Former President Donald Trump plans to visit Springfield, Ohio, “soon,” a source familiar with the planning said.
The town has become the center of a national political fight on immigration, with Trump and his running mate, Sen. JD Vance, R-Ohio, spreading baseless conspiracy theories that Haitian immigrants in Springfield are eating dogs and other pets.
Though the unfounded claims have circulated online in right-wing circles for weeks, they went mainstream last week when Trump and Vice President Kamala Harris met for a debate in Philadelphia.
“In Springfield, they’re eating the dogs. The people that came in. They’re eating the cats. They’re eating — they’re eating the pets of the people that live there. And this is what’s happening in our country. And it’s a shame,” Trump said on the debate stage.
Trump ally Vivek Ramaswamy also announced on X that he will visit the town Thursday.
Officials in Springfield and elsewhere in Ohio have resoundingly condemned all allegations that immigrants in the city have been eating pets.
In a statement to NBC News on Monday ahead of the debate, the Springfield Police Division said that “there have been no credible reports or specific claims of pets being harmed, injured or abused by individuals within the immigrant community.”
GOP Gov. Mike DeWine told ABC News on Sunday that there is no evidence that immigrants in Springfield have been eating pets and that the conspiracy theories were “garbage.”
“The Haitians who are in Springfield are legal. They came to Springfield to work. Ohio is on the move, and Springfield has really made a great resurgence,” DeWine said.
Since the debate, municipal buildings in the city have been the targets of bomb threats and immigrants in Springfield have reported feeling unsafe.
“We’re in pain right now,” Mayor Rob Rue said Friday on NBC News’ “Meet the Press NOW,” adding that if Trump decided to visit, “that could be difficult, a very difficult visit.”
Asked what he’d say to Trump if he had the opportunity, Rue said: “We need help and not hate. And we need calm voices.”
On Sunday, Vance disputed that his claims about the Haitian immigrants were unfounded, telling NBC News’ “Meet the Press,” “I hear you saying that they’re baseless, but I’m not repeating them because I invented them out of thin air.
“I’m repeating them because my constituents are saying these things are happening,” he said. “Clearly, these rumors are out there because constituents are seeing it with their own eyes.”
Later, in an interview with CNN, Vance echoed his remarks and blasted the “American media” for not paying attention to what he alleged was happening in Springfield.
“If I have to create stories so that the American media actually pays attention to the suffering of the American people, then that’s what I’m going to do,” Vance said.
Questioned about what he meant by “creat[ing] stories,” Vance said, “I say that we’re creating a story, meaning we’re creating the American media focusing on it.”
Asked whether she accepts that Trump and Vance’s claims are untrue, Republican National Committee co-chair Lara Trump, who is Trump’s daughter-in-law, told Fox News: “It is not up to me to decide that. This information came directly from the people of Springfield. No one at our campaign — Donald Trump did not make this up himself.”
This article was originally published on NBCNews.com
