During last night’s presidential debate, there seemed to be a moment when Donald Trump warned Hillary Clinton that he was going to bring up Bill Clinton’s past affairs, but he held back. It’s been a topic he has warned would be his — no pun intended — trump card numerous times, and his surrogates are applauding him for not using his ace up his sleeve.
Trump said he “didn’t feel comfortable” mentioning Clinton’s personal life during the debates, although he’s no stranger to doing so on the campaign trail. And Trump Campaign Manager Kellyanne Conway is calling this win in the W column. Conway stopped by MSNBC’s Morning Joe and claimed Trump didn’t go for his knockout punch, even after Clinton brought up comments regarding Miss America Alicia Machado, and he deserves credit for this:
“I have to say, certainly as a woman, I appreciated the restraint at the end, and I am not sure I would have been able to exercise it myself. To tell Hillary Clinton after she accused him about women, and I was prepared to go rough tonight and I am not going to do it because of your husband and daughter are here, and that’s a great temperament.”
Trump praised his own temperament during the debate, even after growing flustered by questions, but Conway’s recent comments seem to be how the Trump campaign is exceeding at the morning-after PR run. The Trump campaign almost seems to know Trump will say something outrageous and arms themselves accordingly. Conway went on to say Clinton failed to hit Trump with a gotcha moment:
“I also feel that there was no knockout punch by Hillary Clinton. As much as her ability to tell us all everything she learned in preparation for Donald Trump. She really needed to force him to make a huge mistake that would be the headline this morning, and she did not. I felt sometimes, the camera, she was speaking and she looked a little glib, almost like why am I on the stage with this man.”
While some may see Trump’s threat to talk about Clinton’s personal life a bit inappropriate, Conway and the campaign are spinning this as a win. But will Trump go further next time? We still have two debates coming up, and anything is possible.
(Via MSNBC’s Morning Joe & Raw Story & The Washington Times)
