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Will Trump Play infidelity card at debate? Clinton camp girds

 
Published Oct. 1, 2016

Hillary Clinton's campaign is preparing for the possibility that Donald Trump, reeling from harsh criticisms of his performance at the first presidential debate, will unleash a personal assault related to her husband's infidelities at their next faceoff on Oct. 9.

It is an attack that her campaign aides have been aware could come since 2015, when Trump's aides raised the impeachment battle that defined Bill Clinton's second term as president to criticize Hillary Clinton's character.

Now, with Trump's advisers struggling to refocus the race away from his critiques of the appearance of Alicia Machado, the former Miss Universe winner who was invoked by Clinton during the debate, the Republican nominee's campaign has signaled a slashing effort going forward.

Hillary Clinton's team, Democrats supporting her and many senior Republicans believe that rehashing Bill Clinton's behavior will be self-defeating for Trump, who is facing a historic gender gap and whose first marriage ended after an affair.

Still, Democrats consider such tactics inevitable, particularly since Trump is now being advised by several people connected to efforts in the late 1990s to reveal Clinton's affair with the White House intern Monica Lewinsky and to the subsequent impeachment fight.

Trump's debate prep sessions included discussions about using the attack as a response if Hillary Clinton discussed the Republican nominee's treatment of women over the years. Now, there is a debate about whether to raise it to Hillary Clinton's face at the next debate, according to two people briefed on the discussions, who were granted anonymity by the New York Times to discuss internal deliberations.

"We are firmly convinced that he is only raising this because he is on defense over his own sexist comments about Alicia Machado," Clinton spokesman Brian Fallon said.