The five remaining presidential candidates are appearing on CNN Monday night, taking on major issues ranging from foreign policy to the complicated path to the Republican nomination.
The event comes as the Republican establishment and a group of influential conservatives intensify efforts to thwart Trump’s march to the nomination, but with no unified strategy for how to achieve that goal. Meanwhile, Hillary Clinton is tightening her grip on the Democratic presidential nomination but is still facing off against Bernie Sanders as more states go to the polls on Tuesday.
Coming on the same day that President Barack Obama held a historic press conference with Cuban leader Raul Castro and one of the largest pro-Israel groups gathered in Washington, the discussions were dominated by foreign policy.
Here’s what they said.
Donald Trump
Donald Trump said Monday the U.S. should rethink its involvement in NATO because the defense alliance costs too much money.
In remarks to CNN’s Wolf Blitzer, he said the U.S. pays a disproportionate amount to NATO to ensure the security of allies.
“Frankly, they have to put up more money,” he said. “We are paying disproportionately. It’s too much, and frankly it’s a different world than it was when we originally conceived of the idea.”
For instance, Trump said Washington was “taking care” of Ukraine and that other European nations were not doing enough to support the Kiev government that has been locked in a long showdown with Moscow.
But Ukraine is not a member of NATO, and Washington is not providing arms to the government as it is fighting pro-Moscow rebels, though has provided nonlethal aid and has helped support international bailouts of the Ukrainian economy.
Later in the interview, Trump qualified his remarks saying that the U.S. should not “decrease its role” in NATO but should decrease its spending. Still, the Republican presidential front-runner’s NATO comments could spur anxiety among the Western foreign policy establishment.
His remarks come as Trump brought his anti-Washington campaign to the nation’s capital Monday. He sought to unify Republicans during a meeting earlier in the day with lawmakers and other members of the party elite. He’s also aiming to bolster his foreign policy credentials, releasing a long-awaited list of his advisers and speaking later to the American Israel Political Action Committee.
Earlier Monday, Democratic front-runner Hillary Clinton used her speech at AIPAC to slam Trump’s position on Israel. He’s come under fire for previously saying he’s “neutral” in the Israel-Palestinian conflict, though he’s repeatedly said he supports Israel.
“We need steady hands. Not a president who says he is neutral on Monday, pro-Israel on Tuesday and who knows what on Wednesday because everything is negotiable,” Clinton said in a clear shot at the Republican front-runner.
But in the CNN interview, Trump said Clinton lacks the strength to be president and dismissed her claim that he was too volatile to be commander in chief.
Trump: Clinton doesn’t have the stamina to be President 00:52
“Hillary Clinton does not have the stamina … does not have the strength to be president,” Trump told Blitzer.
Trump also dismissed Clinton’s critique about his potential qualifications to serve as president.
“I have the steadiest hands. Look at those hands,” Trump said. “Far steadiest than hers,” he said, accusing Clinton of simply reading speeches scripted by her aides off a teleprompter.
Trump also said that if elected president, he would require the removal of the U.S. embassy to Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem in a reversal of long standing American policy.
“It’s a process but fairly quickly,” Trump said, when asked how quickly he could make such a move happen.
On a day that President Barack Obama held historic talks in Havana with Cuban leader Raul Castro, the billionaire broke with many others in the GOP foreign policy establishment by saying he would continue the President’s policy of normalizing relations with the former U.S. communist foe.
“Probably so,” Trump said. “But I want much better deals than we are making,” Trump said, and said at the “right time” he would be willing to open one of his signature luxury hotels in Havana. He said that Castro had also delivered “a very, very big slight” to Obama but not meeting him at the airport when Air Force One touched down in Havana on Sunday.
The Republican front-runner also warned the party against depriving him of the GOP nomination if he falls marginally short of the 1,237 delegates needed to formally clinch the party’s presidential election nod.
“If it was at 1190, so I am a little bit off …. I think it is going to be very hard for them to do,” Trump said, pointing out he had several million more votes than any other candidate in the Republican primary process. He added that it was “a little unfair” that he had been forced to compete against so many Republican candidates in a manner that made it tougher for anyone to reach that magic number.
“I had many, many people that I am competing with, so you know when you talk about the majority plus one it is a very unfair situation.”
Ted Cruz
Ted Cruz took immediate swipes at Trump over the Middle East and NATO, accusing him of a dangerous lack of knowledge about the world.
He accused the Obama administration of not living up to an agreement with Ukraine to secure its territorial integrity made at the end of the Cold War when Kiev gave up its Soviet-era nuclear weapons. “Everything I just said, I bet you dollars to donuts Donald Trump has no idea about any of that.”
“It has been Russia’s objective, it has been Putin’s objective for decades to break NATO. What Donald Trump is saying that he would unilaterally surrender to Russia and Putin, give Putin a massive foreign policy victory by breaking NATO and abandoning Europe.”
Cruz also mocked Trump’s knowledge of the Middle East following the billionaire’s speech to AIPAC earlier Monday. “His speech was actually an improvement. He clearly hired someone to write that speech for him,” Cruz told Blitzer. “One of the challenges with foreign policy that Donald’s knowledge of the world is very, very limited.”
John Kasich
Ohio Gov. John Kasich struck a more conventional foreign policy stance in his interview than Trump, especially on NATO.
“We clearly have to make sure we strengthen NATO, we have to make sure that (Russian President Vladimir) Putin understands we will arm the Ukrainians so they fight for freedom,” Kasich told Anderson Cooper. “We need NATO. NATO is important, we all wish they would do more.”
And he would not go as far as Trump on moving the U.S. embassy in Israel, though he took pains to describe his own speech to AIPAC on Monday as strongly pro-Israel.
Gov. John Kasich: I’d keep ISIS out of Libya 01:47
“It’s easy to make a lot of statements, but when you have a lot of experience in this matter which I have … you learn to choose your words carefully,” Kasich said, adding that Trump was “dead wrong” on NATO — though he declined to make a judgment — on the GOP front-runner’s personal qualities.
The Ohio governor also turned his fire on Clinton and her tenure as secretary of state, saying she had made a “terrible” mistake in intervening in Libya against longtime strongman Moammar Gadhafi.
“We should have let Gaddafi stay there,” he said, saying that the Libyan leader’s ouster had led to a “Wild West” situation in Libya exploited by terrorists.
Kasich ruled out any deal with Ted Cruz or Trump that would involve him taking a spot on their presidential tickets. “First of all, there is zero chance that I would be Vice President with either of them,” Kasich said. “Below zero actually.”
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