Ryan: I Have A Responsibility to Support Trump and Not ‘Disrespect Voters’

Sunday’s on NBC’s “Meet the Press,” Speaker of the House Paul Ryan (R-WI) said he supports presumptive Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump because he “won the election” and that he does not want to “disrespect the voters.”

Ryan said, “I feel like I have certain responsibilities as not just Congressman Paul Ryan from the First District of Wisconsin, but at Speaker of the House. And imagine the Speaker of the House not supporting the duly elected nominee of our party, therefore creating a chasm in our party to split us in half, which basically helps deny us the White House and strong majorities in Congress.”

He continued, “He won the election. The voters picked him. He beat Ted Cruz and Marco Rubio and Jeb Bush and everybody else..He won the election, The voters voted for him. That’s the point. He won the delegates. That’s a choice they made. This isn’t a top down party where a handful of people pick our nominee in the president. The voters pick him, That’s the choice they made. What can I control? That’s not something I can control.”

He added, “I have a responsibility and that is to not dis-unify our party and disrespect the voters, the Republican voters of America.”