Donald Trump accused the media of being “dishonest” about a controversial Hillary Clinton image he tweeted, while the Clinton campaign accused Trump of continuing a trend of “blatant” anti-Semitism.
It began with a Saturday tweet from Trump calling Clinton the “most corrupt candidate ever” within a six-pointed star on a background of cash. After an outcry on Twitter that the Star of David and cash were anti-Semitic, the campaign superimposed a circle over the star and Trump retweeted it:
The graphic was found to have been posted on a neo-Nazi message board at least a week before the tweet.
Trump aide Ed Brookover told NBC News, “We took it down. We corrected it. And that correction, I think it says enough from the campaign.”
“A tweet is a simple tweet. And the bottom line is, you can read into things that are not there. This is a simple star… it’s the same star that sheriff’s departments across the country use all over the place to represent law enforcement,” former Trump campaign manager Corey Lewandowski said on CNN Sunday, saying the campaign switched the star to a circle because of “political correctness run amok.”
Today Trump tweeted: “Dishonest media is trying their absolute best to depict a star in a tweet as the Star of David rather than a Sheriff’s Star, or plain star!”
The Clinton campaign released a statement from their director of Jewish outreach, Sarah Bard.
“Donald Trump’s use of a blatantly anti-Semitic image from racist websites to promote his campaign would be disturbing enough, but the fact that it’s a part of a pattern should give voters major cause for concern,” Bard said. “Now, not only won’t he apologize for it, he’s peddling lies and blaming others.”
“Trump should be condemning hate, not offering more campaign behavior and rhetoric that engages extremists,” she added. “The president should be someone who brings Americans together, not someone who sends signals and offers policies of division.”
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