Reince Priebus Says Trump Agrees With GOP Platform on ‘Vast Majority’ of Things

On Thursday night, Fox’s Megyn Kelly grilled RNC chair Reince Priebus about the party’s rocky courtship of its presumptive nominee.

Priebus explained that the widely-touted meeting between Donald Trump and House Speaker Paul Ryan was a “more than a great start” toward party unity.

Kelly asked to know if the men discussed substance or policy — to which the RNC chair responded, “Both. Substance, policy, our party, and working together. I don’t want to ruin it for everyone.” He noted that as the intermediary he couldn’t speak to the specifics.

Kelly challenged Priebus with a catalogue of Trump’s stated positions that are not aligned with the Republican platform — on health care, Planned Parenthood, mass mandatory deportation, NATO, to name a few — and indeed had been disavowed by many party standard-bearers. Priebus said that Trump was “visiting some of those subjects again.”

Priebus continued: “He understands that he’s moving into a general election, he understands he wants to be presidential and gracious, and focus on Hillary Clinton and how she’s not a good answer for our future.”

“Given that, given his win,” Kelly said, “does he has to move closer to the party on these issues […] or do you need to move closer to him, because he’s the one with these votes?”

“The party’s the party,” he responded averring that the GOP would not change. But he conceded that the party’s “same old way of doing things” and selecting candidates hadn’t worked out. (“You’re talking about yourself!” Kelly observed.) However, less than a minute later, when pressed on the fact that Trump did not align with the party platform, Priebus argued that that didn’t matter by pointing to previous nominees, including Mitt Romney and John McCain.

“I don’t know if anyone lines up 100 percent with the platform of the party. The point is, do you agree with 80, 90, 95 percent of it, and I think we’re there with that,” Preiebus said.

“We don’t expect 100 percent purity, but we expect that for the most part, the vast majority of your positions line up with our platform, and I think he does,” he concluded.

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[image via screengrab]