‘He Should Run. I’m Serious’: Washington Post Columnist Says John Bolton Would ‘Eviscerate’ Trump and DeSantis
AP Photo/Manuel Balce Ceneta
Washington Post columnist and MSNBC contributor Jennifer Rubin encouraged former US National Security Advisor John Bolton to run for president on Monday, suggesting he would “eviscerate” both former President Donald Trump and Florida Governor Ron DeSantis.
Reacting to a May 16 appearance on CNN This Morning, where Bolton said foreign leaders saw Trump as “a laughing fool,” Rubin encouraged Bolton to enter the 2024 presidential race.
“He should run. I’m serious. He’d eviscerate both Trump and know-nothing DeSantis,” she tweeted.
Rubin’s suggestion that Bolton would “eviscerate” both Trump and DeSantis was mocked by some conservatives, who argued that the former national security advisor “wouldn’t win a single delegate.”
During his CNN appearance this month, Bolton said:
Trump has this impression that foreign leaders, especially adversaries, hold him in high regard — that he’s got a good relationship with Xi Jinping, Vladimir Putin, Kim Jong-Un. In fact, the exact opposite is true. I have been in those rooms with him when he’s met with those leaders. I believe they think he’s a laughing fool, and the idea that somehow his presence in office would have deterred Putin is flatly wrong. If anything, if Trump had won a second term and done what I think he intended to do, which is get out of NATO, Putin would have just waited and let him do it, and even the weakening of NATO would have made it a lot easier for the Russians to prevail.
He also said it was “virtually treasonous” for Trump to consider pardoning those involved in the January 6, 2021 storming of the Capitol.
While Bolton served as Trump’s National Security Advisor between April 2018 and September 2019, he has since become a harsh critic of his former employer, and has said he is “prepared to get in the race” to stop a second Trump presidential term if necessary.
Trump is the current frontrunner of the 2024 Republican primary at 53.2%, according to RealClearPolitics‘ poll average, followed by DeSantis at 22.4%, former South Carolina Nikki Haley at 4.4%, former Vice President Mike Pence at 3.8 percent, and businessman Vivek Ramaswamy at 2.6%.
