US PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATES Kamala Harris and Donald Trump clashed last night in a 90-minute debate held on ABC News, in which one false claim by the Republican nominee stood out — that immigrants were eating Americans’ pets.

Trump made the claim in response to a question about why he tried to kill legislation that would have increased border security.

“In Springfield [Ohio], they’re eating the dogs, the people that came in, they’re eating the cats,” he said. “They’re eating… they’re eating the pets of the people that live there.”

The claim has previously been spread by Trump’s running mate and Ohio-native JD Vance about Springfield, a town in the potential vice president’s home state.

“You bring up Springfield, Ohio, and ABC News did reach out to the City Manager there,” David Muir, a debate moderator said in response to Trump’s claim.

“He told us that there were no credible reports of specific claims of pets being harmed, injured or abused by individuals within the immigrant community…”

“I’ve seen people on television,” Trump interrupted. “People on television say ‘my dog was taken and used for food’”.

The claim, which has been made about Haitian immigrants in the city, is not the first time this group has been targeted by the American right.

Trump has a long history of blaming immigrants for things that they have not done and has previously singled out people from Haiti, which he famously referred to as “a shithole country”.

He had falsely claimed for years that Barack Obama was not born a natural American citizen and therefore his presidency was fraudulent. 

More recently, Trump has been criticized for his comments that Kamala Harris had “happened to turn black” a few years ago.

Cat Food

Despite Trump’s assertions, the story that immigrants in Springfield, Ohio, have been taking and eating people’s pets is false, and comes from an extremely dubious origin.

According to local news sources, the story began on a local Facebook group, where one poster said that their “neighbour’s daughter’s friend had lost her cat” and later found it in a Haitian neighbour’s garden as it was being prepared to be eaten.

Local police as well as city and county officials were quick to point out that there was no evidence to support this claim, and the town’s mayor denounced the story as false.

The story also bears some similarity to an actual news story about an Ohio woman who was accused of stomping a cat to death and eating it.

However, there is no indication that the woman charged was an immigrant and that incident was said to have occurred in Canton, a city on the other side of the state, more than 200 kilometres away.

Nevertheless, in recent days the claim quickly spread around pro-Trump social media and was soon echoed by influential commentators, including Trump’s running mate, JD Vance, who encouraged people to spread the false claim despite acknowledging that there was no evidence and the rumours could be false.

“It’s possible, of course, that all of these rumors will turn out to be false,” he tweeted, before following up by saying, “don’t let the crybabies in the media dissuade you, fellow patriots. Keep the cat memes flowing.”

The rumour was further spread by Trump supporter and owner of social media platform X Elon Musk, who shared memes about the story.

Musk has previously reposted videos from far-right figures spreading unverified rumours about Haiti, including that “cannibal gangs” were rampaging through the country and might soon migrate to America.

The verified account of the Republican House Judiciary Committee also spread the claim, along with clearly AI-generated images , one of Trump hugging a cat and a duck (referencing another false claim that Haitians were also cooking ducks from local parks), as well as kitten duck hybrids floating in water.

“Please vote for Trump so Haitian immigrants don’t eat us,” reads a caption over an image of cats, posted by Republican Senator Ted Cruz, a one-time presidential candidate who called Trump a “pathological liar” after he was himself a victim of Trump’s misinformation.

However, despite Trump’s reputation of lying, as well as clear denials from local authorities and a lack of any evidence, it seems that Trump and his party will continue to push the story.

With reporting from Jane Matthews.