The president roasted former House Speaker Paul Ryan in a trio of tweets, calling his record “atrocious,”. The tweets were evidently inspired after excerpts from an upcoming book by Politico’s Tim Alberta were leaked, in which Ryan is featured prominently, voicing strong critiques of the president.
SLIDESHOW: TOP DEMOCRATS RUNNING FOR PRESIDENT IN 2020
Trump attacked the former Speaker over a laundry list of faults, ranging from Ryan’s failed 2012 run with Mitt Romney to his failure to secure funding for a border wall. The president even blamed Ryan for the loss of the Republican House in the midterm elections.
“Paul Ryan, the failed V.P. candidate & former Speaker of the House, whose record of achievement was atrocious (except during my first two years as President), ultimately became a long-running lame-duck failure, leaving his Party in the lurch both as a fundraiser & leader,” Trump railed. “He quit Congress because he didn’t know how to Win.”
The book which triggered the president’s ire, American Carnage, is drawn from Alberta’s reporting and details the split in the Republican party between centrist moderates and far-right extremists, a fight which ultimately brought about the rise of Trump. In the book, Ryan admits that his decision not to run for reelection was an “escape hatch” out of government and away from the Trump administration. “Those of us around him really helped to stop him from making bad decisions. All the time,” Alberta quotes from Ryan. “We helped him make much better decisions, which were contrary to… what his knee-jerk reaction was. Now I think he’s making some of these knee-jerk reactions.”
The Speaker and the President maintained a tensional relationship. After the release of the Access Hollywood tape which depicted Trump bragging about sexual assault, Ryan refused any public appearances with then-candidate Trump. After he took office, the two managed to form a working relationship.
Upon announcing his retirement, Trump tweeted; “Speaker Paul Ryan is a truly good man, and while he will not be seeking re-election, he will leave a legacy of achievement that nobody can question. We are with you Paul!”
