Former Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton has slammed the hand gestures made by supporters of Donald Trump at his Ohio rally, comparing them to the Nazis.
Ms Clinton, who was speaking at the Texas Tribune Festival in Austin on Friday, said her reaction to the index finger salute seen at the rally was similar to how she used to feel about Nazis, adding: “What’s going on?”
The former US secretary of state talked about her years as a student when she would spend time thinking about how people could be drawn to Hitler.
“I remember as a young student, you know, trying to figure out how did people get basically drawn in by Hitler. How did that happen?” Ms Clinton said at the event.
“I’d watch newsreels and I’d see this guy standing up there ranting and raving, and people shouting and raising their arms. I thought, ‘What’s happened to these people?”
“You saw the rally in Ohio the other night,” she said, referring to the 17 September rally where Mr Trump campaigned for Senate candidate JD Vance.
“Trump is there ranting and raving for more than an hour, and you have these rows of young men with their arms raised,” she said. “I thought, ‘What is going on?’’
The finger salute at the rally made by dozens of Mr Trump’s supporters made headlines inviting comparisons to gestures seen at an evangelical conference, to the so-called “QAnon salute”, and even with the Nazi sieg heil.
Some, however, argued it was simply a reference to Mr Trump’s “America First” slogan.
Mr Trump’s aides were quick to respond to Ms Clinton, who the former president still frequently attacks in his speeches and interviews.
Taylor Budowich, a spokesman for Mr Trump, told Fox News that Ms Clinton’s comparison of his supporters with Nazis was “pathetic” and “divisive.”
