Trump's new attack against Clinton uses 'short-circuited' line against her

For weeks, the Hillary Clinton campaign has been using Donald Trump’s own words against him. Now the Republican nominee is returning the favor.

The Trump campaign released a new online video mocking his Democratic rival as a malfunctioning robot after her recent assertion that she “short-circuited” during an interview about the FBI’s investigation into her use of a private email server as secretary of state.

The 30-second clip — posted to Trump’s Facebook page on Saturday — features footage of Clinton accidentally calling Trump her “husband” to a group of Hispanic and black journalists on Friday; appearing to say she’ll raise taxes on the middle class; then explaining that she “may have short-circuited” when she insisted that FBI Director James Comey concluded she never misled the American people. While Comey testified that Clinton had been truthful to the FBI about her handling of classified information, he refused to say whether she misled the public.

“Is Robot Hillary melting down?” text in the video asks before sparks are seen shooting out of Clinton’s mouth.

“Crooked Hillary said loudly, and for the world to see, that she ‘SHORT CIRCUITED’ when answering a question about her e-mails. Very dangerous!” Trump tweeted Saturday morning. “Anybody whose mind ‘SHORT CIRCUITS’ is not fit to be our president!”

He used the same line of attack at a rally in New Hampshire on Saturday night.

“Unstable Hillary Clinton,” Trump said. “You saw where she basically short-circuited? She short-circuited. She used the term. I think that the people of this country don’t want somebody that’s going to short-circuit up there.”

Former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani, a Trump campaign adviser, says he expects the real estate mogul to continue to attack Clinton using that term.

“That was a heck of a comment,” Giuliani said on ABC’s “This Week” on Sunday. “I mean, first of all, she lied. She didn’t short-circuit. She lied last week when she said the FBI found that she hadn’t lied. You read Comey’s report, he found she lied in about eight different places. So maybe short-circuit is her euphemism for lying.”

“I don’t know,” Giuliani continued. “Did she short-circuit when she didn’t protect the Benghazi compound, when she got 20 requests for more help? Did she short-circuit during the Benghazi situation when, if we had gotten people there, we might have been able to save Sean Smith and the other CIA gentleman’s life? … Did she short-circuit when she advocated for the overthrow of Gadhafi, and Libya is now an Islamic State stranglehold? Did she short-circuit when she said she’s going to raise taxes on the middle class?”

On the tax question, the Clinton campaign pushed back, insisting that the candidate never said she intends to raise taxes on the middle class.

Clinton campaign spokesman Josh Schwerin pointed to a transcript of her prepared remarks in which she states, “We aren’t going to raise taxes on the middle class.”

Meanwhile, the Clinton campaign released a new ad that raises questions about Trump’s ties to Russia.

“We don’t know why Trump praises Putin,” states the text at the beginning of the video, which shows a clip of Trump calling Russian President Vladimir Putin a “strong leader” and highlighting campaign proposals that appear to be in line with Kremlin positions.

The fresh attacks come amid a new wave of national polls that show Clinton has opened up a significant lead over Trump, whose ongoing feuds with the Gold Star parents of a fallen Muslim American soldier, as well as members of the GOP’s top brass, have led some Republicans to distance themselves from the party’s nominee.