RNC Largely Avoids Weighing In On Trump's Performance With Putin
By STEVE PEOPLES | July 21, 2018 6:21 pm
AUSTIN, Texas (AP) — There was no sign of shock or outrage in the hotel hallways and conference rooms where Republican officials gathered to discuss party business even as politicians on both sides and foreign policy experts fretted about President Donald Trump’s cozy relationship with Russian President Vladimir Putin.
The men and women from all 50 states who run the Republican National Committee did their best to avoid the topic of post-Helsinki summit angst during their summer meeting, which ended late Friday. When pressed in interviews, they defended Trump’s conduct or begged ignorance, citing what some claimed as a complicated policy matter.
“You know what I know about foreign policy? Once a month I eat at the International House of Pancakes. That’s my foreign policy experience,” said Ron Kaufman, a longtime RNC committeeman from Massachusetts and former political director for President George H.W. Bush. “People wanted change. He’s changing,” Kaufman said of Trump. “The foreign policy experts may not like it. I’m not qualified to say whether it’s right or wrong.”
It was a different story last summer when the RNC formally condemned Nazis and the KKK after Trump’s muddled response to violent protests by white supremacists in Charlottesville, Virginia. Trump said in his initial response to that incident said there were “some very fine people on both sides.”
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