A US Democratic senator has accused Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump of inciting his supporters to assassinate Hillary Clinton.
Senator Chris Murphy took to Twitter on Saturday to warn Trump that if Clinton is killed, “the blood will be on your hands."
Murphy wrote that “if you keep suggesting your supporters kill @HillaryClinton, someone will listen.”
At a campaign rally on Friday night, Trump said Clinton’s Secret Service detail should have their guns taken away to “see what happens to her.”
“Heartless hypocrites like the Clintons ... want to get rid of guns, and yet they have bodyguards that have guns,” Trump said.
“Take their guns away. She doesn’t want guns … let’s see what happens to her. Take their guns away, OK? It’d be very dangerous,” he added.
His statement was angered many of Clinton’s fellow Democrats, who described it as an incitement of violence.
Former Arizona congresswoman Gabby Giffords, who survived a mass shooting in 2011, also took to twitter to condemn his remarks. She described Trump as “reckless, irresponsible and unworthy of the office he seeks.”
Clinton’s campaign manager, Robby Mook also called on Republican leaders to denounce Trump’s statement.
"Whether this is done to provoke protesters at a rally or casually or even as a joke, it is an unacceptable quality in anyone seeking the job of Commander in Chief," Mook said.
“This kind of talk should be out of bounds for a presidential candidate," he added.
Trump’s Friday statement echoed his remarks in August, when he was criticizing Clinton for trying to abolish “second amendment," referring to the right to own guns.
"By the way, if she gets to pick her judges, nothing you can do, folks. Although the second amendment people (gun owners), maybe there is, I don't know," he said in a campaign rally in North Carolina.
Democrats denounced the remarks as a call for Clinton’s assassination. His camp, however, later claimed that Trump was referring to action through the ballot box, not violence.
While Democrats have been pushing for tougher gun laws to bolster the United States' national security, Republicans claim that new laws will not necessarily keep arms out of the hands of people intent on doing harm.
Firearms are the cause of death for more than 33,000 people in the United States every year, according to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).