House Speaker Paul Ryan took a big hammer to Donald Trump on Monday as he abandoned his presidential campaign and told Republican members that they are free to distance themselves from the controversial billionaire.
In a testy conference call, Ryan told his members that “you all need to do what’s best for you in your district.” Ryan said he would dedicate himself full time to keeping control of the House and said flatly that he “won’t defend” the GOP presidential nominee.
“The speaker is going to spend the next month focused entirely on protecting our congressional majorities,” said AshLee Strong, Ryan’s spokeswoman.
That brought an angry reaction from Trump:
Paul Ryan should spend more time on balancing the budget, jobs and illegal immigration and not waste his time on fighting Republican nominee
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) October 10, 2016
A House Speaker abandoning the top of his party’s ticket is unprecedented in modern times. Ryan has never been close to Trump and the final straw came over the weekend as Trump was heard on tape making lewd comments about women.
Over a dozen Republican members of Congress withdrew their support of Trump over the weekend. Over 100 former GOP administration officials and elected officials have endorsed Clinton in recent weeks.
The last two Republican presidents, George H. W. Bush and George W. Bush, and the last two Republican nominees, John McCain and Mitt Romney, do not back Trump. George H. W. Bush is voting for Clinton.
Ryan’s decision to pull away from Trump comes on the day a new NBC/WSJ poll finds Clinton leading the GOP nominee nationally by double digits.
- Clinton 46%
- Trump 35%
- Johnson 9%
- Stein 3%
Trump’s image is strikingly negative: 63 percent have a negative opinion of him, including 52 percent who view him very negatively. Only 29 percent have a positive view of him.
Clinton’s image is markedly better, though still more negative (50 percent) than positive (40 percent), and 37 percent of voters view her very negatively.