Clinton on Trump 'stalking' her around debate stage: 'You could just sense how much anger he had'

Pamela Engel

Oct 14, 2016, 19:11 IST

Thomson Reuters

Republican U.S. presidential nominee Donald Trump listens as Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton answers a question from the audience during their presidential town hall debate at Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri, U.S., October 9, 2016.

In her first interview since the second presidential debate, Hillary Clinton derided Donald Trump for supposedly "stalking" her around the debate stage Sunday.

The Democratic presidential nominee sat down with talk-show host Ellen DeGeneres on Thursday and talked about how she reacted to the debate.

"It was clear that my opponent, Donald Trump, was going to try to, you know, dominate the space almost to the exclusion of the people who were sitting there," Clinton said of the town-hall debate setting.

"I mean, they were sitting there so that we could talk to them and that they could ask questions, we would then answer, and because of the revelation of the public video and everything that came out on Access Hollywood, you know, he was really all wrought up and you could just sense how much anger he had," she continued.

She was referring to a a salacious, leaked "Access Hollywood" tape that showed Trump bragging in 2005 that his celebrity status allowed him to grope women.

Clinton continued: "And so he was really just trying to dominate and then literally stalked me around the stage, and I would just feel this presence behind me and I thought, 'whoa, this is really weird.' I was just trying to stay focused, trying to keep my composure, trying to interact with the moderators ... and deal with the string of accusations that he was putting forth."

Clinton talked about how she find it difficult to debate Trump, whom DeGeneres compared to a "teenager."

"It's frustrating," Clinton said. "I mean, look, I feel such a sense of obligation to people that, you know, I work at trying to make sure what I'm saying is appropriate, is accurate, conveying that to people. Everybody makes mistakes, don't get me wrong, I obviously have made more than my share, but to run against somebody and debate somebody who is consistently just spewing forth falsehoods, and when you catch him, when you say, 'No, wait a minute, you said this, you actually were on the record about this,' 'No I wasn't. No I wasn't.'"