Clinton On Trump’s Misogyny: ‘He Doesn’t See Us As Full Human Beings’

Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton gestures as she speaks during a campaign stop Tuesday, Nov. 1, 2016, in Dade City, Fla. (AP Photo/Chris O'Meara)
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Hillary Clinton tore into Donald Trump Tuesday for his treatment of women, both during this presidential race and throughout his life as a businessman.

“We have got to talk about something that frankly is painful because it matters,” Clinton said at a rally in Dade City, Florida of Trump’s history of misogynistic comments and alleged inappropriate behavior. “You know, a lot of his supporters don’t like to hear this, and I don’t blame them. If I were supporting him I wouldn’t want to hear it either to be honest.”

Referring to Alicia Machado, the former Miss Universe who Trump publicly shamed for gaining weight and who endorsed Clinton for the presidency earlier this year, Clinton said “she gained some weight and he called her Miss Piggy and called her Miss Housekeeping because she is a beautiful Latina.”

“Can we just stop for a minute and reflect on the absurdity of Donald Trump finding fault with Miss Universe?” she asked.

In her own remarks introducing Clinton, Alicia Machado didn’t mince words.

“I could not be prouder to cast my first presidential vote for Hillary Clinton,” she said, before detailing Trump’s treatment of her after she won the Miss Universe pageant. “It is really clear that he does not respect women,” she said.

Clinton spent much of the speech detailing allegations from more than a dozen women that Trump inappropriately touched them.

She also referenced a leaked “Access Hollywood” tape from 2005 that caught Trump saying on a hot mic that he can kiss and grope women without permission due to his celebrity status.

“Donald Trump was bragging about grabbing women, mistreating women and I have to tell you, since that tape came out 12 women have come forward to say ‘What he said on that tape is what he did to me,'” she said.

Clinton also referenced allegations from multiple contestants in Trump’s beauty pageants that the Republican nominee would “barge in” to dressing rooms while the women inside were changing, often catching them nude or semi-clothed.

“Some of them were just 15 years old,” Clinton said, referencing a report that Trump walked into the dressing room of the 1997 Miss Teen USA Pageant. “We cannot hide from this. We have got to be willing to face it. This man wants to be president of the United States of America.”

“He doesn’t see us as full human beings with our own dreams, our own capabilities, our own purposes,” she said. “He has shown us who he is. Let us show him who we are.”

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