Clinton Describes Half of Trump Supporters As ‘Basket Of Deplorables’

Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton speaks at a Digital Content Creators Town Hall at the Neuehouse Hollywood in Los Angeles, Tuesday, June 28, 2016. (AP Photo/Andrew Harnik)
Start your day with TPM.
Sign up for the Morning Memo newsletter

During a Friday night LGBT fundraiser in New York, Hillary Clinton said that some of Donald Trump’s supporters are part of a “basket of deplorables.”

“To just be grossly generalistic, you can put half of Trump supporters into what I call the ‘basket of deplorables.’ Right? Racist, sexist, homophobic, xenophobic, Islamaphobic, you name it,” she said, according to NBC News. “And unfortunately, there are people like that and he has lifted them up … he tweets and retweets offensive, hateful, mean-spirited rhetoric.”

Clinton then described the other half of Trump supporters.

“That other basket of people are people who feel that government has let them down, the economy has let them down, nobody cares about them, nobody worries about what happens to their lives and their futures. They are just desperate for change. Doesn’t really even matter where it comes from,” she said, according to CNN. “They won’t wake up and see their jobs disappear, lose a kid to heroin, feel like they’re in a dead end. Those are people who we have to understand and empathize with as well.”

Clinton told the fundraiser attendees that they should “stage an intervention” with any friends who support Trump.

“That may be one conversion therapy I endorse. Just remember: friends don’t let friends vote for Trump,” she joked, according to NBC News.

Notable Replies

  1. Avatar for betsyb betsyb says:

    Of course though she will be skewered for this. The furor will be pathetic, especially given the absolutely profane things Trump has said.

  2. Awaiting the VRWC media to twist these words into an unrecognizable pretzel of false logic and misogynistic hate in 3, 2, 1…

  3. The Trump supporters are going nuts on Twitter. Funny that the I hate political correctness crowd is now screaming because Hillary was not PC and did some truth telling. I will add that if you are not a racist, bigot, sexist, misogynist or Islamophobe and you are still supporting Trump you are enabling said behavior and are guilty of supporting racism, sexism,and Islamophobia.

  4. Would have been better to just describe the ‘basket cases’ as she did and then name the basket of possible conversionso with something more hopeful: Basket of Redeemables or some such

  5. But they’re not redeemable. They’ve probably been haters all their (long) adult life and they aren’t going to change.

Continue the discussion at forums.talkingpointsmemo.com

127 more replies

Participants

Avatar for codegen86 Avatar for victorabrahamsen Avatar for pluckyinky Avatar for brooklyndweller Avatar for matthew1961 Avatar for squirreltown Avatar for randyabraham Avatar for yskov Avatar for sickneffintired Avatar for danny Avatar for maxaroo Avatar for greycardinal Avatar for pandastirfry Avatar for clauscph Avatar for dommyluc Avatar for pmaroneyb Avatar for jtx Avatar for just_observing Avatar for jacksonhts Avatar for claccker Avatar for corncaucus2008 Avatar for grack Avatar for maximus Avatar for betsyb

Continue Discussion
Masthead Masthead
Founder & Editor-in-Chief:
Executive Editor:
Managing Editor:
Deputy Editor:
Editor at Large:
General Counsel:
Publisher:
Head of Product:
Director of Technology:
Associate Publisher:
Front End Developer:
Senior Designer: