The Wisconsin businessman challenging House Speaker Paul Ryan in next week’s primary sharply criticized the speaker as a “soulless globalist” but expressed skepticism that GOP presidential nominee Donald Trump, who has spoken favorably of him, would come to his aid with an endorsement.
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In an interview with the Washington Post, Donald Trump said he was not going to back Paul Ryan in the Wisconsin primary next week, nor would he be backing John McCain in his primary in Arizona later in the month. Trump invited more tension Tuesday when he told The Washington Post he’s not ready to endorse Ryan in next week’s Republican primary contest against Paul Nehlen, praising the underdog for running “a very good campaign”. “Speaker Ryan’s actions once again indicate that he never cared about his constituents he’s been elected to represent”, Nehlen says.
Party chairman Reince Priebus is appealing to the NY billionaire’s adult children to help amid new signs of a campaign in trouble.
“I have said that I will support the nominee of the party, and let me just say to you that is the last time”, McCain said while speaking to reporters in the Phoenix suburb of Chandler.
“The candidate is in control of his campaign”, top Trump aide Paul Manafort said separately on Fox News.
“I’m really not that concerned about this simply from the fact I think the people here in the 1st District know who I am, what I do, and how and why I fight for them”, Ryan said in a June interview.
“I never said I’d support him”.
He also warned what would happen if Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton becomes president.
Trump tweeted Wednesday that the campaign unity is “perhaps greater than ever before”.
He backed up those remarks at a Monday evening town hall meeting in Nevada, when the audience jeered a woman who asked how he can tolerate what she called Trump’s disrespect of American servicemen. He’s a strong conservative leader.
The House Speaker said these same words when he held back from endorsing a Trump presidency.
McCain is also declining to address Trump’s comments that he would not support McCain’s re-election because he hasn’t done enough to help veterans.
In better news for Trump, his campaign and the Republican National Committee jointly raised $80 million for his White House bid in July, the campaign said on Wednesday.
“I’m not there right now”, he told CNN host Jake Tapper.
Last weekend, Pence, whose only son is a U.S. Marine, sought to quell the uproar Trump created by lashing out at Capt. Humayun Khan’s parents, who appeared at the Democratic convention and have criticized Trump’s anti-Muslim rhetoric.
Nehlen has tried to paint Ryan, who first took office in 1999 and was the 2012 Republican vice presidential nominee, as part of the D.C. elite.
Trump’s slap at two of the nation’s most prominent Republicans escalated GOP turmoil barely a week after a convention meant to promote party unity.
“The Trump campaign is despondent right now because they can’t get Trump to take the direction that normal candidates take when they get to the general election”, CNBC’S John Harwood says.
Nehlen’s campaign has the largest concentration of former Trump campaigners.
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On Friday, Trump is due to return to Wisconsin for a visit to Green Bay.
