This is an archived article that was published on sltrib.com in 2016, and information in the article may be outdated. It is provided only for personal research purposes and may not be reprinted.
It was an awkward setup: The two candidates for president attending a charity dinner in which they were supposed to tell light-hearted jokes about one another just 24 hours after a heated debate.
Supposed to.
Speaking first at the Al Smith dinner in New York City on Thursday night — a dinner that benefits Catholic charity — Donald Trump took the opportunity to unleash a torrent of very-not-light-hearted jokes about Hillary Clinton. Many of them didn't even seem intended to evoke laughs, so much as controversy. They were the kind of thing you'd expect at a Trump rally, in fact.
They ranged from Clinton hating Catholics to Clinton being corrupt to the Clinton Foundation's alleged misdeeds during its relief efforts in Haiti.
A sampling:
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• "Last night, I called Hilary a nasty woman, but this stuff is all relative after listening to Hillary rattle on and on and one, I don't think so badly of Rosie O'Donnell anymore."
• "Now I'm told Hillary went to confession before tonight's event, but the priest was having a hard time when he asked her about her sins, and she said she couldn't remember 39 times."
• "Hillary is so corrupt, she got kicked off the Watergate Commission. How corrupt do you have to be to get kicked off the Watergate Commission?"
• "We've learned so much from WikiLeaks. For instance, Hillary believes that it's vital to deceive the people by having one public policy and a totally different policy in private. . . . For example, here she is tonight, in public, pretending not to hate Catholics."
• "Everyone knows of course, Hillary's belief that 'It takes a village," which only makes sense — after all, in places like Haiti, where she's taken a number of them."
• "According to her sworn testimony, Hillary has forgot more things than most of us will ever, ever know."