LANSING — Trump is expected to criticize President Joe Biden's border management on Tuesday when he visits Wisconsin and Michigan, two key 2024 battleground states. Trump will speak on “Biden’s Border Bloodbath” in Grand Rapids, Michigan, first. His next rally will be in Green Bay, Wisconsin, on presidential primary day.
Many potential voters are frightened about record-high illegal border crossings, giving Trump an immigration advantage over Biden. Trump and his party have seized on several high-profile incidents of illegal immigrants being charged with crimes, including the Georgia nursing student's murder by a Venezuelan man.
Trump is likely to discuss Ruby Garcia's March 22 death on a Grand Rapids freeway on Tuesday. She was dating Brandon Ortiz Vite, the suspect, according to police. He told authorities he shot her many times after an altercation, then left her dead on the road in her red Mazda.
Mexican citizen Ortiz Vite was deported after a drunk driving arrest, authorities say. His attorney is not listed in court documents.
“Every state is a border state under Crooked Joe Biden. Joe Biden has brought the devastation, turmoil, and slaughter from around the world into our backyards, making every town a border town, Trump spokesperson Karoline Leavitt said in a statement previewing the former president's address.
The FBI said that U.S. violent crime fell again last year following a pandemic-era rise. The latest Michigan data shows violent crime at a three-year low in 2022. Last year, Detroit had the fewest homicides since 1966.
It was unclear if Garcia's family will attend Trump's rally in Georgia last month, where Riley's family met him backstage. On Monday, Trump told conservative Michigan radio presenter Justin Barclay that he would “love to have her family there, if they’d like to be there — it’d be in my honor” and asked him to organize.
Last Monday, her sister asked reporters not to politicize her tale on Facebook. Biden's team foreshadowed the speech by accusing Trump of scrapping a bipartisan border pact that would have increased more than 1,500 Customs and Border Protection troops and other limitations.
“Tomorrow, Donald Trump is coming to Grand Rapids where he is expected to once again try to politicize a tragedy and sow hate and division to hide from his own record of failing Michiganders,” said Biden campaign Michigan communications director Alyssa Bradley. Democratic Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer said Monday that Congress and the president must address “a real problem on our southern border.”
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