The Sentinel-Record

Trump stand-ins struggle to speak for nominee

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LAURIE KELLMAN

WASHINGTON — Donald Trump isn’t making it easy for top supporters and advisers, from his running mate on down, to defend him or explain some campaign positions.

Across the Sunday news shows, a parade of Trump stand-ins, led by vice presidenti­al nominee Mike Pence, couldn’t say whether Trump was sticking with or changing a central promise to boot the roughly 11 million people living in the U.S. illegally, with the help of a “deportatio­n force.” And they didn’t bother defending his initial response Saturday to the killing of a mother as she walked her baby on a Chicago street.

Questioned on whether it’s a problem that the GOP presidenti­al nominee has left key details on immigratio­n policy unclear so late in the election, Republican National Committee Chairman Reince Priebus demurred: “I just don’t speak for Donald Trump.”

It was a striking look at Trump’s leadership of a team he had said would help drive him to victory in the Nov. 8 election.

The very purpose of surrogates is to speak for and back up their presidenti­al nominee. But Trump’s struggled to do so even as they stayed tightly together on the details they know: Trump will issue more details on the immigratio­n plan soon, the policy will be humane, and despite his clear wavering, he’s been “consistent” on the issue. Any discussion of inconsiste­ncies or potentiall­y unpresiden­tial tweeting, Pence and others suggested, reflected media focus on the wrong issue.

Asked whether the “deportatio­n force” proposal Trump laid out in November is still in place, Pence replied: “Well, what you heard him describe there, in his usual plainspoke­n, American way, was a mechanism, not a policy.”

Added Trump’s campaign manager, Kellyanne Conway: “The softening is more approach than policy,” adding that on immigratio­n, Trump “wants to find a fair and humane way.”

The Indiana governor, Conway and other surrogates said the main tenets of Trump’s immigratio­n plan

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