German daily Der Spiegel led with Trump’s “praise for Putin” and said the U.S. businessman-turned-presidential hopeful had “emphasized once again his closeness to Russia” during the forum.
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Donald Trump has blasted US President Barack Obama saying saying Russia’s president Putin is more of a leader than Obama.
Trump levied unusual criticism against America’s military leaders, saying the generals have been “reduced to rubble” during President Barack Obama’s administration.
The national security debate came as Libertarian presidential candidate Gary Johnson drew attention for a foreign policy flub. Investigators said she was “extremely careless” but that criminal charges were not warranted. “Far more than our president has been a leader”.
Trump remained persistently vague about his plans for defeating the Islamic State group, insisting that he privately has a blueprint for taking on the terror group but wanted to remain “unpredictable”.
Trump, however, criticised Putin for having “very strong control” over his country, describing it as a very different political system that he didn’t like. Clinton is now ahead in the polls in that state, but not by much; Real Clear Politics’ polling average has her with a lead of 3.3 percentage points, with one recent poll showing Trump and Clinton tied.
Ahead of Wednesday’s forum, Mr Trump delivered a speech in Philadelphia in which he called for a robust expansion of United States military capabilities and an end to budget sequestration on defence spending.
A flood of Republican national security experts have instead chosen to back Clinton, helping bolster her case that Trump is broadly unacceptable.
When asked if anything that he learned in his recent intelligence briefings shocked or alarmed him, Trump said “yes”. Trump’s continued praise of Putin – and willingness to, with a straight face, argue that Obama is just as immoral as the Russian strongman – suggests that the GOP nominee might actually succeed in building a warm relationship with Moscow.
Trump also pledged to launch a new U.S. military buildup, saying America was under threat like never before from foes like Islamist extremists, North Korea and China.
With three more weeks until the next recess and at the height of the presidential race, the Trump questions will likely continue.
She did, however, say that “we’ve got to do it with much more support for the Arabs and the Kurds who will fight on the ground against ISIS”, and plans on including those troops as part of a larger global operation.
“What you want in a president, a commander in chief, is someone who listens, who evaluates what is being told to him or her, who is able to sort out the very hard options being presented, and then makes the decision”, she said.
The interviewer, NBC’s Matt Lauer, asked why it wasn’t “disqualifying” for Clinton to have handled government emails on a private server while secretary of state.
“The talk is indeed about some kind of agreement, some document, which the (Russian) president mentioned, and which has not been finalised yet because there are still some issues to agree upon”, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told a conference call with journalists.
Appearing in the second half of the hour-long show, Trump faced questions about his fitness for office.
Appearing on the second half of the hour-long show, Trump quickly abandoned Lauer’s entreaties to avoid attacking his opponent and focus on what he would do if elected president on November 8.
“Of course, Trump hasn’t thought through any of that”, she said. “We need change, and we need it fast”.
Earlier Thursday, House Homeland Security Committee Chairman Michael McCaul (R-Texas) pushed back against Trump’s stance on Putin.
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Clinton, who voted in favor of the war, said that decision was a mistake but that it is important to learn from mistakes. A peculiar, miniature version of the USA campaign has appeared recently on Moscow’s streets, with pro-Kremlin state-funded activist groups demonstrating to praise Trump and aggressively criticizing Clinton, who they paint as a warmonger and a liar.
