Newt Gingrich: Trump is ‘Utterly Stupid’ For Getting Involved In Wives Spat
Newt Gingrich has scolded GOP front-runner Donald Trump for getting sucked into a personal spat over how the appearance of his wife stacks up against the partner of rival Ted Cruz.
Gingrich argued Monday that Trump’s “utterly stupid” decision to attack Heidi Cruz has demonstrated the real estate mogul’s inability to exhibit presidential decorum and will ultimately damage his campaign numbers.
Trump traded blows with Cruz via social media last week after an anti-Trump super PAC posted a nude image of Trump’s supermodel wife on Facebook that had appeared in a January 2000 issue of British GQ.
The reality TV star and presumed Republican nominee immediately fired back by retweeting an image of wife Melania next to Heidi Cruz, insinuating the Texas Senator’s wife was unattractive.
"@Don_Vito_08: "A picture is worth a thousand words" @realDonaldTrump #LyingTed #NeverCruz @MELANIATRUMP pic.twitter.com/5bvVEwMVF8"
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) March 24, 2016
The post generated an immediate backlash. Fox News anchor Megyn Kelly led the charge against Trump, yet the Republican front-runner refused to delete the post. Instead, he’s since escalated the row.
On Friday, Trump aide Katrina Pierson appeared on MSNBC in order to rattle off a long list of attacks specifically targeting Cruz’s wife.
“She is a Bush operative,” Pierson said. “Her entire career has been spent working against everything Ted Cruz says that he stands for.”
But on Monday night, former House Speaker and 2012 presidential hopeful Newt Gingrich told Fox News’ Sean Hannity the attack will only serve to remind voters of Donald Trump’s questionable record on women.
“For Trump to get sucked into this at a personal level… is just utterly stupid,” Gingrich said. “It sent a signal to women that is negative at a time when his numbers with the women are already bad. It sent a signal of instability to people who are beginning to say, ‘OK, maybe I’ve gotta get used to it, maybe I’ve gotta rely on him, maybe he could be presidential,’ and frankly, it energized Cruz.”
According to Gingrich, Trump could have effortlessly deflected attempts to discredit his wife in the first instance.
“The answer was simple: Melania was a supermodel on a professional shoot for a very famous magazine,” Gingrich said of the nude photograph that sparked the row. “He’s very proud of her, and she’ll be a very beautiful first lady. Now, if he had just said that and moved on, then the Cruz campaign would have looked stupid, the issue would have been over, he would have seemed more disciplined and pleasant and a gentleman and instead he gets down into this mud that I think really has hurt him.”
Although Gingrich has provided multiple boosts for the Trump in recent weeks, he did tell Sean Hannity on Monday that the spat had strengthened Ted Cruz’s presidential bid. Gingrich said Cruz was poised to do well in the upcoming GOP primary in Wisconsin on April 5 and added it should “be a wake-up call” for Trump to reassess his campaign strategy.
“I’m not sure anybody in the Trump campaign understands yet what a big mistake this is, and they can’t keep doing this stuff and think they’re going to get the nomination,” he said. “He’s gotta get in there, be well-organized and actually get the delegates. And I think he’s got to reassess some of what he’s doing.”
Despite Trump’s “utterly stupid” behavior, he’s still sitting comfortably at the top of the polls. According to RealClearPolitics, Trump currently maintains a 10.8 point lead over Cruz. He has already won 739 delegates, with 1,237 needed to secure the GOP nomination.
[Photo by Alex Wong/Getty Images]
