Sign up for the daily Inside Washington email for exclusive US coverage and analysis sent to your inbox
Get our free Inside Washington email
Get our free Inside Washington email
Former President Donald Trump expressed his frustration over a fly that approached his lecturn in a bizarre moment during a rally speech.
Trump was on stage at Prairie du Chien, Wisconsin, making a point about a hat, when he appears to get distracted by the creature.
“Oh there’s a fly,” the former president said. “I wonder where the fly came from?”
One audience member shouted out “Kamala.”
Trump continued: “See, two years ago, I wouldn’t have had a fly up here. You’re changing rapidly. We can’t take it any longer.” It wasn’t clear who the president was referring to before changing the subject.
The internet was quick to react to Trump’s unexpected outburst, with MSNBC host and legal analyst Katie Phang saying “this is not normal.” Meanwhile, American Bridge 21st Century, who describe themselves an a Republican accountability group, said: “Trump is exhausted and struggling to stay on track. He begins a story about a hat, but gets distracted by a fly and never finishes. He starts a entirely new story and struggles with the word “unique.” Many others drew the comparison between Trump and former Vice President Mike Pence, after a fly landed on the latter’s head and remained there for almost two minutes during his 2020 debate with Kamala Harris.
In separate remarks made during his speech, Trump leveled harsh rhetoric against Harris, who he called “mentally disabled” and “mentally impaired”. Harris visited the US-Mexico border earlier this week and most of Trump’s speech took aim at migrants who have entered the US illegally.
Posters of migrants who have been charged with murder and other violent crimes surrounded Trump on stage. Some of them read: “End Migrant Crime” and “Deport Illegals Now.” He referred to those who had been charged as “monsters,” “stone-cold killers” and “vile animals.”
He continued to blame Harris and President Joe Biden for the influx of migrants coming into the country, and claimed some of them wanted to “rape, pillage, thieve, plunder and kill the people of the United States of America.” In fact, a 2024 study conducted by researchers at Northwestern University found immigrants have never been incarcerated at a greater rate than people born in the United States over an 150-year period.
While speaking at her own news conference from the border, Harris vowed to fix the country’s “broken immigration system” and accused the former president of “fanning the flames of fear and division”.
