Washington: Here's Paul
Ryan in December 2015 on then-Candidate Donald Trump's proposed temporary ban
on Muslims entering the United States: "This is not conservatism."And here's Ryan on Friday
in the wake of Trump's executive order restricting refugees from entering
the U.S. and stopping entry of all visitors from seven predominantly Muslim
countries: "President Trump is right to make sure we are doing everything
possible to know exactly who is entering our country."
Ryan and other Republican
leaders are explaining their seeming about-face on Trump's ban by insisting
that the executive order isn't targeted at any particular religion and,
therefore, doesn't violate Ryan's stated opposition to barring people from the
country due to their religious preference.
What's really happened
between Ryan's first statement in December 2015 and his current reaction to the
Trump executive order is that Donald Trump got elected president. Back in
late 2015 there was considerable doubt that Trump would even emerge as the
Republican nominee. He did -- and then he won the White House running,
unapologetically, on policies just like this one.
Over that time, Ryan
found a way to make a sort-of peace with Trump, focusing on Trump's seeming
willingness to defer to Congressional Republicans on major domestic policy
matters including the repeal and replacement of the Affordable Care Act,
entitlement reform and tax reform.
The
problem for Ryan -- as the latest Trump executive order makes clear is that
Trump's vision of conservatism is radically at odds with Ryan's vision. Ryan
spent much of last fall after he publicly
pronounced that he would not campaign for Trump laying out a positive and inclusive vision of
the GOP. Ryan was clearly hoping that when not if
Trump lost, he could begin to emerge as the party's primary leader and
implement some of his ideas on a party desperate for direction.
Instead, he
found himself sitting on a dais on Thursday in Philadelphia while Trump
touted a protectionist view on trade and offered few specifics on how he
proposes Congress fund his many priorities including infrastructure spending
and the construction of a wall along our southern border.
This
week drove home two painful realities for Ryan: 1) Trump is not going to sit
back and let others run the country and 2) Trump's vision of what the
Republican party is and should be is totally different than the Speaker's own. For
those two reasons and the prospect of four more years of President Trump, Paul
Ryan, you had the Worst Week on Washington. Congrats, or something.
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