'Keep fighting Juaquin!' Trump attacks Castro brothers in deleted tweet that misspelled one of their names
WASHINGTON – Hours after spending time with survivors of the El Paso mass shooting, President Trump took to Twitter with Texas still on his mind.
Texas Rep. Joaquin Castro, twin brother of 2020 Democratic presidential candidate Julián Castro, that is.
"I don’t know who Juaquin Castro is other than the lesser brother of a failed presidential candidate (1%) who makes a fool of himself every time he opens his mouth," Trump wrote in a tweet. "Juaquin is not the man that his brother is, but his brother, according to most, is not much. Keep fighting Juaquin!"
Trump deleted the tweet several minutes later and reposted it with the spelling of Joaquin Castro's name corrected. Although Trump did not mention Julián Castro, a former San Antonio mayor by name, the president also hit the 2020 presidential candidate. Despite making both the primary debates in June and July, Castro has rarely broken past 1% in polling.
He responded to Trump's tweet Wednesday night.
"Joaquin and I will keep fighting. The American people will fight every day for our nation, against your hate, your corruption, and your ego. And we’ll win," Julián Castro posted on Twitter, using the hashtag #AdiósTrump.
Joaquin Castro, who is the campaign chairman of his brother's 2020 campaign, has drawn the ire of many Republican lawmakers and the president's reelection campaign after he posted a list of major Texas Trump donors.
I don’t know who Joaquin Castro is other than the lesser brother of a failed presidential candidate (1%) who makes a fool of himself every time he opens his mouth. Joaquin is not the man that his brother is, but his brother, according to most, is not much. Keep fighting Joaquin!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 8, 2019
In the tweet posted Monday evening, Castro criticized 44 donors that donated the maximum amount of $2,000 to Trump, all of which were from San Antonio, his hometown and the district he represents.
He included a screenshot of the names of and their businesses in the tweet. The list is public record and can be found online at the Federal Elections Commission website.
"Their contributions are fueling a campaign of hate that labels Hispanic immigrants as ‘invaders,'" he wrote in the tweet.
Castro's tweet came two days after a mass shooting in El Paso, where at least 22 people have died. Authorities have linked the alleged shooter to a "manifesto" that had anti-immigrant and anti-Latino ideologies.
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Less than 24 hours later, another mass shooting happened in Dayton, Ohio, where 9 people were killed. The motive of the shooter is still unclear, authorities said.
Trump on Wednesday evening visited El Paso to meet with first responders, hospital staff and shooting victims and their families. Earlier on Wednesday, he was in Dayton visiting with victims and first responders of that shooting.
Some politicians, such as 2020 presidential candidate Beto O'Rourke and Rep. Veronica Escobar, said that they did not want Trump to come, pointing to his language and rhetoric that they say led to the attack.
Trump on Monday address the shootings, condemned "racism, bigotry and white supremacy."
However, the president did not address his own language. During his campaign announcement in 2015, Trump labeled Mexican immigrants as “people that have lots of problems,” adding that they’re bringing “drugs” and “crimes,” and calling some “rapists.” Since then, Trump has repeatedly called the increased number of migrant immigrants, most of who are from Central America, an "invasion."
Castro has repeatedly defended posting the donors, which Trump's campaign has claimed is a "target list." Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, also accused Castro of "doxxing" the donors. Doxing is when someone publishes private information about a person on the internet in an effort to harm that person.
During an interview with MSNBC, Castro said he did not post personal information such as a physical address or phone number of the donors.
Instead, he said he shared that list to "lament" about prominent business owners that are giving money to Trump, who ran over 2,000 Facebook ads that claimed the U.S. was under “invasion” by migrants coming through the U.S.-Mexico border.
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"It was a lament about all of us go to the restaurants these people own, the businesses they own, we patronize these places," he said on MSNBC. "And they're giving this money, their money to this guy whose taking their money and using it to buy Facebook ads talking about how Hispanics are invading this country, and that there is a cost to that.
"We saw the cost to that in El Paso over the weekend that people died," Castro concluded.
Eight minutes after Trump vented about Castro, he tweeted about his visit to El Paso and Dayton — this time criticizing the media's coverage of the two events.
"Leaving El Paso for the White House. What GREAT people I met there and in Dayton, Ohio," he said in a tweet. "The Fake News worked overtime trying to disparage me and the two trips, but it just didn’t work.
"The love, respect & enthusiasm were there for all to see. They have been through so much. Sad!" he concluded.
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This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Donald Trump attacks Joaquin Castro, Julián Castro after donor tweet
