 -- After being called a "bigot" by her White House rival earlier in the week, Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton refused to directly return the insult when prompted in an interview today, instead reiterating her charge that Republican nominee Donald Trump is a man with a "long history of racial discrimination" and all she can do is "point to the evidence of what he has said and what he has done."

In an interview on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe,” she claimed Trump's campaign was "built on prejudice and paranoia," a theme she had brought up at a campaign rally in Reno, Nevada.

"It is deeply disturbing that he is taking hate groups that lived in the dark regions of the internet making them mainstream, helping a radical fringe take over the Republican Party," Clinton continued. "What I want to make clear is this, a man with a long history of racial discrimination, who traffics in dark conspiracy theories drawn from the pages of supermarket tabloids, and these kind of white supremacist, white nationalist, anti-Semitic groups, should never run our government or command our military."

Earlier this week, Trump told supporters at an event in Jackson, Mississippi, that "Hillary Clinton is a bigot who sees people of color only as votes, not as human beings worthy of a better future."

Trump's campaign manager, Kellyanne Conway, defended the New York businessman's comment on “Good Morning America" this morning.

"Is she right to call him a bigot? Have you seen what this man is called on a daily basis?” Conway said. “He's called a bigot, a racist, a sexist. Why is this a one way conversation?"

Conway also argued that Trump "deserves credit" for his outreach to African-American voters, even though Trump primarily campaigns in predominantly white communities.

"Usually, Republican nominees are not bold enough to go into communities of color and compete for all ears and all votes," Conway said.