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Donald Trump Junior just compared Syrian refugees to poisonous Skittles

Wrigley, the maker of Skittles, said: “Skittles are candy. Refugees are people.”

GOP 2016 Convention Donald Trump Junior. Carolyn Kaster / PA Carolyn Kaster / PA / PA

DONALD TRUMP JUNIOR showed all his father’s subtle understanding of the world’s problems by likening Syrian refugees to poisonous sweets.

The badly punctuated meme, sent by Republican nominee Donald Trump’s son, said:

If I had a bowl of skittles and I told you just three would kill you. [sic] Would you take a handful? That’s our Syrian refugee problem.

A spokesman for Hillary Clinton called the comparison “disgusting”.

United Nations

The meme set off a flurry of accusations that The Little Donald was making light of the refugee crisis, which is currently being discussed at a United Nations summit in New York.

In a statement to CNBC, a spokesperson at Wrigley, the maker of Skittles, said:

Skittles are candy. Refugees are people. We don’t feel it’s an appropriate analogy. We will respectfully refrain from further commentary as anything we say could be misinterpreted as marketing.

Commentators, including a Washington Post journalist, took issue with the characterisation of a people who have undergone five years of war.

Others compared America’s potential First Family with America’s treatment of some Jews during the Holocaust.

Joe Walsh, an Illinois Republican and right-wing radio show host once banned from the airwaves for racial slurs, noted that the meme bore an uncanny resemblance to one he sent a month earlier.

Others corrected Trump Junior’s punctuation or used it to make political points about the Republican nominee’s manifesto.

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Darragh Peter Murphy
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