The violent and vulgar rhetoric at Donald Trump’s Madison Square Garden rally Sunday has prompted finger-pointing within the former president’s inner circle and deep concern that his message was once again eclipsed by controversy.

Donald Trump took the stage Sunday night at New York’s Madison Square Garden to deliver his campaign's closing argument with the election nine days away after several of his allies used crude and racist insults toward Vice President Kamala Harris and other critics of the former president.

Trump's 2016 presidential opponent, Democrat Hillary Clinton, has accused him of "re-enacting" a pro-Nazi rally that was held at Madison Square Garden in 1939 on the eve of World War Two. Trump’s critics have long accused him of empowering white supremacists with dehumanizing and racist rhetoric.