DNC launches Milwaukee billboards with Trump ‘horrible’ city comment

The Democratic National Committee (DNC) is launching 10 billboards in the Milwaukee area spotlighting former President Trump’s alleged remarks calling Milwaukee a “horrible city,” according to the DNC.

The Trump campaign quickly clarified the former president’s comment, saying Trump does not think Milwaukee itself is “horrible,” but that the crime in the city is. Still, Democratic political operatives have seized on the criticism of the city — the largest in the pivotal swing state of Wisconsin and the site of the Republican National Convention this summer.

The billboards include Trump’s face alongside bold capital letters that says, “Milwaukee, where we are having our convention, is a horrible city,” attributing the quote to “Donald J. Trump.”

Directly underneath, the billboard includes a screenshot of the original tweet from a Punchbowl News reporter, which reads, “TRUMP TO HOUSE REPUBLICANS:” before including the same quotation. The billboard highlights “is a horrible city” in both iterations of the quotation.

DNC spokesperson Addy Toevs said in a statement that Trump “has made his contempt for Wisconsinites and their home clear.”

“Just yesterday, he called Milwaukee – which will host the RNC in July – a ‘horrible city.’ The dislike is mutual – in 2020, Wisconsin handed Trump a one way ticket back to exile in Mar-a-Lago and sent President Biden to the Oval Office. In November, they’ll do it again,” Toevs said.

“Trump hates Milwaukee because Milwaukeeans know exactly who he is – a sore loser who they’re going to make a two-time loser this November,” Toevs added.

Dylan Johnson, a Trump campaign spokesperson, previously told The Hill that the situation was “a desperate attempt to get likes” on social media and noted no reporters were in the room where the former president met with Republican lawmakers on Capitol Hill — and allegedly took aim at the city.

“It’s a total lie,” Johnson said in a statement that included links to GOP members who defended Trump. “President Trump was explicitly referring to the problems in Milwaukee, specifically violent crime and voter fraud.”

A Wisconsin Republican leapt to Trump’s defense as well.

“He said nothing that I consider to be a criticism of Milwaukee, other than that we’ve got to get more of them to be voting Republican in the future,” Rep. Glenn Grothman (R-Wis.), who represents a district near Milwaukee, told NewsNation’s “The Hill.”

Trump returned to Capitol Hill on Thursday for the first time since the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol. He met with House Republicans in the morning, before joining Senate Republicans for lunch.