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Hillary Clinton slams Trump over latest Obama "birther" comments

Clinton back on campaign trail
Clinton rips Trump over new Obama "birther" comments 02:43

Hillary Clinton has called rival Donald Trump “bigoted” before, but at a Hispanic awards gala in Washington, D.C. Thursday, she brought up what she called several new examples -- including when he called a black pastor a “nervous” mess, and his refusal to say President Obama was born in the United States despite what his campaign now says he believes. 

“Every time we think he’s hit rock bottom, he sinks even lower,” Clinton said in Washington Thursday evening. “He was asked one more time ‘where was President Obama born?’ And he still wouldn’t say Hawaii. He still wouldn’t say America.” 

Trump’s campaign reversal on the so-called “birther” issue came just an hour after Clinton unleashed a barrage of tweets calling his campaign the “most divisive... of our lifetimes.” 

At the gala, Clinton said Trump’s comments had gone beyond just “innuendo or dog whistles.” 

It’s gotten worse, according to the Democratic nominee -- “from the racist lie about Mexican immigrants that launched his presidential campaign to his racist attacks on a federal judge.” 

Directly addressing a policy question at the forefront of the 2016 election, Clinton told the Hispanic gathering that she would send a comprehensive immigration proposal to Congress​ in her first 100 days in office. 

“I will reach out to Republicans and say, this is your chance, to help millions of families, and show that your party, the party of Lincoln, is better than Donald Trump,” she said. 

In the most recent CBS News/New York Times poll​, voters thought Clinton would do a better job than Trump handling immigration (51 percent to 43 percent) and a much better job on foreign policy (58 percent to 36 percent). 

But Trump still has an edge on the economy -- the number one issue for voters. 

In Greensboro, North carolina, Clinton tried turning her recent illness and campaign absence into a political point. 

“I can afford to take a few days off,” she said, after recovering from a bout of pneumonia. “Millions of Americans can’t. They either go to work sick or they lose a paycheck, don’t they?”

Clinton said that she realizes she needs to give Americans something to vote for -- not just vote against -- so she promised that she would try to talk about policy as much as possible and stay positive

But only a few hours after she said that, she was on stage in Washington blasting Trump.

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