Veteran Reporter Andrea Mitchell Slams Donald Trump, Says Candidate Is ‘Completely Uneducated’ On Foreign Policy
Republican candidate Donald Trump often makes it his business to take shots at members of the media, but on Sunday, it was veteran journalist Andrea Mitchell who had some harsh critique for the aspiring Chief Executive.
Mitchell, 69, has worked for NBC News for over three decades according to her official biography. She is currently a chief foreign affairs correspondent for the network. In a segment on this week’s Meet The Press, she talked with Chuck Todd about Trump’s recent meeting with the Washington Post‘s editorial board, saying that the billionaire is “completely uneducated about any part of the world.”
As noted in a recap posted via Mediaite, Andrea Mitchell remarked that Donald Trump seemed very unfocused during the aforementioned event at the Washington Post offices.
“He cannot stick to a subject. It is remarkable,” Mitchell said of Donald Trump. “And when he doesn’t know something, he just changes the subject, makes it all about himself.”
Mitchell referred specifically to a moment during the recorded meeting between Donald Trump and the paper’s editors in which he was asked about using a nuclear weapon to eliminate ISIS. Trump responded by referring to his success on the campaign trail against his former rivals.
“I don’t want to use, I don’t want to start the process of nuclear,” Donald Trump said, according to a transcript published by the Washington Post. “Remember the one thing that everybody has said, I’m a counterpuncher. Rubio hit me. Bush hit me. When I said low energy, he’s a low-energy individual, he hit me first. I spent, by the way he spent 18 million dollars’ worth of negative ads on me.”
When one of the people present at the meeting reminded Trump that they had been discussing ISIS, he did not revisit the topic, instead asking to go around the room with introductions. The exchange occurred about fifty-five minutes into the hour-long interview.
Mitchell also discussed a key exchange between Donald Trump and the Washington Post staff in which he complained that Iran “isn’t buying our planes,” according to a quote by Raw Story. She noted that Trump had to be informed that Iran is under sanctions and cannot legally purchase planes from the United States. He made similar gaffes in discussing the trading practices of Iran and North Korea.
In the wake of the get-together between Trump and the newspaper’s editorial board, Washington Post writers described the candidate’s responses as “baffling” and containing “shocking ignorance.” In a particularly stinging piece, the editorial board noted that electing Donald Trump will be a “radical risk,” noting his “breezy willingness to ignore facts and evidence.”
“As Donald Trump observed during a visit to The Post on Monday, we have been critical of his candidacy, so give him credit for agreeing to sit down with us and answer questions for more than an hour. Unfortunately, the visit provided no reassurance regarding Mr. Trump’s fitness for the presidency.”
Following his high-profile visit to The Post‘s offices, Donald Trump unveiled key members of his new foreign policy team, including Walid Phares, Joseph Schmitz, and George Papadopoulos. An article by Politico described the group as consisting of “relative unknowns,” suggesting that many Republicans were surprised at Donald Trump’s choices for advisers on vital issues including national security and international relations.
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