Donald Trump Jr. Compares Syrian Refugees to Skittles That ‘Would Kill You’

Donald Trump Jr. is facing intense backlash on social media after he posted a message on Twitter Monday night that compared Syrian refugees to a bowl of Skittles sprinkled with a few that “would kill you.”

“This image says it all. Let’s end the politically correct agenda that doesn’t put America first,” the post said.

Mr. Trump, a top adviser in his father’s presidential campaign, appeared to suggest that the nation was faced with a blind selection process in which a few potentially poisoned pieces would be lurking among the thousands of Syrians fleeing a brutal five-year-old civil war.

The post, shared widely on Twitter, drew swift condemnation and comparisons to white supremacist memes.

Social media users shared images of displaced residents in the region. President Obama’s chief speechwriter, Jon Favreau, invoked Omran Daqneesh, the bloodstained, dust-coated boy who was shown sitting in an ambulance after an airstrike and who became a symbol of the suffering in Aleppo, Syria.