Libertarian vice presidential candidate Bill Weld revealed more striking divisions within his party when he vouched for Hillary Clinton, the Democrats’ nominee for president, during an interview with MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow Tuesday.
Weld didn’t hesitate when Maddow questioned whether his loyalty to the Libertarian Party is stronger than his fear of a Donald Trump presidency.
“Well, I’m here vouching for Mrs. Clinton ― and I think it’s high-time somebody did,” he said.
Weld continued that his decision is based on his personal experience with the former secretary of state.
“I think she deserves to have people vouch for her other than members of the Democratic National Committee, so I’m here to do that,” he added.
Libertarian presidential nominee Gary Johnson and Weld seem unable to get on the same campaign message of late. This became even more evident when the running mates separately discussed their views on the FBI’s latest investigation into Clinton’s private email server.
Weld, the former head of the Department of Justice Criminal Division, told Maddow that the agency’s decision to examine the emails was “incomprehensible” because “there’s nothing there.” He expressed similar concerns Monday when he told CNN’s “New Day” that the probe left him “outraged.”
“I do not have my candidate hat on here,” he said on CNN. “I have on my former Justice Department hat. And I’m outraged by what’s going on here because it’s such a violation of Justice Department policies, procedures, whatever.”
Johnson, however, told a Colorado radio station over the weekend that the former secretary of state “could well end up in impeachment” over the controversy surrounding her email server if she wins the election Tuesday. “This is Watergate kind of stuff,” he said, in reference to the break-in cover-up that led to Richard Nixon resigning as president in 1974. “This is really, really deep, real stuff.”
Earlier Tuesday, Weld emphasized on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” the importance of not electing Trump as president. He compared the Republican nominee’s campaign to the dystopian society led by a tyrannical figurehead in George Orwell’s 1984.
Editor’s note: Donald Trump regularly incites political violence and is a serial liar, rampant xenophobe, racist, misogynist and birther who has repeatedly pledged to ban all Muslims — 1.6 billion members of an entire religion — from entering the U.S.
CORRECTION: Due to an editing error this article originally stated that Nixon resigned in 1971.
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