Bob Dole: ‘ Trump’s going to make a great president’

Nominee knows how to compromise, says venerable politician

Other past Republican presidential nominees seem sufficiently dismayed by Donald Trump as standard- bearer that they haven’t even shown up here for the GOP convention.

But Bob Dole, who marks his 93rd birthday Friday, was happily sitting with the Kansas delegation on the convention floor Tuesday night after the states’ roll call officially nominated Trump, and he endorses Trump with a fullthroated enthusiasm rare among Republican graybeards.

“I think Trump’s going to make a great president,” Dole declared in an interview with USA TODAY, adding that he believes Trump will win in November. “I really believe there’s — maybe ‘ a movement’ is too strong — but there’s just a lot of people, Republicans, independents and some Democrats, who are angry for some reason. Government, Congress, maybe something in their own state. And, you know, they’ve all kind of rallied around Trump.”

No one has deeper Republican credentials than Dole. He has at- tended every convention since 1964 (“Basically, they’re the same”) as a member of the House and then the Senate, as Republican national chairman, as the running mate for then- president Gerald Ford and, finally, as the presidential nominee himself in 1996.

“I had a pretty good speech,” he says ruefully, “but I didn’t have any votes. I didn’t have enough.”

He has some advice for Trump on his big acceptance speech Thursday night. The two men have chatted by phone a half- dozen times in recent months.

Trump’s aggressive tone “was great for the primaries, but it’s not so good for the general,” Dole says. “Now he has to tone down his rhetoric and reach out to people and become inclusive. ... You know, we’re not going to win if we just keep picking on independents or groups, whether it’s African Americans or Latinos or Asians, middle- class white people, whatever. And I sense that Trump understands that.”

As president, Dole predicts Trump would have the skills to work with Congress. “I think that’s his strength,” he says. “He’s done that all his life. He’s made deals. He’ll compromise.”

Dole struggles a bit when asked whether Trump reminds him of any other politician.

“No,” he says, “I think Trump’s just a different animal.”

“Now he has to tone down his rhetoric and reach out to people and become inclusive.” Bob Dole

RODNEY WHITE, USA TODAY Bob Dole works the convention floor in Cleveland on Wednesday. During the roll call Tuesday night, the Kansas delegate noted it was “the proud home of the iconic Bob Dole.”