Joe Biden said children are beginning to make racist remarks because of President Trump’s inflammatory rhetoric toward immigrants and minority lawmakers.
Biden, speaking at a fundraiser near Los Angeles on Friday night, said there’s not enough attention being paid to Trump’s effect on children, according to a pool report from the event.
He recalled that a man who hosted an event for him told him his 7-year-old son had been negatively influenced by Trump and asked why Spanish people were on a beach they were visiting.
“Our children are listening,” Biden said.
Trump created a whirlwind of backlash last weekend when he told four Democratic congresswomen of color they should “go back” to their home countries if they are unhappy with the status of the United States, though only one of the women was born outside the U.S.
On Wednesday, a crowd at his campaign rally in North Carolina chanted “send her back” after he criticized Rep. Ilhan Omar, a Somali-born American citizen from Minnesota.
He claimed a day later he did not approve of the chant and tried to stop it, but video shows the president allowing it to go on for about 13 seconds before he moved on with his speech.
Trump appeared to walk back his disavowal on Friday, defending those who chanted as “incredible patriots.”
“This guy is more George Wallace than George Washington,” Biden said of Trump, comparing the president to the segregationist.
