Clinton campaign: Trump going ‘nasty and divisive’ with staff changes

Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump is embracing his “nasty and divisive instincts” with the hiring of a Breitbart News executive to lead his campaign, a top aide to Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton charged on Wednesday. 

Trump announced a shakeup of his top campaign staff late Tuesday, bringing on veteran GOP pollster Kellyanne Conway and Breitbart News executive editor Steve Bannon, who will serve as the campaign’s CEO.

{mosads}”After several failed attempts to pivot into a more serious and presidential mode, Donald Trump has decided to double down on his most small, nasty and divisive instincts by turning his campaign over to someone best known for running a so-called news site that peddles divisive, at times racist, anti-Muslim, anti-semitic, conspiracy theories,” Clinton campaign manager Robby Mook said Wednesday on a conference call with reporters. 

“No matter how the establishment wants to clean Donald Trump up, get him on a teleprompter and get him on message, he has officially won the fight to let Trump be Trump. He keeps telling us who he is, it’s time we believe him.”

Conway had already been a part of the Trump campaign as an adviser and counts vice presidential nominee Mike Pence as a client. But while reports have pegged Bannon as an informal adviser to Trump, the move makes his involvement official. 

Clinton aides slammed Breitbart, citing what they called “deranged conspiracy theories” on the site. 

“We should expect in the coming weeks to see more of what, at the end of the day, really scares voters about Donald Trump,” Mook said, predicting more “wild accusations” from the GOP nominee.

Under Bannon, Breitbart has been unabashedly pro-Trump and has regularly tangled with GOP establishment figures like Speaker Paul Ryan (Wis.).  

The site regularly hammers Clintons and the Democrats, publishing more than a dozen stories this month questioning whether the Democratic nominee is hiding an illness from voters. The Clinton campaign rejected those rumors in a statement Tuesday night.