Republican president candidate Donald Trump today said that no one respects women more than he does.
“Nobody has more respect for women than I do,” he said while speaking at the final presidential debate at the University of Nevada in Las Vegas.
He also called his Democratic rival Hillary Clinton ‘such a nasty woman’.
Trump made the comment after Clinton took a jab at him while discussing her plan to raise taxes on the wealthy.
“Well, Chris, I am on record as saying that we need to put more money into the Social Security trust fund. That’s part of my commitment to raise taxes on the wealthy. My Social Security payroll contribution will go up, as will Donald’s, assuming he can’t figure out how to get out of it,” she said.
Political pundits of both parties expressed shock at the snipe, with many on social media and cable news identifying it as one of the Republican nominee's worst moments of the 90-minute meetup in Las Vegas.
Clinton, the Democratic nominee, seemed to get under Trump's skin just before the comment.
She'd been talking about her proposal to preserve Social Security and Medicare. Her plan, she noted, would raise taxes on the wealthy, including her and Trump. And then she added of the billionaire, who in the 1990s took nearly a $1 billion write-off for business losses: "Assuming he can't figure out how to get out of it."
As she continued talking Trump interjected, "Such a nasty woman." He raised his right hand to point his finger and shook his head, letting his mouth drop open in apparent disgust.
Clinton let the comment roll off her and continued pressing her case.
Clinton beats Trump in final presidential debate
Meanwhile, Clinton beat Trump 52 per cent to 39 per cent in today night's final presidential debate, according to a CNN/ORC poll of debate watchers.
There was a plus or minus 4 percentage point margin of error.
The sample of debate watchers were 36 per cent Democratic and 29 per cent Republican, making them slightly more Democratic than an average poll of all Americans.
Trump did outperform expectations, however. Nearly 6 in 10 viewers said he did better than expected, whereas 44 per cent said the same of Clinton, the poll showed.
The debate took place in University of Nevada and was moderated by Chris Wallace of Fox News.
