An American Muslim woman who was forced to leave Republican presidential hopeful Donald Trump's rally in South Carolina said on Saturday she wanted his backers to realise they are supporting “hateful rhetoric”. She said, “His supporters really need to look at what it is that he’s proposing, and the type of bully mentality that he has of disrespecting people to such a tremendous degree.”

Rose Hamid, a 56-year-old flight attendant, had staged a silent protest in the stands directly behind Trump at the rally after he suggested that refugees fleeing Syria were affiliated with Islamic State militants. Hamid told Reuters she was a registered Democrat and had gone to the Republican rally because she wanted Trump supporters to meet a Muslim in real life.

Following the mass shooting in San Bernardino last month, Trump had called for a border shutdown on all foreign Muslims from entering the United States “until our country’s representatives can figure out what is going on”. In November, he said he saw thousands of Muslims in New Jersey cheering the 9/11 attacks, a claim that was debunked by fact-checkers.

The Council on American-Islamic Relations , a Muslim advocacy group in the United States, demanded Trump to apologise for ousting Hamid. Trump’s campaign has not responded to the incident yet.