Establishment Hate Helps Donald Trump, Says Bill Clinton’s 1992 Adviser

Political strategist Dick Morris addresses the Faith and Freedom Coalition June 3, 2011 in
Win McNamee/Getty Images

Cleveland, Ohio – Donald Trump is winning because he’s the outsider, and he’ll cement his victory by changing his approach once his polls drop, says Dick Morris, the maverick political consultant who helped outsider Bill Clinton snag the presidency in 1992.

“When all of the Republican leadership dumps on Trump, and [Gov. Jeb] Bush won’t show up [at the convention] and the Bushes and the Clinton hate him, what a recommendation to the American voters,” Morris tells Breitbart News. “I think that every [establishment] knock is a boost for him,” he said.

But Trump needs to become more reassuring and predictable if he wants to grab a decisive bloc of the roughly 15 percent of voters who still don’t want to pick a candidate, Morris said. He needs “gravitas, status, and style” — but won’t change his image until he’s worried about losing, said Morris. 

“If [his poll numbers] go down, he’ll freak, and he’ll do the right thing,” Morris said.

In contrast, Clinton can’t change her negatives. “Hillary can’t undo what she has done,” he said.

Continued opposition from the GOP establishment will help Trump, Morris said. “Remember [Sen. Ted] Cruz was winning [in the primary race] after Wisconsin, and then Bush and everyone else endorsed him and he went crashing,” he added.

The Bushes and their establishment allies are electoral poison, he said. “I think the lesson there is they are the kiss of death and [Trump] can run against ‘Hillary the Insider’ [while] he’s the outsider.

“That’s the lesson of the Brexit vote, of the Sanders campaign and of the Trump campaign,” he said.

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