Donald Trump’s disastrous week has sent Republicans scrambling to see how they can control their loose cannon candidate. This is after he went too far in attacking the parents of a deceased U.S. military officer, as well as the other gaffes he’s committed recently. Now it turns out that things have gotten so bad that key Republican allies are telling the press that Trump has to rein it in. The latest person to do that? Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, who’s saying that Trump’s behavior will only help his opponent, Hillary Clinton.
According to the Washington Post, Gingrich granted them an interview, where he laid out how Trump was shooting himself in the foot:
“The current race is which of these two is the more unacceptable, because right now neither of them is acceptable,” Gingrich said in a Wednesday morning telephone interview. “Trump is helping her to win by proving he is more unacceptable than she is.”
Indeed, who’s talking about email servers or Benghazi, when Trump’s antics have completely hijacked attention, and not in a good way?
Gingrich also expressed worry that if he didn’t quickly change, then his campaign was done:
Gingrich said Trump has only a matter of weeks to reverse course. “Anybody who is horrified by Hillary should hope that Trump will take a deep breath and learn some new skills,” he said. “He cannot win the presidency operating the way he is now. She can’t be bad enough to elect him if he’s determined to make this many mistakes.”
Trump might have won the nomination based on his “tell it like it is” persona, but catering to that perception in such a reckless manner is actually starting to hurt him. Trump himself seemed to recognize that when he fired his campaign manager that he might have to change course. Perhaps Newt Gingrich’s public rebuke will further wake him up to that.
(Via Washington Post)