Overview
- Speaking in Mount Pocono, Pennsylvania, Trump recounted telling senators in 2018, “Why is it we only take people from shithole countries,” while invoking Norway, Sweden and Denmark as preferred sources of immigrants.
- His remarks align with contemporaneous reporting by The Washington Post and others about the closed‑door immigration meeting that triggered an international uproar in 2018.
- The acknowledgment undercuts his 2018 tweet asserting that his DACA meeting language was tough but did not include the specific slur.
- At the rally, Trump disparaged Afghanistan, Haiti and Somalia as “hellholes” and described Somalia as “filthy, dirty, disgusting” while promoting a claimed permanent pause on migration from such countries.
- The confirmation follows years of conflicting accounts from attendees, with Sen. Dick Durbin saying the slur was used and Republicans Tom Cotton, David Perdue and then‑DHS Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen saying they did not recall it.