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Trump clears out Allentown as Puerto Rican voters leave

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Victor Martinez's radio stations were flooded with calls. Yesenia Westerband’s food truck customers were thrilled. Guillermo Lopez's Facebook feed was full of comments.

“Como Puertorriqueño te diré que eso tiene manera de disculparse!!!” A listener commented on Martinez's show. “As a Puerto Rican, there is no excuse.”

As Donald Trump arrived for a rally in Allentown, Pennsylvania, on Tuesday, comedian Tony Hinchcliffe's comments at the former president's Madison Square Guardian event on Sunday, in which he called Puerto Rico a “floating island of trash,” reverberated throughout the crowd Puerto Rican population of the community.

Martinez, Westerband and Lopez are all of Puerto Rican descent and said Hinchcliffe's comments were the talk of the majority-Hispanic city, inflaming the community and likely moving votes.

“It's everywhere right now what happened at Madison Square Garden,” said Westerband, who moved to the Lehigh Valley from Puerto Rico when she was 6 and lived on the island again after high school before moving back to Pennsylvania.

For many Puerto Ricans, the “garbage” comments were an October surprise that shocked and concerned them, just before a major election in which their votes could be crucial, said Martinez, who runs a chain of five Pennsylvania radio stations based in Allentown owns.

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Pennsylvania is the most hotly contested and consequential swing state and home to the fourth-largest Puerto Rican population in the country. With 19 electoral votes up for election, the state has nearly 500,000 Puerto Ricans, according to census data. President Joe Biden won the state in 2020 by just 80,555 votes.

“Boricuas a votar Pennsylvania Wisconsin,” one listener commented on the show’s YouTube channel. “Boricuas, let's vote in Pennsylvania and Wisconsin, strong with this old convict who thinks he's God.”

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New York State Senator Gustavo Rivera, who was born and raised in Puerto Rico and now represents the Bronx, believes Hinchcliffe's comments will have a negative impact on the Trump campaign.

He noted that the comments had spread like wildfire through the Puerto Rican community from New York to Florida to Pennsylvania – and said he had received numerous text messages and Facebook messages from Boricuas across the country.

“This is an important turning point,” he said. “It definitely wakes a lot of people up. I hope that this is the energy that we take with us in the last few days.”

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Trump's campaigns are trying to convey calm as the fallout mounts

The Trump campaign denied Hinchcliffe's comments, saying they did not reflect the former president's views.

Trump told ABC News that he didn't know the comedian and hadn't heard his comments, only reiterating that he hadn't heard them when asked to share his thoughts on the Puerto Rico joke.

Trump did not address the controversy during a news conference at his Mar-a-Lago estate in Palm Beach on Tuesday. He called the rally at Madison Square Garden, where speakers made racist, misogynistic and other controversial statements, a “love fest.”

“No president has done more for Puerto Rico than I have,” Trump said at a forum in Pennsylvania later in the day, without directly mentioning Hinchcliffe’s comments.

Prominent Hispanic Republicans joined the former president at his rally in Allentown on Tuesday. He asked Shadow U.S. Sen. Zoraida Buxó of Puerto Rico to join him on stage.

“The people of Puerto Rico trust you,” said Buxó, who is part of Puerto Rico’s shadow delegation that supports statehood but does not have the right to vote, adding: “We need this man back in the White House.”

Trump declared that “no one loves our Latino and Puerto Rican community more than I do” and reiterated that he has done more for the island than any other president. He mentioned the two hurricanes that hit Puerto Rico in 2017 during his presidency and reported that he had sent a hospital ship to the island.

Trump's response after Hurricane Maria hit Puerto Rico was heavily criticized.

An inspector general report found that tensions within the Republican administration led to delays in disbursing funds approved by Congress. The mayor of Puerto Rico's capital and others criticized the former president for throwing paper towels into a crowd during his visit to the island.

A Republican adviser close to the campaign said Trump's team was showing calm amid the fallout from the Madison Square Garden rally and urged his allies to point to Trump adviser Danielle Alvarez's statement, which said: “This joke does not reflect the views of President Trump or the campaign.”

“I think they wish it had never happened… it just takes air time and oxygen,” the consultant said, adding: “In no world was that helpful.” However, the individual questioned whether it would have a big impact, saying , most people have already decided.

Another GOP consultant who has close ties to some members of the Trump campaign said: “I don't think they're too worried, it was a single event and a single news cycle.”

But in a close election where a few thousand votes could make the difference, the adviser said, “at the very least, it's an unnecessary headache that could potentially hurt them at the ballot box, at a time when they're most concerned.” least we can afford.”

“Island of Trash” comments concern swing voters

Westerband is very proud of her Puerto Rican roots and said it was hurtful to hear the island where she was born referred to as “trash.”

Puerto Rico is a U.S. territory and those born there are U.S. citizens, but it often feels like the island is “treated like an extra piece that is not part of the country,” Westerband said.

The food truck owner doesn't think she's very political and doesn't decide until it's time to vote. As a Democrat, she voted for Biden in 2020 but also supported Republicans.

“I’m not swinging in one direction yet, I’m not going to say which way I’m going to vote yet,” she said.

The “garbage” comments are definitely on her mind and that of many people she knows, including the customers of her two food trucks that sell traditional Puerto Rican dishes.

“I know there are a lot of changes of minds and hearts,” she said.

Republican consultant Mike Madrid said there are about 33,500 Puerto Rican voters in Allentown alone.

“The racial slurs at Trump's Madison Square Garden rally could cost him the election,” said Madrid, author of “The Latino Century: How America's Largest Minority Is Transforming Democracy.”

Madrid added: “Even if it moves Pennsylvania even slightly, it's game over – and it will probably move Latinos and Republicans there.”

Martinez, the radio station's owner, does a morning political segment that normally lasts 20 to 30 minutes but lasted more than an hour on Monday because so many people wanted to talk about Hinchcliffe's comments.

As a Democrat, Martinez supports Kamala Harris and was even featured in one of her campaign ads. He had already made up his mind. However, many of his listeners who responded to the “garbage” comments were politically inactive people who are now disappearing from the sidelines.

“A lot of the comments we got and the calls we got were people who didn’t care and weren’t engaged,” Martinez said. “They've had enough of all the talk about politics and now all of a sudden their pride is hurt and now they're going to vote.”

Martinez's stations in Philadelphia, Allentown, Reading, Harrisburg, Lancaster and York reach about 250,000 Latinos, most of them of Puerto Rican descent.

Guillermo Lopez was born in Bethlehem, near Allentown, after his father was recruited from Puerto Rico to work at the Bethlehem steel mill. Lopez followed his father into the mill and worked there for 27 years.

A former union leader, he has been involved in Democratic politics for decades and is also a leader in the area's Hispanic community, serving as vice chair of the Lehigh Valley Hispanic Center.

Lopez has opposed Trump since the former president descended the golden escalator at Trump Tower to announce his first presidential campaign in 2015.

“As a Latino, as a Puerto Rican, it was just abhorrent the whole time,” Lopez said of Trump’s time in office at the height of American politics. “He started with a dog whistle… but now they have a full megaphone.”

Lopez is a vocal activist. But now, after Hinchcliffe's comments, even people he knows who haven't commented on politics are speaking out. He quoted three different Facebook friends who had posted that they wouldn't vote but now do.

“Ever since this happened, it’s like someone gave a bat signal and they came out of the doom,” he said.

Contributor: Rebecca Morin and David Jackson

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