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Every time a bizarre statement highlights Trump's vulnerabilities, the task of conservatives weighing whether to back him gets more difficult, says Tara Setmayer.
Paul Ryan is walking a tightrope, aiming for party unity and supporting conservative principles
Editor’s Note: Tara Setmayer, a CNN political commentator, is former communications director for Rep. Dana Rohrabacher, R-California. Follow her on Twitter @tarasetmayer. The opinions expressed in this commentary are hers.
(CNN) —
At a time when Donald Trump is trying to gain the support of conservative leaders like Paul Ryan and when they are trying to see if they can unite behind him, the flaws in his candidacy are on full display.
On Friday, Trump had to address a report by the Washington Post that he posed as his own publicist, using a fake name, in speaking with reporters as he built his business empire in the 20th century and denied that it was his voice on a recording despite evidence to the contrary.
We have yet to see his tax returns – which he says the public doesn’t have a right to see – and you never quite know when the next outrageous comment or event will happen.
Whether it’s white nationalist sympathizers ending up as delegates or most recently, his longtime butler’s recently discovered racially violent rants on social media (which Trump’s campaign disavowed Thursday), the volatility of Trump’s candidacy is an ongoing liability.
Speaker Ryan finds himself stuck between a rock and a political hard place. Ryan didn’t ask to be put in this situation, just like he didn’t ask to be thrust into the speaker’s chair last fall, but he’s in it now.
The sudden demise of the Cruz campaign, leaving Trump as the presumptive nominee, happened so quickly it hit many in the party like a flash grenade with their proverbial ears still ringing, in the aftermath. This includes Ryan, who last week on CNN said he “wasn’t ready” to support Trump just yet and for good reason. Is it too much to ask to expect common decency from your party’s presidential nominee?
Trump and his surrogates have sounded the clarion call for party unity and to fall in line behind him. Based on what exactly? A wing and a prayer? What has Trump done to demonstrate his penchant for unity? His behavior thus far has been quite the opposite. Just days after becoming the presumptive nominee, Trump said on “Meet The Press” that he didn’t need party unity to win. That’s not exactly an olive branch.
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President-elect Donald Trump has been in the spotlight for years. From developing real estate and producing and starring in TV shows, he became a celebrity long before winning the White House.
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Donald J. Trump for President, Inc.
Trump at age 4. He was born in 1946 to Fred and Mary Trump in New York City. His father was a real estate developer.
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Donald J. Trump for President, Inc.
Trump, left, in a family photo. He was the second-youngest of five children.
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Trump, center, stands at attention during his senior year at the New York Military Academy in 1964.
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Trump, center, wears a baseball uniform at the New York Military Academy in 1964. After he graduated from the boarding school, he went to college. He started at Fordham University before transferring and later graduating from the Wharton School, the University of Pennsylvania's business school.
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Trump stands with Alfred Eisenpreis, New York's economic development administrator, in 1976 while they look at a sketch of a new 1,400-room renovation project of the Commodore Hotel. After graduating college in 1968, Trump worked with his father on developments in Queens and Brooklyn before purchasing or building multiple properties in New York and Atlantic City, New Jersey. Those properties included Trump Tower in New York and Trump Plaza and multiple casinos in Atlantic City.
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Trump attends an event to mark the start of construction of the New York Convention Center in 1979.
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Trump wears a hard hat at the Trump Tower construction site in New York in 1980.
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Trump was married to Ivana Zelnicek Trump from 1977 to 1990, when they divorced. They had three children together: Donald Jr., Ivanka and Eric.
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The Trump family, circa 1986.
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Trump uses his personal helicopter to get around New York in 1987.
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Trump stands in the atrium of the Trump Tower.
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Trump attends the opening of his new Atlantic City casino, the Taj Mahal, in 1989.
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Trump signs his second book, "Trump: Surviving at the Top," in 1990. Trump has published at least 16 other books, including "The Art of the Deal" and "The America We Deserve."
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Trump and singer Michael Jackson pose for a photo before traveling to visit Ryan White, a young child with AIDS, in 1990.
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Trump dips his second wife, Marla Maples, after the couple married in a private ceremony in New York in December 1993. The couple divorced in 1999 and had one daughter together, Tiffany.
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Trump putts a golf ball in his New York office in 1998.
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An advertisement for the television show "The Apprentice" hangs at Trump Tower in 2004. The show launched in January of that year. In January 2008, the show returned as "Celebrity Apprentice."
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A 12-inch talking Trump doll is on display at a toy store in New York in September 2004.
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Trump attends a news conference in 2005 that announced the establishment of Trump University. From 2005 until it closed in 2010, Trump University had about 10,000 people sign up for a program that promised success in real estate. Three separate lawsuits -- two class-action suits filed in California and one filed by New York's attorney general -- argued that the program was mired in fraud and deception. Trump's camp rejected the suits' claims as "baseless." And Trump has charged that the New York case against him is politically motivated.
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Trump attends the U.S. Open tennis tournament with his third wife, Melania Knauss-Trump, and their son, Barron, in 2006. Trump and Knauss married in 2005.
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Trump wrestles with "Stone Cold" Steve Austin at WrestleMania in 2007. Trump has close ties with the WWE and its CEO, Vince McMahon.
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For "The Apprentice," Trump was honored with a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in January 2007.
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Trump appears on the set of "The Celebrity Apprentice" with two of his children -- Donald Jr. and Ivanka -- in 2009.
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Trump poses with Miss Universe contestants in 2011. Trump had been executive producer of the Miss Universe, Miss USA and Miss Teen USA pageants since 1996.
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In 2012, Trump announces his endorsement of Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney.
