US Democratic presidential hopeful Hillary Clinton has she regrets calling half of Donald Trump's supporters "deplorables,", but has insisted she would not stop calling out "bigotry and racist rhetoric" in the campaign.
Mrs Clinton received a firestorm of criticism after she slammed Trump voters at a fundraiser late yesterday in New York, saying, "To just be grossly generalistic, you could put half of Trump's supporters into what I call the basket of deplorables."
"The racist, sexist, homophobic, xenophobic, Islamophobic - you name it. And unfortunately there are people like that. And he has lifted them up," she said.
Mr Trump, 70, angrily fired back, calling her words "insulting." Her comments instantly went viral, and Mrs Clinton was the target of a fiery Twitter backlash.
Wow, Hillary Clinton was SO INSULTING to my supporters, millions of amazing, hard working people. I think it will cost her at the Polls!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) September 10, 2016
"Last night I was 'grossly generalistic,' and that's never a good idea. I regret saying 'half' - that was wrong," Mrs Clinton said in a statement released by her campaign.
But she then went on to list a number of "deplorable" things about Mr Trump.
"It's deplorable that Trump has built his campaign largely on prejudice and paranoia and given a national platform to hateful views and voices, including by retweeting fringe bigots with a few dozen followers and spreading their message to 11 million people," she said.
"It's deplorable that he's attacked a federal judge for his 'Mexican heritage,' bullied a Gold Star family because of their Muslim faith, and promoted the lie that our first black president is not a true American," she said.
"So I won't stop calling out bigotry and racist rhetoric in this campaign."
Mrs Clinton, 68, reiterated that many of Mr Trump's supporters are "hard-working Americans" who feel marginalised.
"I'm determined to bring our country together and make our economy work for everyone, not just those at the top," she said.
