding cats and geese in his arms.
Claims of pet-eating immigrants first appeared on X, formerly known as Twitter, in recent days. A woman claimed in a Facebook post that her neighbour’s daughter’s friend had seen her lost cat being eaten by Haitians.
The post was shared alongside by the X account ‘End Wokeness’ alongside an image of a black man carrying two geese.
Another video widely shared online shows police bodycam footage of a woman being arrested and accused of eating a cat.
The image of the man carrying geese was taken in Columbus, Ohio and there is no evidence he is Haitian. The social media user who first posted the image told the Daily Dot website that he was outraged that “right-wingers including Ohio’s Republican senator will take a random picture from the internet and use it as a weapon to further their agenda.”
The woman in the arrest video was born in the US, not Haiti, and was arrested in Canton, 172 miles from Springfield, the Daily Dot reported.
Police in the city also issued a statement denying the claims. “There have been no credible reports or specific claims of pets being harmed, injured or abused by individuals within the immigrant community.”
The Trump rapid response team stood by the claim, citing a report in The Federalist, a conservative online magazine.
It quoted a report to a to a police dispatcher in which a member of the public claimed to have seen four Haitian migrants each carrying a goose.