There was an ugly moment at Donald Trump's rally in Mobile, AL, on Friday night. A video from the event captured an audience member yelling out "White power!" during the Republican candidate's speech. Trump, addressing a massive crowd in his trademark "Make America Great Again" hat, did not respond.
It appears this was not an isolated incident — reports from the event and comment threads from attendees suggest the phrase was shouted multiple times throughout the event, by one attendee or several.
CNN asked Trump's campaign manager, Corey Lewandowski, about the incident over the weekend, and he suggested that Trump hadn't heard the racist comment. “I don’t know about the individual you’re talking about in Alabama," he said. "I know there were 30,000 people in that stadium…who want to be proud to be Americans again.” Trump’s campaign has not returned R29's request for comment.
Critics have blamed the campaign’s extreme rhetoric on immigration — starting with Trump's campaign kickoff speech, when he suggested that Mexican immigrants were “rapists,” — for inciting extremist rhetoric and racism among his followers.
CNN host Jim Acosta also asked Lewandowski about a prior incident, when two men in Boston beat up an immigrant man, telling police they’d been motivated by Trump’s message. Lewandowski said Trump would “never condone violence." Trump also condemned the attack in a tweet.
Trump's campaign claims Friday's rally drew 30,000 attendees, which would make it the biggest such event of the 2016 race thus far — though reports from the scene suggest that estimate might be overblown. Trump remains the GOP frontrunner, and his lead in the polls is continuing to grow; hopes from Democrats and Republicans that the business mogul's popularity is just a passing fad are looking more and more unfounded.
This article was originally published on August 22 and updated on August 24, 2015.
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