President Trump should have ignored London Mayor Sadiq Khan’s criticism of him, Karl Rove said Tuesday.
“This is the one thing I think the president will be better off not punching down,” said the Fox News contributor and former White House deputy chief of staff under George W. Bush.
“I think it would have been better to have left it in the hands of the British prime minister, who obviously answered by basically ignoring the mayor, which is how he deserves to be treated,” he said.
Trump and Khan reignited their long-running feud during the president’s visit to the United Kingdom this week.
On Sunday, Khan called Trump “one of the most egregious examples of a growing global threat.” Trump responded by comparing Khan to “our very dumb and incompetent” New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio and referring to him as a “stone cold loser.”
In a news conference with outgoing British Prime Minister Theresa May in London on Tuesday, Trump said Khan should not be criticizing a representative from the U.S.
“And if you look at what he said, he hurts the people of this great country,” Trump said. “And I think he should actually focus on his job. It would be a lot better if he did that. He could straighten out some of the problems that he has and probably some of the problems that he has caused.”
May did not say, when asked by a reporter, whether she agreed with Trump that Khan is a “stone cold loser.”
