Rep. Joseph Crowley (D-N.Y.) slammed President Trump on Saturday over a report claiming that the president suggested that Haitian immigrants “all have AIDS,” among other comments.
Crowley, a member of Democratic leadership as chairman of the House Democratic Caucus, took to Twitter to accuse Trump of “embarrassing” the U.S. “at home and abroad.”
“These comments are beneath the office of the President. The America I know welcomes those fleeing conflict and disaster with open arms. President Trump is once again embarrassing our nation at home and abroad,” Crowley tweeted.
An article in The New York Times on Saturday cited two Trump administration officials who claimed Trump made the remark about Haitian immigrants in a June meeting in the Oval Office, as well as other remarks aimed at immigrants from Nigeria.
{mosads}
Once they had seen what the U.S. had to offer, those immigrants would never “go back to their huts” in Africa, Trump reportedly said.
The White House issued a swift denial of the comments on Saturday, calling the claims made by the Times “outrageous.”
“General Kelly, General McMaster, Secretary Tillerson, Secretary Nielsen and all other senior staff actually in the meeting deny these outrageous claims,” White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders said.
“It’s both sad and telling The New York Times would print the lies of their anonymous ‘sources’ anyway.”
The White House did not deny the subject of the meeting, but strongly denied that Trump ever used the words “AIDS” or “huts” to describe immigrants entering the U.S.