Pat Buchanan, twice the runner-up for the Republican presidential nomination, thinks it’s a good idea for Jeb Bush to go after Donald Trump in Thursday night’s primary debate.
In an interview with CNBC posted online Thursday, Buchanan offered Bush and Trump separate advice.
“If I were Bush, I would challenge Trump directly and politely, maybe with a compliment thrown in at the beginning and a light comment,” Buchanan said. “Make yourself stand out as though, this [debate] is Trump versus Bush. But make it more Bush-Trump.”
The debate is the first of the GOP primary campaign and will be hosted by Fox News. Because Trump and Bush are at the top of national polls, they will each be positioned next to each other on stage.
Fox anchor Chris Wallace, who will co-moderate the debate, has said Trump will be served a “fat juicy ball” to go after Bush.
For Trump, Buchanan said he’ll have to be ready to answer for criticism – that he has deep associations with Democrats and that he flip-flops on some issues, among them – he has received in the early stages of his campaign.
“He’s going to have to take each of these things where he’s been hit and have a short substantive answer,” Buchanan said, noting that Trump has “shown a tremendous amount of really political athletic skills.”
“I think unless there’s a real explosion or a blow up, he’s certainly in the final four,” Buchanan said of Trump. “And I would not be surprised to see him in the final two. I mean, I made the final two myself [in 1992 and 1996] and I didn’t start off with anything approaching what he has now. ”
