President Barack Obama paused after a campaign stop for Hillary Clinton on Sunday for what was one of the more poignant moments of the presidential campaign.
Obama, campaigning in the Orlando, Fla., area, stopped to greet 12-year old JJ Holmes. The young man uses a wheelchair and speaks with assistance of a computer, a consequence of severe cerebral palsy.
"I hate Donald Trump. I hate Donald Trump," Holmes said to a pool reporter traveling with Obama, through his vocalization device.
Holmes' mother Alison explained that he had been wheeled out of a campaign event for Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump a day earlier in Tampa. A Trump campaign spokeswoman did not respond to a request for details on that incident.
But a Clinton campaign aide said that Holmes had been removed from the Trump event for holding up a pro-Clinton sign.
His mother said that JJ wanted to grow up to advocate for rights of persons with disabilities, according to a Clinton aide in Florida. Days before a presidential election, individual moments don't always resonate, but the interaction between Obama and Holmes is a reminder of the incident in which Trump appeared to mock Serge Kovaleski, a journalist with arthrogryposis, or joint contractures.
The Clinton campaign and supporters of the former secretary of state have been aggressive in using the video of Trump on a campaign stage making gestures that he has denied were directed at mocking Kovaleski, and Clinton surrogates like former Iowa Sen. Tom Harkin have talked about the importance of people who have disabilities, some who may need extra assistance getting to the voting booth.
