Frank Luntz Defends Trump’s ‘Clunky’ Gaffe On Whether He Thinks About ‘Americans’ Financial Situations’

Pollster Frank Luntz defended Donald Trump for making a “clunky” gaffe when the president was asked whether he considered Americans’ financial situations when trying to make a peace deal with Iran.

Earlier this week, a reporter asked, “Mr. President, what extent are Americans financial situations motivating you to make a deal?”

“Not even a little bit,” Trump said. “The only thing that matters when I’m talking about Iran, they can’t have a nuclear weapon. I don’t think about Americans’ financial situation. I don’t think about anybody. I think about one thing: we cannot let Iran have a nuclear weapon. That’s all.”

CNN host Breanna Keilar said Trump’s answer set off a “buzzer” for her, “because Republicans really need to be seen right now as thinking about Americans’ financial situations. They really need to be seen as that. Should they be worried about this statement kind of coloring voters’ perceptions of them?”

“It was clunky. It was a mistake, it was clunky,” Luntz said of Trump’s answer. “I don’t believe that he actually meant it that way. I don’t think he would say it that way again.”

Luntz said he believed Trump’s intent was to communicate that national security is “job number one.”

“It’s the first and foremost responsibility of the commander in chief,” Luntz continued. “And that all these other aspects of it, which makes life easier for Americans, is secondary. That’s not how it came out. I understand what was meant, but in the end, we expect at a minimum for the American people to be safe and secure in their homes, in their neighborhoods, and he probably wishes he hadn’t said it.”

“Yeah, I wonder if you think he’s adequately communicated why this war will, in his opinion, make Americans safer and more secure, as probably the really dominant worry in their daily lives right now,” Keilar said, adding that the cost of groceries is “so horrendously expensive.”

“At some point, the president needs to communicate not only his desire, his intention, to address the affordability issue, but he has to show some success,” Luntz said. “And just saying it is not enough. He has to actually do something and communicate that he’s done something on it.”

Watch the clip above via CNN.

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