CLAREMONT, N.H. — Republican presidential contender Donald Trump was plainly in his wheelhouse at his latest rally when supporters made cracks about Hillary Clinton and Muslims supposedly running America.
In September, many contentious Trumpisms ago, he was criticized when he failed to correct a rally-goer who called President Barack Obama a Muslim. On Tuesday night at a rally in New Hampshire, he took a different approach to that matter as he branded the country’s leaders dishonest, unintelligent, incompetent “or they have some other agenda that we don’t even know about.”
“They’re Muslims!” shouted a man in the crowd.
“I didn’t say it,” Trump responded. “Oh, I’m supposed to reprimand the man. Who is the man that said that? I have to reprimand him. How dare you?”
Later he criticized Clinton’s campaign schedule.
“She goes to an event and then you don’t see her for another week,” he complained.
She’s “in the bathroom!” someone in the crowd yelled. It was a reference to Clinton returning late to the Democratic debate stage following a bathroom break — a situation Trump had previously labeled “disgusting.”
“That’s terrible, terrible. You should never say that,” Trump responded.
“You’re admonished,” he went on playfully. “We should throw him the hell out here. Get out of here … It’s all in good fun.”
Later, a man on the balcony asked whether Trump would support what he described as lowering military standards to allow women to serve in infantry roles.
In December, Defense Secretary Ash Carter ordered the armed forces to open all military jobs to women, removing the final barriers that kept them from serving in combat, including the most dangerous posts.
Trump, apparently stumped by the question, said there is “a tremendous amount of turmoil” in the military over the issue and proceeded to poll the audience.
“How many people in here like seeing women in the military, in infantry, fighting?” he asked. “How many people think that women should not be in the military, in an infantry way?”
“It’s a little bit of a mix,” he concluded, before saying he would have to weigh the issue before deciding on a position.
Asked about equal pay for women, Trump was less ambiguous.
“I love equal pay,” he said, citing the number of women he’s hired for senior positions at his company.
“I was very, very far advanced on women,” he said.
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