Springfield, Ohio, has been dealing with bomb threats for two straight days after the city was catapulted into the international spotlight on Tuesday when former president Donald Trump pushed a narrative, without evidence, about Haitian immigrants during the presidential debate with Vice-President Kamala Harris.
“In Springfield, they’re eating the dogs. The people that came in, they’re eating the cats. They’re eating — they’re eating the pets of the people that live there,” Trump said during the debate, which was watched by more than 67 million people.
ABC moderator David Muir fact-checked Trump during the live debate, but Trump refused to retract his statements. Both Springfield’s mayor and city manager have said there is no evidence to back up the viral claims and the Republican governor of Ohio, Mike DeWine, says he trusts the city officials.
The fallout of Trump’s remarks came quickly for the city of Springfield. Less than 48 hours after the debate, numerous government buildings and elementary schools received a bomb threat that the city’s mayor said included “hateful language” against Haitians. On Friday, two new bomb threats were made, targeting even more schools.
The first threat came in via email on Thursday morning just before 8:30 a.m. and were sent to multiple government agencies and media outlets, police Chief Allison Elliott said during a press conference. The emails threatened to target Springfield City Hall, two driver’s licence offices and two elementary schools.
All the locations in the email were evacuated and cleared by investigators, with the help of bomb-sniffing K9s.On Friday morning, however, more two bomb threats came through, according to a statement shared with Global News by Springfield city official Karen Graves.The first bomb threat was sent at 7:21 a.m. and targeted “several City Commissioners and a City employee,” the statement reads. The second was sent just over 20 minutes later and threatened city hall, two government buildings and three schools, including elementary, middle and high schools.