Republican
presidential nominee Donald Trump closed out a rough week for his campaign on
Saturday by escalating personal attacks on Democrat Hillary Clinton,
questioning her stamina and saying she should be in prison for her handling of
classified emails.
After a week
in which he drew wide criticism for a public feud with a former beauty queen,
Trump sought to rebound with a highly negative attack on his opponent in the
Nov. 8 election, with a second presidential debate against her looming in a
week.
At the same
time, the New York Times reported it had obtained records showing Trump
declared a $916 million loss on his 1995 income tax returns, a deduction so
large that it may have allowed him to avoid paying any federal income taxes for
years.
Trump has
refused to release his tax records, saying he is under a federal audit.
At a rally in
Manheim, Pennsylvania, Trump said he did not believe Clinton, who suffered a
bout of pneumonia last month, was up to the task of being president. He tried
to resurrect a tactic he employed against former Republican rival Jeb Bush, who
Trump had derided as "low energy."
Clinton kept
her pneumonia diagnosis private until she was seen nearly collapsing while
getting into her vehicle at a ceremony marking the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks in
New York.
Ticking off a
list of world problems, Trump said, "She's supposed to fight all of these
things and she can’t make it 15 feet to her car. Give me a break."
"Folks,
we need stamina, we need energy, we need people who are going to turn deals
around," Trump said.
Trump has
often told crowds who chant "lock her up" over her use of a private
email server as U.S. secretary of state from 2009 to 2013 to instead help him
defeat her.
But on
Saturday, Trump told thousands of supporters that Clinton's handling of
classified emails and destroying of 33,000 emails that she had deemed of a
personal nature meant that "she should be in prison, let me tell
you."
Trump did not
stop there. He said he did not believe Clinton would be loyal to her supporters
and chuckled, "I don't even think she's loyal to Bill, to tell you the
truth. And why should she be, right? Why should she be?"
In 1998,
Clinton's husband, former President Bill Clinton, was caught up in a sex
scandal involving former White House intern Monica Lewinsky.
Trump was
widely seen as having lost his first presidential debate with Clinton last
Monday although he cites online polls showing he won.
In the days
since the debate, Trump has been struggling to regain his footing, getting
caught up in a back-and-forth with former Miss Universe Alicia Machado, who
Trump had criticized for gaining weight.
Reuters
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