Clinton has managed a 5-point lead over Trump after the first presidential debate, according to the latest CNN/ORC poll.
Donald Trump’s presidential hopes suffered a punishing new setback Monday as authorities clamped down on his charitable foundation, while Hillary Clinton seized the offensive to brand the Republican a rapacious, bullying businessman.
With just five weeks to go before the November 8 election, billionaire Trump is struggling to regain his footing against a surging Clinton and climb out of one of the darkest periods of his White House campaign.
Already weakened by damaging revelations about his taxes, Trump was hit with an order by New York Attorney-General Eric Schneiderman that the Donald J. Trump foundation must “cease and desist from soliciting contributions” in New York.
The notice, delivered Friday and made public on Monday, informed the charity that it had engaged in fundraising activities that were not permitted under the law because it had not been registered with state authorities.
With Team Trump on the defensive after leaked documents suggested the brash billionaire may have paid no income tax for two decades, the Democrat Clinton rounded on him as an unscrupulous businessman who cares little for his fellow countrymen.
“While millions of American families, including mine and yours were working hard paying our fair share, it seems he was contributing nothing to our nation. Imagine that,” a fired up Clinton said in Toledo, in key battleground Ohio.
“He has been ‘dissing’ America in this whole campaign,” charged the Democrat, riding high on a surge in polling carried out after the bruising first presidential debate.
Trump, on his own swing-state tour, used an appearance before military veterans in Virginia to pound the former secretary of state once more for handling classified information via a “basement” private email server.
Even as he launched the contentious attacks, a defiant Trump campaign dodged swirling questions about his tax record. Clinton and Trump face off in their second debate on Sunday.
