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Hillary Clinton

Nashua — Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren accused Donald Trump and his fellow Republicans of “making hate okay” as she campaigned for Hillary Clinton on Saturday.

“We’re here to say hate is not okay,” Warren told a crowd of roughly 500 volunteers packed inside a New Hampshire campaign office. “We build a stronger America together, that’s what this is about.”

Warren is making three stops across New Hampshire, a battleground presidential state and home to one of the top Senate races in the country, a contest between incumbent Republican Sen Kelly Ayotte and Democratic Governor Maggie Hassan.

Warren is tying Ayotte and the rest of the Republican field to Trump as she works to fire up her party six weeks before the November 8 general election.

Hundreds of volunteers from New Hampshire and Massachusetts lined up to see Warren, a favourite of the party’s liberal wing.

A frequent and biting critic of Trump, Warren said she never predicted a major presidential candidate would base a campaign on scapegoating Mexicans, women and Muslims.

“What Donald Trump is doing is not what any of us thought a man who’s running for president would do,” she said. “He’s found something much uglier that he wants to make the basis of his campaign.”

Warren was particularly critical of Texas Sen Ted Cruz, who said he’d vote for Trump after denouncing him in the primary campaign. “Is that really what your word is worth, Ted Cruz?” she said.

Meanwhile, Ted Cruz announced he will vote for Trump, a dramatic about-face that may help unite a deeply divided Republican Party months after the fiery Texas conservative called Trump a “pathological liar” and “utterly amoral”.

Cruz said he was simply following through on a promise to support his party’s presidential nominee, even though the New York billionaire had nicknamed him “Lyin’ Ted,” insulted his wife and linked his father to the John F Kennedy assassination.

But facing intensifying political pressure to back Trump, Cruz said he would cast a vote for Trump, while stopping short of an official endorsement in a statement posted on Friday on Facebook.

The distinction may matter little to voters, but helps Cruz save face among those supporters still unwilling to forgive Trump’s heated attacks during their ugly and often intensely personal primary campaign. Cruz was booed by Trump supporters at the national convention for encouraging Republicans to “vote your conscience”.

“After many months of careful consideration, of prayer and searching my own conscience, I have decided that on Election Day, I will vote for the Republican nominee, Donald Trump,” Cruz wrote on Friday.

Trump accepted Cruz’s support, describing it as an “endorsement” in a statement. That’s even after Trump claimed he didn’t want Cruz’s endorsement immediately after the convention chaos.

“I am greatly honoured by the endorsement of Senator Cruz,” Trump said on Friday. “We have fought the battle and he was a tough and brilliant opponent. I look forward to working with him for many years to come in order to make America great again.”— AFP