News

Actions

Tim Kaine calls Donald Trump a clown in Spanish: ‘Payaso’

Posted at 2:50 PM, Nov 04, 2016
and last updated 2016-11-04 14:50:44-04

WASHINGTON — Virginia Sen. Tim Kaine may have made history by giving a speech entirely in Spanish Thursday, but an ad-libbed line from the speech is getting more attention: calling Trump a clown in Spanish, “payaso.”

“Donald Trump dijo que los inmigrantes de México son traficantes de drogas, violadores y asesinos. Es un payaso!” Kaine said in Phoenix, Arizona, which translates to, “Donald Trump said that immigrants from Mexico are drug dealers, rapists, and murderers. He is a clown!”

Some Hispanic viewers noticed Kaine’s call-out. Some supported it and some disliked it, and others just found it entertaining:

This isn’t the first time Kaine has called Trump a clown in Spanish. In an interview with Univision’s Jorge Ramos Kaine called Trump not only a clown, but an idiot. Trump acts like “un idiota” and “un payaso,” Kaine told Ramos in August, saying Trump’s actions against the Latino community are idiotic and actions of a clown.

This election season certainly hasn’t been lacking any negative language. But Kaine hit a new demographic with this, using his language ability to attack his opponent for a broader audience.

Kaine’s Spanish speech includes the Hispanic community and over 40 million Spanish-speaking Americans in the conversation during this election. The speech was coupled with a Spanish-language media push with Univision and Telemundo, and Kaine took over the Spanish-language Hillary Clinton Twitter account, @Hillary_ESP.

The outreach strategy seemed to be working — Telemundo led their evening broadcast with Kaine’s speech.

“While we wanted to do the speech in Arizona for very specific reasons, our goal is obviously to reach more broadly across the country to the Latino community,” said Kaine communications director Karen Finney, pointing to high registration and early vote numbers from the Latino community in Arizona. “The Latino vote is going to make a huge difference and I don’t think that those that folks are going to turn out for Donald Trump.”

Kaine told Thursday’s audience that the power of the Latino vote will make a “historical difference” in next week’s election, and emphasized the value of the Latino community, making a direct appeal.

“Whether your family got here recently, or whether your family has been here since before the US came to be Hillary Clinton and I believe that you are our brothers and sisters, and we will fight for all of you. We will fight for all of you,” Clinton’s running mate said in his remarks.

“I want all of you to know that we do understand you, and that we are with you. The United States is a better country because of you. A better country.”