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The controversy around an offensive joke about Puerto Rico told at a campaign rally for former President Trump on Sunday in New York has reached the battleground state of Wisconsin. Reaction there shows another divide between supporters of the Republican presidential candidate and those of the Democratic nominee, Vice President Kamala Harris. Chuck Quirmbach of member station WUWM reports.
CHUCK QUIRMBACH, BYLINE: Republican vice presidential candidate JD Vance held a rally in Racine, Wisconsin, just south of Milwaukee Monday evening. Even before Vance spoke, some attendees were aware of the controversy stemming from Sunday night's Trump rally at New York's Madison Square Garden, where there were disparaging remarks about Black and Latino Americans, and a comedian made an offensive quip about Puerto Rico, saying the U.S. territory is, quote, "a floating island of garbage." Vance and Trump supporter Ben Dahlstrom says criticism of the rally is excessive.
BEN DAHLSTROM: Everyone's so - awareness is so heightened with - like, with words, and I understand it. But I think it's gone a little bit too far. And so any slip of the tongue, anything like that can be really taken the wrong way.
QUIRMBACH: The Trump campaign distanced itself from the comedian's remarks, releasing a statement saying, quote, "this joke does not reflect the views of President Trump or the campaign." Dahlstrom's wife, Heather Dahlstrom, said she had heard great things about Sunday's rally but had not heard the joke. When her husband summed it up, she defended the comedian.
HEATHER DAHLSTROM: Well, I mean, comedians, their job is to push boundaries, and I think their job, in some ways, is even to be offensive.
QUIRMBACH: During Senator Vance's speech in Racine, he eventually got around to Sunday's event.
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JD VANCE: We had a big rally yesterday in Madison Square Garden. It was very fun. We had a good time.
QUIRMBACH: But when Vance took questions from local reporters, the first question was about the offensive joke. He says he doesn't think it's news and that real news is people having trouble affording groceries, blaming Vice President Harris.
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VANCE: And that's what the American people are interested in, and that's what the American people and the American media should focus on.
QUIRMBACH: After the rally, attendee Daniel Rhea called the joke about Puerto Rico a bad one. But he says he doesn't think it will hurt the Trump campaign's effort in Wisconsin to reach out to diverse voters. About 500,000 people, just over 8% of the state, identify as Hispanic or Latino. Rhea says only a small number will be offended.
DANIEL RHEA: If you're going to get - what? - a sliver of those, which is already a sliver, so you're talking about a sliver of a sliver of a sliver. So no, it's not going to bother anything.
QUIRMBACH: But these days, elections have been settled by narrow margins. In Wisconsin, the past two presidential contests have been won by around 20,000 votes each, with Trump taking the state in 2016, then President Biden winning four years later. But the joke at the Trump rally has offended a prominent Wisconsin resident of Puerto Rican descent - Milwaukee Common Council President Jose Perez.
JOSE PEREZ: It was rude. It was crass. It was racist.
QUIRMBACH: Perez says the joke causes extra pain because of his roots in Puerto Rico.
PEREZ: But yeah, it feels extra hurtful, knowing my mother lives there. I have so much family there. And what Puerto Rico means to our family and our culture, it especially stings.
QUIRMBACH: Perez says he was already bothered by remarks Trump made about Puerto Rico as president and has endorsed Harris this year. Perez says some of his friends in Milwaukee of Puerto Rican descent had been staying out of this year's election but now plan to vote for the Democratic ticket.
For NPR News, I'm Chuck Quirmbach in Milwaukee.
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