Leaked Paul Ryan Audio: I Am Not Going To Defend Donald Trump – Not Now, Not in The Future

By Grant M. Deltz

Breitbart News has released leaked audio of House Speaker Paul Ryan from October 2016 where he claims he is finished with defending now-President Donald Trump. The audio comes from an October 10, 2016 conference call with House Republican members following the release of an Access Hollywood tape where Trump made inappropriate remarks regarding women.

Ryan remarked,

“I am not going to defend Donald Trump-not now, not in the future.” He continued, “Look, you guys know I have real concerns with our nominee,” Ryan continued. “I hope you appreciate that I’m doing what I think is best for you, the members, not what’s best for me. So, I want to do what’s best for our members, and I think this is the right thing to do. I’m going to focus my time on campaigning for House Republicans. I talked to a bunch of you over the last 72 hours and here is basically my takeaway. To everyone on this call, this is going to be a turbulent month. Many of you on this call are facing tough reelections. Some of you are not. But with respect to Donald Trump, I would encourage you to do what you think is best and do what you feel you need to do. Personally, you need to decide what’s best for you. And you all know what’s best for you where you are.”

At this point there is no indication of which Republican congressmen were on the call, and which ones concurred with Ryan privately.

Listen to the audio for yourself.