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ICYMI: ‘Rick Scott defends Laura Loomer and Donald Trump Over Anti-Latino “joke”’ [Palm Beach Post]
Scott on Loomer: “She’s somebody who believes in this country.”
New reporting from Palm Beach Post shows that Rick Scott “defended” racist conspiracy theorist Laura Loomer after appearing on Looomer’s podcast earlier this week. Loomer has called 9/11 “an inside job,” suggested the January 6th attack on the U.S. Capitol should be celebrated as a “national holiday,” and insinuated that the mass shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School that killed 17 Floridians was a hoax. Loomer has also said Puerto Ricans shouldn’t serve as federal judges because they’re “not even from this country.”
Click here to read the full story. See key excerpts below:
- U.S. Sen. Rick Scott defended Laura Loomer, a far-right firebrand who has previously intimated that Puerto Ricans are not U.S. citizens, during his West Palm Beach campaign stop this week — just days after a comedian at a Donald Trump rally called the territory “a floating island of garbage.“
- The night before, he was on Loomer’s podcast discussing his support for mass deportations and his plans to become the Republican leader in the Senate should he be reelected.
- Loomer wrote on Monday on X, formerly known as Twitter, that people should “get over” comedian Tony Hinchcliffe’s “joke” at Republican presidential nominee Trump’s Sunday night rally in New York City. At that event, Hinchcliffe sparked a political firestorm by calling Puerto Rico a “floating island of garbage” and saying Latinos “love making babies.”
- Scott, at Don Ramon’s, defended Loomer, who had shared a post on social media on Sept. 11, 2023, saying that the U.S government was behind the 9/11 terrorist attacks. “She’s somebody who believes in this country,” he said, adding that she is “a big supporter of President Trump.“
- Loomer on Tuesday endorsed Scott for re-election. Scott thanked her and praised her for helping him as far back as 2014, when he ran for reelection as Florida’s governor.
- Loomer has a history of making disparaging remarks about Hispanics, including those against Puerto Ricans. She said during a May 21 episode of her podcast that three of the judges presiding over federal cases involving Trump were “not even from this country.”
- Trump has not denounced the comedian his campaign hosted.
- “These Latinos, they love making babies, too,” he said. “There’s no pulling out. They don’t do that. They come inside, just like they did to our country.” Moments later, he said, “there’s literally a floating island of garbage in the middle of the ocean right now. I think it’s called Puerto Rico.”