Asked by “Morning Joe” panelist Mike Barnicle what he would do about Aleppo, Johnson stared blankly and said, “And what is Aleppo?”.
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“And what is Aleppo?”. Johnson asked on MSNBC when he was asked about what he would do about the besieged Syrian city.
“You can find Aleppo on a map, ” she said. “I do understand Aleppo and I. understand the crisis that is going on”. But the gaffe, while embarrassing, may not have a significant impact on the fate of Johnson’s campaign, as experts say foreign policy doesn’t typically play a large role in the outcome of elections.
Gary Johnson, the Libertarian Party candidate in the 2016 US presidential race, was questioned about a major flashpoint of the Syrian civil war on Thursday and asked, “What is Aleppo?”.
There have been recent calls to let Johnson into the debates, including from another former Massachusetts Republican governor – Mitt Romney – the GOP presidential nominee in 2012 and a fierce critic of Trump.
Johnson’s interview, of course, aired the morning after Trump, at a candidate forum, was effusive in his praise of Russian President Vladimir Putin, especially, he said, when compared with our own president’s leadership.
They were forced to correct themselves no less than three times, finally settling on broadly defining Aleppo as a “wartorn Syrian city”.
When host Joe Scarborough questioned Johnson’s lack of understanding about Aleppo, Johnson attempted to defend himself.
“The inclusion of the Libertarians could set the stage for one of the most exciting races in our history, instead of one of our most depressing”, the paper said.
Johnson later apologized in a statement, saying he was thinking of an acronym, not the Syrian city.
Deadspin pointed out that Google searches for the city’s name didn’t spike after a chlorine gas attack there on Tuesday. No”, he continued. “Should I have identified Aleppo?Yes. Do I understand it’s significance? Yes.
“I have to get smarter, and that’s just part of the process”, he said.
Johnson’s support has been hovering around 10 percent.
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“Our political system benefits when we open the conversation instead of closing it, which is why I fought for and the voters passed Open Primaries in California and why I hope the Commission on Presidential Debates will listen to the people and include the Governors”, Schwarzenegger said. In an interview with Bloomberg’s Mark Halperin, he said that he felt “horrible” about the question. “From the standpoint of making the world a better place and believing a better place from the standpoint of the medical side of cannabis and from the recreational side”, Johnson said.
