Trump meets with Hispanics in Miami a day after first presidential debate

A day after the first televised debate with his Democratic rival Hillary Clinton, US Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump met here on Tuesday with more than 100 Hispanic leaders amid protests by other members of the Latino community.

Finally, after two cancelled attempts in July, the billionaire managed to hold a meeting with the Hispanic community at the Koubek Centre, part of Miami Dade College, where he arrived shortly before the scheduled time amid protests from dozens of Latino activists, union members and students, EFE news reported.

"Every time he comes to Miami we're going to denounce his racism and the xenophobe that he is," Maria Asuncion Bilbao, an undocumented Argentine citizen with the United Families organisation told EFE, calling the magnate a "bad person" and a "danger" to the United States.

Trump is a candidate "who wants to divide" the middle class, the poor, African Americans, said Elbert Garcia, the director of Florida's Voice, an affiliate of the national America's Voice organisation, adding that his vision of America is "limited and very small, (and) isn't going to be enough" to win the election,

Inside the Koubek Centre, Trump met for half an hour with members of the Hispanic community, including some who are local Republican leaders such as Republican Party Latino spokesperson Helen Aguirre Ferre, along with businessmen and members of the local religious community.

Trump's campaign team had scheduled two smaller meetings with Miami Hispanics earlier this summer, but both of those events had to be cancelled.

One of those attending the meeting on Tuesday, Mario Bramnick, the President of the Hispanic Israeli Leadership Coalition, told EFE that Trump is the only candidate who can change the US course at this "critical moment", and -- he added -- those problems are partly due to the Democratic Party.

"We're worried, those of us who came from Cuba or Venezuela are seeing a lot of similarities with what the (Fidel) Castro and (Hugo) Chavez governments started," he said.

On his first day of campaigning after the debate on Monday evening, the real estate magnate said at his meeting with Hispanics, many of them Cuban-Americans, that re-establishing relations between Washington and Havana in July 2015 should have been done in accord with "principles", Bramnick said.

The most recent voter surveys show a very tight race between Clinton and Trump in the key state of Florida, although the former First Lady has a wide advantage over the mogul among Hispanics.

Clinton is scheduled to visit Miami on Friday.

--IANS

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