Donald Trump says there are “a lot of bad genes” among immigrants in America

Former President Donald Trump told conservative radio host Hugh Hewitt on Monday morning that there are “a lot of bad genes” among migrants living in America.

During his presidential campaign, Trump, the Republican nominee, has repeatedly claimed that President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris, the Democratic nominee, have allowed “millions of people from prisons and jails” into the country.

Appearing on Hewitt's syndicated radio show, Trump repeated a recent campaign theme that there are “13,000” convicted murderers who have entered this country illegally.

“If you look at the things (Harris) is suggesting, they are so far out,” Trump told Hewitt. “She has no idea. What would it be like to allow people to cross an open border? Thirteen thousand of them were murderers. Many of them murdered more than one person and now they live happily in America.”

He continued: “Well, I believe that, a murderer; it's in their genes. And we have a lot of bad genes in this country right now.”

Newsweek emailed the Trump and Harris campaigns seeking comment.

Trump has frequently used the term “immigrant crime,” even though violent crime is declining in the United States. Studies show that immigrants are less likely to commit crimes than U.S. citizens.

Figures listed in a Sept. 25 letter from Immigration and Customs Enforcement Acting Director Patrick Lechleitner to Texas Rep. Tony Gonzales show that 13,099 immigrants convicted of murder are on the agency's non-detainer list, meaning they are not in immigration detention.

But the Department of Homeland Security says Trump and some Republican lawmakers are misinterpreting the data in the letter.

Most of the 13,099 people likely have not entered the United States in the past 3.5 years. The data covers the last 40 years. Many of these individuals are not in immigration detention as they are currently in police custody serving their sentences.

Additionally, a 2022 ruling by the Supreme Court, not the Biden-Harris administration, ruled that people cannot be held in immigration detention indefinitely. As a result, people from countries that do not accept deportation flights must be released.

“The data in this letter is being misinterpreted. The data goes back decades; they include people who have entered the country in the last 40 years or more, and the vast majority of custody decisions were made long before this administration. This includes many who are under the jurisdiction of, or currently in custody of, federal, state, or local law enforcement authorities,” DHS said in its statement.

Trump's critics took aim at the former president's continued rhetoric regarding migrants.

“Donald Trump has become a complete eugenicist here,” wrote constitutional law professor Anthony Michael Kreis on X, formerly Twitter, after Trump’s interview with Hewitt.

Eugenics is the debunked belief that selective breeding can improve the human species by breeding out undesirable traits and encouraging people with desirable traits to reproduce.

Trump has previously bragged about his genetics. During a January rally in Nevada, he told the crowd that he shared genes with “smart people,” including his uncle, Professor John Trump, who he falsely claimed was the longest-serving professor in the history of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

“You know, I had an uncle. “He's the longest-serving professor, Doctor John Trump, in the history of MIT, with the same genes – we have genes, we're smart people, we're smart people,” Trump said at a rally in Nevada in January.

“We are like racehorses – Mr. Lieutenant Governor – we are also like racehorses. You know, the fast ones breed the fast ones, and the slow ones don't work so well, right? But we are no different in that sense.”

Trump's talk of him Genes could This was due to his family's alleged belief in eugenics, the president's biographer Michael D'Antonio said in 2016.

“The (Trump) family espouses a racehorse theory of human development,” D'Antonio said in his PBS documentary. The choice. “They believe that there are superior people and that if you put the genes of a superior woman and a superior man together, you will have superior offspring.”

Immigration is a top issue for voters in this presidential election, second only to inflation or rising costs.

Mass deportation was announced as a central part of the Republican Party's 2024 immigration policy, promising it would be the largest deportation program in American history.

The party says it would target illegal or undocumented migrants in the U.S., citing a figure of 11 million.

Trump political adviser Stephen Miller promised a 100 percent deportation rate at the border by reinstating strict policies including “Remain in Mexico” and Title 42 restrictions that were used during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Trump said the National Guard and local law enforcement could be deployed to implement the directive.