Jolted by a weeklong blowback in terms of sinking poll numbers and deepening rift with the Republican Party establishment, Donald Trump has finally opted to mend fences by endorsing the re-election bid of top party guns — House Speaker Paul Ryan and Senator John McCain.
Trump has had an uneasy relationship with both Ryan and McCain, even after they endorsed him after he became the presumptive Republican presidential nominee nearly three months ago. He had been particularly dismissive of Senator McCain, a widely-respected war hero and veteran lawmaker.
The volte-face on Friday came as the New York billionaire faced daunting poll numbers, showing Democratic rival Hillary Clinton stealing a big march over him. The latest poll from McClatchy/Marist put Clinton ahead of him by a whopping 15 per cent. An average of 10 different polls released this week has her ahead by nearly 7 per cent.
Holding a campaign rally in Ryan’s home State of Wisconsin on Friday night, Trump announced: “In our shared mission, to make America great again, I support and endorse our speaker of the House, Paul Ryan.”
“We will have disagreements, but we will disagree as friends and never stop working together toward victory. And very importantly, toward real change,” he said, amid cheers from a big gathering.
“And while I’m at it, I hold in the highest esteem Senator John McCain for his service to our country in uniform and in public office, and I fully support and endorse his re-election,” said Trump, who also endorsed Senator Kelly Ayotte’s bid for re-election from New Hampshire.
Also highlighting the need for the Republicans to retain their control of both chambers of Congress, Trump said, “I need a Republican Senate and a House to accomplish all of the changes that we have to make.”
Trump’s course correction came four days after indicating his unwillingness to endorse as yet the three lawmakers – all of whom had criticised his stand vis-à-vis the parents of slain Pakistani-American Muslim soldier Army Capt. Humayun Khan. Trump took the stand that he only hit back at Khan’s father after he launched a vicious attack against him from the Democratic convention platform.
And Speaker Ryan for his part had indicated that his own endorsement of Trump was not irreversible. A day before Trump fell in line, Ryan had spoken about his “pretty strange run” since the convention when “you would think you ought to be focusing on Hillary Clinton – on all of her deficiencies”.
Trump’s vice-presidential running mate Mike Pence is thought to have played an important role in bringing the maverick real-estate mogul around. Pence himself had taken Trump’s permission a couple of days earlier to announce his own endorsement of Ryan, a personal friend of many years.
While Trump may have restored some order for now with his turnaround, Clinton faced more questions on her controversial email saga. On Friday, at a question-answer session with African-American and Hispanic journalists, she admitted that she might have “short-circuited” an answer on the emails issue during an interview to Fox News last weekend.
In a lengthy report to a question on whether she misrepresented FBI’s conclusions in two of her recent interviews, Clinton said: “Director Comey (FBI Director James Comey) had said that my answers in my FBI interview were truthful. That’s really the bottom line here. And I have said, during the interview and in many other occasions over the past months, that what I told the FBI, which he said was truthful, is consistent with what I have said publicly.” Clinton stood by her assertion that she “never sent or received anything that was marked classified” via e-mail.