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Trump speaks in Sarasota, Florida, after accepting the Statesman of the Year Award at the Sarasota GOP dinner in August 2012. It was shortly before the Republican National Convention in nearby Tampa.
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Trump appears on stage with singer Nick Jonas and television personality Giuliana Rancic during the 2013 Miss USA pageant.
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In June 2015, during a speech from Trump Tower, Trump announced that he was running for President. He said he would give up "The Apprentice" to run.
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Trump -- flanked by U.S. Sens. Marco Rubio, left, and Ted Cruz -- speaks during a CNN debate in Miami on March 10. Trump dominated the GOP primaries and emerged as the presumptive nominee in May.
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The Trump family poses for a photo in New York in April.
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Trump speaks during a campaign event in Evansville, Indiana, on April 28. After Trump won the Indiana primary, his last two competitors dropped out of the GOP race.
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Trump delivers a speech at the Republican National Convention in July, accepting the party's nomination for President. "I have had a truly great life in business," he said. "But now, my sole and exclusive mission is to go to work for our country -- to go to work for you. It's time to deliver a victory for the American people."
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Trump faces Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton in the first presidential debate, which took place in Hempstead, New York, in September.
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Trump apologizes in a video, posted to his Twitter account in October, for vulgar and sexually aggressive remarks he made a decade ago regarding women. "I said it, I was wrong and I apologize," Trump said, referring to lewd comments he made during a previously unaired taping of "Access Hollywood." Multiple Republican leaders rescinded their endorsements of Trump after the footage was released.
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Trump walks on stage with his family after he was declared the election winner on November 9. "Ours was not a campaign, but rather, an incredible and great movement," he told his supporters in New York.
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Trump is joined by his family as he is sworn in as President on January 20.
Yes, Donald Trump won a plurality of GOP primary votes, but close to 60% of Republican voters did not support him prior to Cruz and Kasich dropping out. Not to mention Trump’s historic negatives among women and minorities – metrics that do not bode well for a Republican candidate heading into a general election.
In a normal election cycle, unification would be a no-brainer. But as we all know, there’s nothing normal about 2016. How are conservatives supposed to unify behind someone who we feel is not only unfit for the office of the presidency, but doesn’t share our values either? This is not only a conundrum for many voters but potentially irreconcilable for even more.
After the much-anticipated meeting between Speaker Ryan and Trump in Washington, Ryan emphasized the importance of bridging the gap on “common core ” principles. No, not that “Common Core,” but the core conservative values that have been the glue that has kept it all together for the GOP for decades: limited government, individual liberty, and adherence to constitutional checks and balances on executive authority, to name a few.
Trump’s positions on all of those issues are relatively unknown and certainly absent from Trump’s free-flowing rants on the stump. Although Ryan’s comments seem to indicate he’s warily warming up to Trump, significant differences still remain.
Beyond Trump’s petulant temperament, character deficit and consistent dishonesty, his “flexibility” on a litany of policies from threatening to abandon our longtime partners in Europe, admiration for strongmen like Russian President Vladimir Putin, dangerous protectionism (reminiscent of Hoover’s disastrous policies of the 1920s) to tinkering with the party’s pro-life platform are anathema to the foundation of the GOP. Ryan’s hesitation to throw his full-throttled support behind Trump is legitimate and heartfelt. There’s more than just the political calculation here.
Paul Ryan is a protégé of Jack Kemp, most famous for his enthusiasm of supply side economics and desire to create equality of opportunity for minorities in broken urban communities. Kemp’s legacy has been largely unfulfilled by other party leaders, but Ryan has made a concerted effort to push for Republican policies that address the needs of the lower class and urban centers. He’s attempted to build the elusive “big tent” so desperately sought by the GOP, in practice not just rhetoric.
For example, Ryan has written books, presented policy prescriptions for tax and entitlement reform and actively participated in joint ventures with Bob Woodson’s Center for Neighborhood Enterprise to address the failed War on Poverty. How does that agenda square with Trump’s brand of Republicanism? A Kemp or Reagan Republican is a very different breed than a Trump Republican, however that is eventually defined.
Paul Ryan is walking a political tightrope with very little room for error. The venerable Cook Political Report has already downgraded GOP prospects in at least 10 House races. Some of the GOP’s 24 Senate seats up for re-election this year are also in play. With GOP control of both houses at risk, the potential consequences of a Trump candidacy extend beyond this election cycle. Clearly, Ryan still needs cover in case Trump implodes or loses in a landslide in November.
Trump surrogates often brag about Trump as a brand. Many of us find that very troubling. Conservatism isn’t simply a brand. It’s a worldview. A set of principles that govern the way we raise our families, run our businesses, our basic way of life.
A full-throttled endorsement of Trump means taking on his litany of transgressions from offensive statements against women, the disabled, immigrants and POWs, to his carousel of policy positions.
Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid has already given us a preview of the coming attacks against Trump and GOP members who support him during a visceral attack from the Senate floor tying Republicans to Trump’s disparaging comments about women and immigrants. This is just the beginning and Paul Ryan knows it.
Jack Kemp once said, “Democracy without morality is impossible.” With a Trump/Clinton match-up in the offing, we’ll soon find out if that still applies.
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What happens when “it’s just talk” becomes actions? That’s the question now facing the campaign of Donald Trump, his supporters and the Republican Party as a growing number of women have come forward with accusations of sexual misconduct by Mr. Trump.
Tara Setmayer, a CNN political commentator, is former communications director for Rep. Dana Rohrabacher, R-California. Follow her on Twitter @tarasetmayer. The opinions expressed in this commentary are hers.
