Jeb Bush may not be willing to run a third-party campaign in the very likely event he fails to with the GOP presidential nomination, but that doesn’t mean he’s going to be a champion for the eventual winner, either.
Wednesday on the Hugh Hewitt Show, the former Florida governor told the host that Republican presidential front-runner Donald Trump was an “isolationist,” and refused to say he would support the billionaire, should be become the GOP nominee. He also hinted at deploying his brother, former President George W. Bush, on the campaign trail in South Carolina.
Asked about the North Korean nuclear test and rising tensions between Iran and Saudi Arabia, Bush immediately went after Trump:
“Donald Trump’s first impulse as it relates to the issue of North Korea is to say that’s China’s problem. But really, I mean, you think about it, you asked a good question to Mr. Trump about the nuclear triad in the last debate, and he didn’t seem to have much knowledge about it. But it is our problem when they’re trying to build long range missile capabilities in trying to develop a nuclear weapon that could reach the shores of the United States. And we can’t outsource our national security to the Chinese.”
Bush said he hoped that issue would come up in next week’s FOX Business debate in New Hampshire. Hewitt, on the other hand, said Trump has previously said that the presence of 28,000 U.S. troops on the Korean Peninsula may not be the best use of American military resources.
The triggered a response from Bush that Trump is an “isolationist.” He added:
“I think it’s dangerous in this world. We see it, we see the unfraying happening. We see the attack in Paris at the police station today. We see North Korea kind of feeling like they need more attention, so they test this bomb. We see the Shiia-Sunni conflict playing out in a very dramatic way, principally, and at least in one reason, because the United States is not sending a signal to one of our strongest allies in the region, Saudi Arabia, that we’re going to be with them.”
Hewitt then asked if he felt Trump had the “deep exposure to and nuanced understanding of American foreign policy and defense factors” to be president of the United States. Bush responded by saying his opponent’s responses during the most recent debate indicated he did not:
“Just take ISIS. Mr. Trump in the matter of, since late September, where he said that we didn’t have a fight in Syria, then he said let’s let the Russians take out ISIS, and prior to that, he said let ISIS take out Assad. And then he said we’re going to bomb the bleep out of ISIS once the attacks took place. That kind of volatility and lack of seriousness should give people pause. We’re electing a president of the United States and a commander-in-chief, and I think we need a steadiness, and someone who has an understanding of the complexity of how the world works, and certainly an understanding about how America’s presence and leadership in the world can bring about security and peace for the homeland.”
Bush continued to insist Trump would not be the Republican presidential nominee. Noting he had “supported and voted for every Republican candidate since Richard Nixon,” he stopped short of answering Hewitt’s yes-or-no answer as to whether or not he would support Trump if he did win the GOP nomination.
Toward the end of the interview, Hewitt asked Bush about the possibility and the rumor that his brother would join him on the campaign trail in South Carolina. He first noted George W. Bush’s continued popularity among Republicans before saying:
“I haven’t talked to him directly about it. I intend to do it. I’m really focused on making progress in the first two states, as you said, as we touch gloves. But there’ll be time to talk about this, and it’s certainly under consideration for sure.”
Bush’s favorable-versus-unfavorable rating has gone from the high 20s in the early fall to minus-1 in the past week. The fall appears to have inversely mirrored the increase in his attacks on Trump and U.S. Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.), which begs the question of whether or not it’s been an effective strategy.
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