

Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, accompanied by campaign manager, Robby Mook, speaks with reporters aboard her campaign plane after the debate. (Andrew Harnik/AP)

LAS VEGAS — As she prepared to head home Wednesday after the final presidential debate, Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton said Republican Donald Trump’s refusal to say whether he will accept the results of the election are “part of his whole effort to blame somebody else for his campaign.”

“You know it was horrifying what he said on the debate stage tonight,” Clinton told reporters aboard her campaign plane. “Our country has been around for 240 years, and we’re a country based on laws, and we have hot, contested elections going back to the very beginning. But one of our hallmarks has always been that we accept the outcomes of our election. We do the best we can to have free and fair elections, which we do, and somebody wins and somebody loses.”

During Wednesday night’s debate, Trump, who has complained in recent days about the election being “rigged,” kept open the possibility that he would declare the results illegitimate.

“I will keep you in suspense,” Trump said from the stage of a debate that grew heated at several points.

Asked about Trump’s contention during the debate that she is a “nasty woman,” Clinton demurred.

“I just didn’t pay any attention to that,” Clinton said.

She also declined to comment on Trump’s accusation that her supporters had incited violence at his rallies.

“I know nothing about this,” Clinton said. “I can’t deal with every one of his conspiracy theories.”

Clinton said she had been reminiscing about the first debate of the Democratic primary season — which took place here in October — and that she is “feeling both relieved and very grateful” to be done with debates.

Her comments to reporters followed a post-debate visit to a watch party in North Las Vegas that attracted a largely Latino audience that her campaign estimated at more than 5,000 people.

“I will fight to keep families together,” Clinton told the crowd. “We are not going to let Donald Trump have a deportation force that will round up 11 million people, along with the 4 million children that were born in this country.”

Immigration was a flash point during the debate, with Trump accusing Clinton of supporting “open borders,” a charge she denied.

“We are a better country than Donald Trump is,” Clinton said at the event, where she was joined onstage by her husband and former president, Bill.