“For this candidate for presidency to not be aware of respect for a Gold Star mother standing there, and he had to take that shot at her-this is the height of ignorance”.
Advertisement
Trump could have responded to Khan’s speech in any number of ways: with grace, with apologies, with an invitation to speak further.
And Trump’s usual political tool kit has appeared to fail him. They had strongly denounced Mr Trump during the Democratic National Convention. He has since suggested that an immigration ban would apply to unspecified countries compromised by terrorism. But one important group of people was notably absent from Trump’s side: top Republican leaders.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and House Speaker Paul Ryan have praised the sacrifices of the Khan family and Muslim Americans in the USA armed forces.
On Saturday, Mrs Clinton made stops in rural western Pennsylvania, a largely white part of the swing state that traditionally votes Republican.
“There is no greater sacrifice than to lay down one’s life for their country, and that’s the sacrifice that Captain Humayun Khan made fighting to defend our freedom and our constitutional rights”, Ayotte said. “Please. I am very upset when I heard when he said that I didn’t say anything”, she said.
Mr Trump’s anti-trade message has appealed to those voters, who feel frustrated with an economic recovery that has largely left them behind.
Clinton said Trump had repaid a family that made the “ultimate sacrifice” with “nothing but insults” and “degrading comments about Muslims”.
When asked about the mother of a State Department official killed in Benghazi, Libya, who blamed Clinton for her son’s death, Clinton said her “heart goes out” to the families and that she didn’t “hold any ill feeling for someone” who has lost a child and recalls events differently.
Mr Trump also accused Mrs Clinton via Twitter of “trying to rig” the autumn presidential debates by scheduling two of the three on the same night as National Football League games.
Mr Clinton, who joined Mr Kaine and his wife at the event, said: “I cannot conceive how you can say that about a Gold Star mother”.
Khan said Sunday Trump’s “policy, his practices, do not reflect that he has any understanding of the basic, fundamental constitutional principles of this country”.
Khan’s wife, Ghazala Khan, writing in the Washington Post, also issued a rebuttal to Trump’s later comments directed at her which suggested that Islamic dogma forbade her from speaking freely about the loss of her son.
Ghazala Khan has said she didn’t speak because she’s still overwhelmed by her grief and can’t even look at photos of her son without crying. Gold Stars are awarded to the families of service members killed in combat. But upon running for any office, she said, “all of these caricatures come out of nowhere, and people begin to undermine me”.
“What he said originally – that defines him”. Still, he has proved remarkably resilient, getting past controversies that might have sunk other candidates. Holding up a copy of the Constitution, the Muslim father asked if Trump had ever read it.
In an interview broadcast Sunday on ABC’s “This Week”, Trump suggested that the people of Crimea would rather be part of Russian Federation. However, the US hasn’t recognized the legitimacy of Russian referendums in Crimea and believes they were not conducted fairly. Though she claimed to Larry King of CNN that she didn’t regret her vote to give the president war authority, she started to cavil. He then backpedaled when Stephanopoulos pointed out that Russian troops had been there for almost two years.
STEPHANOPOULOS: What would you say to the father? “He’s not gonna go into Ukraine, alright?”
You can mark it down and you can put it down, you can take it anywhere you want.
Trump: “OK – well, he’s there in a certain way”. “But I’m not there”. You have Obama there. Frankly, a thank you for their service would’ve sufficed.
“In the meantime, he’s going away”.
Advertisement
And Gen. John Allen, a retired officer who led American forces in Afghanistan and later coordinated worldwide efforts against the Islamic State, said on ABC’s “This Week” Sunday that Trump was endangering American troops overseas with his attacks on Islam.
