On Saturday, the democratic presidential nominee explained in a statement that she regretted saying “half”. Let me just say, no one with a record of failure at home and overseas, no one with her avalanche of dishonesty and corruptions, and no one with that low opinion of the American people should ever be elected president of the United States of America.
Advertisement
The statement was aimed at shutting down the negative reaction by the Trump campaign and preserving Clinton’s appeal to moderate Republicans and independents.
She also cited Trump’s decision to hire as his campaign’s chief executive Stephen Bannon, executive chairman of the right-wing Breitbart website that is a favorite of the alt-right movement. But, the guidance says, “it is deplorable that Trump has built his campaign largely on prejudice and paranoia and given a national platform to hateful views and voices”.
“You know, just to be grossly generalist, you could put half of Trump’s supporters into what I call the basket of deplorables”, Clinton said on Friday night.
Earlier, she said many of those backing her rival were racist, sexist, xenophobic and Islamophobic.
The campaign of Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump responded forcefully Saturday to Democratic opponent Hillary Clinton’s depiction of half of Trump’s supporters as a “basket of deplorables”. Trump said. “Hillary Clinton should be ashamed of herself”.
Clinton holds a 46 percent to 41 percent edge over Trump among likely voters, followed by Libertarian candidate Gary Johnson at 9 percent and the Green Party’s Jill Stein at 2 percent. “Insulting everyday Americans to a group of wealthy donors shows whose priorities Clinton really has in mind and exposes the hypocrisy of a candidate whose stated desire to unite the country is clearly all for show”.
Clinton attempted to walk back the comment Saturday, releasing a statement expressing regret for speaking in generalities. “And she wouldn’t be prosecuted”.
The comment was reminiscent of Trump’s January description of the loyalty of his supporters. “We have an electorate that doesn’t always pay that much attention to what’s going on, so people are influenced by a simple slogan rather than the facts or the truth or what’s happening”, he said. “It’s like incredible”, he said.
She told 1,000 lesbian, “gay”, bisexual and transgender donors in NY that half of Trump supporters hold hateful views that put them in a “basket of deplorables”, calling them “irredeemable”. And he has lifted them up.
In a more surprising move, he also retweeted a 2012 tweet from Barack Obama, in which the then-campaigning president called for a “president who is fighting for all Americans”.
Clinton then pivoted and tried to characterized the other half of Trump’s supporters, putting them in “that other basket” and saying they need understanding and empathy.
“Obviously not everyone supporting Trump is part of the alt right, but alt right leaders are with Trump”, Merrill said on Twitter.
“I won’t stop calling out bigotry and racist rhetoric in this campaign”, she promised.
However, Mrs. Clinton said that she stood by her criticism that the Republican nominee appealed to the worst of America. But reporters traveling with her campaign were not allowed in and did not see her.
So did Trump’s running mate, Indiana Gov. Mike Pence, appearing at a Washington gathering of Christian conservatives.
Advertisement
Clinton had a choice: play by the old rules (like she did with the email scandal), or just get it right.
