Donald Trump questioned Kamala Harris’ racial identity and returned to Pa. for the first time since his assassination attempt

CHICAGO — Former President Donald Trump on Wednesday questioned Vice President Kamala Harris’ racial identity at an event for Black journalists that was part of a whirlwind day of campaigning that also saw him return to Pennsylvania for the first time since surviving an assassination attempt in the state two weeks ago.

“She was Indian all the way and then all of a sudden she made a turn and she went — she became a Black person,” Trump said of Harris, whose mother emigrated from India and whose father emigrated from Jamaica. “I think somebody should look into that.”

The comments were part of a combative exchange between Trump and the moderators at a conference of the National Association of Black Journalists. They were the latest in a long line of offensive and racist remarks that have defined his political career, including when he made his first foray into national politics nearly 15 years ago by falsely suggesting then-President Barack Obama wasn’t born in the United States.

» READ MORE: Donald Trump questions Kamala Harris’ race, attacks ABC News’ Rachel Scott during NABJ interview

“The man is just a complete moron, racist, white supremacist,” said City Councilmember Nina Ahmad, a Bangladeshi immigrant who is the first South Asian city lawmaker in Philadelphia history. “It’s just ludicrous what he’s saying. Clearly we’ve known her heritage for a long time, that she has an Indian mother who came here and met her Jamaican father, who obviously has African heritage.”

Ahmad said she thought Trump was cynically questioning Harris’ race because her popularity with Black voters threatens his chances.

“He wants to destroy her Black support,” Ahmad said. “I’m sure that’s probably why. The amount of excitement that her candidacy has generated reminds me of 2008, and it’s very powerful.”

Harris, who attended Howard University, would be the first Black woman to serve as president if she prevails against Trump in November. She would also be the first Asian American, in addition to being the first woman of any race.

She has embraced all of these identities as a candidate, speaking at events targeting both Black and Asian American voters in Philadelphia in recent weeks.

Harris spokesperson Michael Taylor said Trump’s “tirade is simply a taste of the chaos and division that has been a hallmark of Trump’s MAGA rallies.”

“Trump lobbed personal attacks and insults at Black journalists the same way he did throughout his presidency — while he failed Black families and left the entire country digging out of the ditch he left us in,” Taylor said in a statement.

After leaving the Chicago event, Trump flew to Harrisburg for a rally. Inside the venue an image of a Business Insider article about Harris’ Indian American background was projected onto the stadium’s big screen before his arrival.

Attendees waited in scorching temperatures for hours before his arrival. Michael Baker, who traveled to the rally from the Gettysburg area, said he thought Trump raised a valid point about Harris after hearing about the former president’s comments in Chicago.

”I don’t think she’s lied about it, but she uses it to her advantage,” said Baker, 68, of Harris’ mixed-race heritage when told of the former president’s remarks. “She’s not African American, she’s Indian.”

The Harrisburg speech was the former president’s first event in Pennsylvania since being shot in the ear during a failed assassination attempt July 13 in Butler, Pa.

Trump began his remarks by discussing the shooting and recognizing Corey Comperatore, a former Buffalo Township fire chief who died after being struck by a stray bullet.

”In his last act on this earth, Corey threw himself over his wife and daughters and died shielding them from the … bullets of a very disturbed guy,” Trump said.

The crowd chanted “Corey! Corey! Corey!” before Trump called for a moment of silence in honor of Comperatore.

Trump has promised to return to Butler in the future.

“We had a rough day. I will tell you, by all accounts, I should not be with you today,” Trump said. “I shouldn’t be with you, but I am.”

Later in the speech, Trump recalled how pundits predicted he would turn into “a nice man” after the shooting.

“And I really agreed with that for about eight hours or so, and then I realized they were trying to put me in prison for doing absolutely nothing wrong,” said Trump, the first former president convicted of a felony.

“These are bad people. We have to win this battle and you know they’re going to become nicer when we win.”

Trump held his Harrisburg rally at the New Holland Arena in Harrisburg’s Pennsylvania Farm Show Complex, an 8,000-seat arena usually used for rodeos and wrangling events. The Harrisburg crowd did the wave more than a dozen times in excitement for Trump’s appearance and sang Oliver Anthony’s “Rich Men North of Richmond,” a MAGA anthem.

A few thousand more attendees were also on the floor of the venue, the dirt floor covered by a concrete slab.

In a rambling speech, Trump described Harris as a “phony” and a far-left extremist who supports open borders and is weak on crime.

“On the one hand, you have a radical left puppet candidate who is fake, fake, fake, and then on the other hand you have a president who will fight, fight, fight for America,” Trump said. “She is an extreme radical left lunatic.”

Harris, a former San Francisco district attorney and California attorney general, has been running on her background as a prosecutor since becoming the Democratic nominee and debuted an ad this week seeking to hit back on Republican criticism on the border.

Roughly an hour into his speech, Trump claimed that President Joe Biden’s withdrawal from the race in favor of Harris amounted to a coup.

“It was a coup. This was a coup of a president. He will be famous. He will be more famous for the coup than the bad job he’s done,” said Trump, who was impeached for inciting the Jan. 6 Capitol attack and faces ongoing prosecutions related to his efforts to overturn the 2020 election.

Trump did not directly address the controversy over his NABJ remarks during the speech.

Phyllis Vance — a Black Trump voter who laughed while mentioning she had no relation to Trump’s running mate, Ohio Sen. JD Vance — said she agreed with Trump’s false assessment of Harris’ racial identity.

“I don’t think he’s racist. He’s done so many things for Black people,” said Vance, a 64-year-old pharmacy technician who added Trump was “for the people, no matter what color you are.”

Montgomery County Commissioner Neil Makhija, whose parents are Indian immigrants, said Wednesday that Trump and other conservatives have shown they “have no integrity” when discussing Harris’ race.

“I’ve seen for years, right wing politicians speaking to Indian American audiences say VP Harris identifies as Black and ‘hides’ her Indian heritage. Now when speaking to a Black audience, Trump and his weirdos say she is Indian, and only recently ‘turned Black,’” Makhija posted on X.

Inquirer staff writers Fallon Roth and Sarah Nicell contributed to this article.