Sen. Tim Kaine (D-Va.), known in part as the running mate for Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton in 2016, proclaimed during an ABC interview this weekend that Donald Trump’s behavior after the most recent presidential election was simply disqualifying for the office of president.
Kaine criticized the lack of a “moral compass” displayed by the GOP presidential candidates sticking in some manner with the former president anyway. The Virginia Senator said these other Republicans also weren’t right to serve as president.
“What I just heard was the complete lack of a moral compass,” Kaine told George Stephanopoulos after an interview on the program with conservative businessman Vivek Ramaswamy, who’s running for president. “If you are unwilling to say that the behavior of Donald Trump trying to overturn the peaceful transfer of power is a disqualifier, if you pledge despite that to vote for him, if you pledge despite that to pardon him should you be elected, it shows that you don’t have the moral compass that you need to be the leader of the greatest nation in the world. Sadly, Mr. Ramaswamy is not alone in lacking the compass. I think that was displayed pretty patently by many of the GOP candidates on the debate stage.”
Ramaswamy has stated that he intends to pardon Trump — which would only apply to the federal cases the former president faces — if he becomes president. It does not seem likely that Ramaswamy will become president, considering he has been struggling to reach pass double digits in some national-level polling data as Trump maintains the lead. Nationally, Trump is far, far ahead of everyone else in the GOP presidential primary. He didn’t participate in the recent GOP presidential primary debate, which happened around the time Trump began dealing with his latest criminal case. Filed in Georgia, it alleges a 19-person conspiracy against Georgia’s election results from 2020. Almost all candidates on stage at the debate said they’d support Trump if he won the nomination even if he was convicted of a felony criminal offense.
“If you’re unwilling to say that the behavior of Donald Trump trying to overturn the peaceful transfer of power is a disqualifier…It shows that you don’t have the moral compass that you need,” Sen. Tim Kaine says of GOP presidential candidates. https://t.co/ZWts634PIQ pic.twitter.com/kQF9E42Fhm
— This Week (@ThisWeekABC) September 3, 2023
