Protests turn violent at Trump rally

Protesters outside a Donald Trump rally in New Mexico have thrown burning T-shirts and bottles and clashed with police.

Police in riot gear fired smoke grenades into the crowd. Protesters also interrupted Mr Trump’s speech at the rally in Albuquerque.

Trump, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, wants a wall to be built along the border with Mexico.

New Mexico is the most Hispanic state in the US.

‘Still in diapers’

The protesters had gathered outside the Albuquerque Convention Center, with banners that read ‘Trump is Fascist’ and ‘we’ve heard enough’.

As the rally got under way, the crowd grew angry, throwing stones at police and trying to set fire to Trump T-shirts they had stolen from a seller, the Albuquerque Journal reports.

Albuquerque police said bottles and rocks had been thrown at officers and police horses, and damage to a Convention Center window may have been caused by a pellet gun.

They were seen responding by firing pepper spray and smoke grenades into the crowd.

Trump, speaking to a crowd of 4,000 people, was typically robust in his response to the protesters.

‘How old is this kid?’ he asked of one that disrupted the rally, adding: ‘Still wearing diapers.’

To others, he said: ‘Go home to mommy.’

Albuquerque is the first stop of Trump’s tour of New Mexico, and his rally came on the same day he easily won the Republican presidential primary in Washington State.

His opponents have dropped out of the race, and he is now just a few votes short of securing the 1,237 delegates needed to officially become the Republican candidate for November’s presidential election.

New Mexico’s Republican Governor Susana Martinez has been critical of Trump’s attacks on immigrants and has not yet said if she will support his candidacy for the election.

She and other senior members of the local Republican party stayed away from Tuesday’s rally.