President Joe Biden drew fire from Republicans over comments he made during a Voto Latino campaign call Tuesday night — when his wording appeared to refer to supporters of former President Donald Trump as “waste”.

“The other day, a speaker at his rally called Puerto Rico a ‘floating island of garbage,'” Biden said, according to a video clip on CNN.

He then called Puerto Ricans “good, decent, honorable people” before adding, “The only trash I see floating around out there is his supporters.” »

The comment was followed by: “His demonization of Latinos is unconscionable, and it’s un-American. It’s completely contrary to everything we’ve done, everything we’ve been.”

Republicans quickly seized on the comment, comparing it to Hillary Clinton’s 2016 “basket of deplorables” comment.

Senator Marco Rubio broke the news to Trump on stage while campaigning in Allentown, Philadelphia.

Trump responded: “Remember, Hilary said ‘deplorable.’

“It didn’t work,” he continued. “I think trash is worse, don’t you?”

The Trump campaign’s national press secretary, Karoline Leavitt, responded by saying, “Joe Biden and Kamala Harris hate America and don’t deserve four more years.” Kamala must answer for this shameful attack on tens of millions of Americans. »

The new controversy comes a week after the election and on the evening that Vice President Kamala Harris delivered her closing campaign message on the Ellipse in Washington, DC.

“The president called the hateful rhetoric delivered at the rally at Madison Square Garden ‘rubbish,’” a White House spokesperson said in a statement.

A transcript of remarks given to ABC News by the White House has an apostrophe at the end of “support,” but it is unclear from the video of Biden’s remarks whether the president meant that word in the possessive.

A Harris campaign spokesperson referred ABC News to the official White House statement.

Biden responded shortly after with a message about X, saying it was specifically the “hateful rhetoric about Puerto Rico spewed by the Trump supporter” that he called “garbage.”

-ABC News’ Justin R. Gomez