The Latest: Trump says Clinton ran ‘criminal enterprise’

WASHINGTON – The Latest on the U.S. presidential race (all times EDT):

2:40 p.m.

Donald Trump is escalating his attacks on Hillary Clinton, accusing her of running “a vast criminal enterprise run out of the State Department.”

There is no evidence of any such thing.

But Trump, who is trailing in the polls, says that revelations that many donors to the Clinton family foundation met with as secretary of state represents “one of the most shocking scandals in American political history.”

“It’s Watergate all over again,” he claims.

Trump is speaking at a rally in Manchester, New Hampshire.

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1 p.m.

Hillary Clinton’s campaign has released an online video that compiles footage of white supremacist leaders praising Donald Trump.

The video comes ahead of a Clinton speech Thursday that will seek to attach Trump to the so-called “alt-right” movement that is often associated with efforts on the far right to preserve “white identity.”

Trump has been criticized for failing to immediately denounce the support that he’s garnered from white nationalists and supremacist, including former Ku Klux Klan Grand Wizard David Duke.

Trump’s campaign responded with a strongly worded statement from a prominent black supporter, Pastor Mark Burns, who says Clinton and her campaign “went to a disgusting new low” with the video tying the Trump Campaign to “horrific racial images.”

He called on Clinton to disavow the video.

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11:20 a.m.

Donald Trump is promising to unveil his new immigration policy over “the next week or two.”

Trump had originally aimed to give his speech Thursday in Colorado but it was postponed and a makeup date has yet to be announced. Trump, in recent days, has signalled that he is backing away from one of his signature immigration policies, mass deportations of the 11 million immigrants living in the United States illegally.

But Trump, speaking Thursday at a meeting with minority Republicans at Trump Tower, emphasized that he’s still “very strong on illegal immigration.” He said “we have to be, we have no choice.”

“We either have our country or we don’t. We either have borders or we don’t,” he said, stressing that he plans to build a stronger border wall with Mexico.

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11:05 a.m.

Top Indiana officials have visited a tornado-ravaged neighbourhood in Kokomo.

Indiana Gov. Mike Pence and U.S. Sen. Joe Donnelly walked around one neighbourhood Thursday morning, speaking with some residents whose homes were destroyed or damaged by Wednesday’s storm.

Many trees were knocked down in the neighbourhood and a large truck was also knocked onto its side, but other houses are largely undamaged.

Pence arrived in Kokomo by helicopter and is viewing storm damage in the area and in other parts of central Indiana hit by the storms.

Pence returned to Indiana after campaign stops in North Carolina on Wednesday as Donald Trump’s running mate and called off a campaign trip planned Thursday.

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10:45 a.m.

Donald Trump is meeting with participants in a new Republican Party initiative meant to train young — and largely minority — campaign volunteers.

More than a dozen members of the Republican Leadership Institute were meeting with Trump Thursday morning at Trump Tower in New York City.

The meeting comes as Trump tries to increase his outreach to black and Latino voters, saying his economic policies would help minorities.

Trump said: “We have great relationships with the African-American community.”

He claimed that Democrats have been “very disrespectful” toward minorities and taken their support for granted. Polls show minorities overwhelmingly favour Democrat Hillary Clinton.

Ben Carson, a Trump ally, and Sean Spicer, the Republican National Committee’s communications director, were among the other prominent Republicans present.

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9:20 a.m.

Donald Trump’s campaign manager is contrasting the Republican presidential nominee’s immigration stance with that of former primary rival Marco Rubio. Kellyanne Conway says that Trump “is not for amnesty.”

Trump took a tougher stance on immigration than Rubio did during the Republican primary campaign. On CNN Thursday, Conway rejected a suggestion that Trump is now adopting a position similar to that of Rubio and other primary rivals.

She described Rubio as a leader of the bipartisan Senate “Gang of Eight” that favoured a pathway to citizenship for some immigrants now in the country illegally.

She said: “Their plan was amnesty.”

Rubio has offered lukewarm support for Trump as he seeks reelection to his Senate seat from Florida.

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3:45 a.m.

It’s a conspiracy: The 2016 campaign features one candidate who warned against the “vast right-wing conspiracy” and another who was a leader of the so-called “birther” movement.

Donald Trump and his surrogates hint at a mysterious “illness” afflicting rival Hillary Clinton. She’s warning of murky ties between Trump and the Russian government, suggesting that her Republican opponent may be a puppet of Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Rumours and innuendo which have been long confined to the far reaches of the Internet are dominating the presidential race.

Clinton plans to speak in Reno, Nevada, on Thursday in an address that will accuse Trump of supporting an “alt-right” campaign that presents “a divisive and dystopian view of America.”