Kristol: At RNC Convention Trump Needs To Say He Regrets Some of the Things He Has Said

Sunday on ABC’s “This Week,” while discussing presumptive Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump’s upcoming Republican National Convention speech, Never Trump leader and Weekly Standard editor Bill Kristol said Trump needs to admit regrets and that he made fun of people in “a nasty way.”

Partial transcript as follows:

STEPHANOPOULOS: Bill Kristol, you’re a Republican, who’s made no secret of his distaste for Donald Trump over the course of this campaign. What we’re seeing though, in our poll, is that he’s gone up from about support of about 77 percent of Republicans to up above 80 percent. How much room does he have to grow there?

BILL KRISTOL, “THE WEEKLY STANDARD”: I mean, I think he has some room to grow because I do think he has — it’s a changed election. And the one thing I learned in 1992 in that first Bush White House is that if people want change, they’re willing to forgive some of the attributes of the candidate who’s for change or willing to rationalize some of the less likable attributes of that candidate, less admirable attributes, if the candidate helps them do that. Clinton crossed the bar at the Democratic Convention in 1992 with the Gore pick, his own acceptance speech and suddenly a guy who looked questionable before and was running second or third behind Bush and Perot takes the lead —

(CROSSTALK)

STEPHANOPOULOS: So what does Donald Trump —

KRISTOL: — has to do.

So I — I think it’s a big moment, that Thursday night speech. People, tens, how many millions of people are going to watch that speech? And if he has the ability — and I don’t think he does — to say, you know what, I’m running for President of the United States and I regret some of the things I’ve said during this campaign. I’m a colorful guy. I say what’s on my mind. How I made fun of some people in a nasty way; I’ve said some things about women —

STEPHANOPOULOS: Mea culpa in an acceptance speech.

DOWD: That’s an R word he will never use: regret.

KRISTOL: But I do think this is why —

(CROSSTALK)

CASTELLANOS: I don’t think you do that.

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