President Donald Trump detoured from touting his tariff-based economic policies to make a plainly racist claim about migrant laborers during his Tuesday morning appearance on CNBC's "Squawk Box."

Echoing the bigotry of centuries past, the president claimed that migrants are uniquely suited to physically strenuous farm work, asserting that it comes "naturally" to them.

"We're taking care of our farmers. We can't let our farmers not have anybody. ... These people, you can't replace them very easily," Trump said on CNBC. "These people do it naturally " naturally," he said of the migrant laborers. Trump then recalled asking a farmer what happens to such workers if "they get a bad back." "He said, They don't get a bad back, sir, because if they get a bad back, they die.'"