CLEVELAND ― No issue better illustrates Donald Trump’s unconventional appeal and his loose adherence to the truth than the Iraq War.
For over a year now, the Republican presidential nominee has said he opposed the U.S. invasion before it began. He didn’t. This is not one of those cases that can be muddied with rhetorical parsings or lawyerly incisions. Trump is quoted in 2002 saying he supported the decision to invade. It’s on tape. And yet he keeps touting his prescience in predicting the war would be a disaster.
That Trump sticks to this script is evidence that he sees more upside in being viewed as an anti-war sage than downside in being criticized as dishonest. That might not be a bad calculation. If you spend some time interviewing his supporters here at the GOP convention, you quickly discover that they don’t actually know he initially supported the war. And when they’re told he did, they don’t care.
Take New Hampshire state Rep. Al Baldasaro, Trump’s own veterans adviser.
“I would say he was against it,” he told The Huffington Post when asked about Trump’s position on the invasion. Told Trump was for it, he responded, “I would say he was a businessman who was saying different things that are open to interpretation.”
I would say he was against it. ... I would say he was a businessman who was saying different things that are open to interpretation.
-New Hampshire state Rep. Al Baldasaro
Out of roughly 20 people interviewed outside the Quicken Loans Arena, only one had actually read about the Howard Stern interview in which Trump said he supported invading Iraq. Even that individual brushed it off: “Everybody makes mistakes.” All others, including officials close to the candidate, seemed to be in the dark.
“You will have to check with the Trump people on that,” said former Sen. Scott Brown (R-Mass.), a close Trump confidant. “You’re asking me what Trump thinks and you need to ask them.”
“Donald Trump has already answered that question. He’s answered that question, I think, 100 times now. More probably,” said Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn, a convention speaker and Trump vice presidential finalist, when approached on the street Tuesday night. Told about the 2002 quote, he responded, “Where’s that at?”
Before he could be shown the quote, Flynn moved on to his own skepticism about the Iraq War and swiftly walked toward the Quicken Loans Arena.
Others, when read Trump’s words, were forgiving.
“Things evolve,” said Johnny Lopez of Texas. “Things change. You have to be able to adapt. From all the research I’ve done, he was against it. If you gave me evidence that he wasn’t, I’d look at it.”
Sandy, a middle-aged man who had driven to Cleveland from Maine, said he had heard that Trump was against the invasion. When we pulled up the BuzzFeed article that first exposed the Stern interview, he replied, “Things are taken out of context. What happens in the past can be used to invalidate the present. The truth is, we are living, changing beings.”
Kevin, a man who roamed the streets with the name of his website on his T-shirt ― SheShouldntBeAllowedToRun.com ― said that Trump “gave a back-and-forth response. He’s a politician.” He was not bothered.
Dean Stocker of California said he didn’t remember what Trump said in 2002. “But I know Hillary supported it. Plus, he wasn’t a politician at the time so it is irrelevant.”
“It doesn’t matter to me,” he concluded.
Every politician changes his or her positions. It’s the extent to which they do it for political expediency that gets them in trouble. The case of Trump and the Iraq War is different, however. He hasn’t changed a position so much as denied that his first one ever existed. It’s a novel approach to campaigning ― creating an alternate reality by which you should be judged.
Trump’s approach has also produced a bit of cognitive dissonance for his supporters.
Larry Bates, a Michigander by the way of England, was certain that when President George W. Bush launched the invasion, Trump was against it. “There are people reminiscing of the fact that he was against it at the time,” Bates said. Shown the Buzzfeed piece, he explained that it wasn’t a “thoughtful response.”
“His thoughtful response is it would create havoc,” said Bates. “He knew the right people to ask the right questions, and they said it would create havoc. If you prove to me that was his consistent, thoughtful position, that would concern me more.”
But the response that best reflected how Trump’s backers feel about his past position on Iraq came from a woman named Cynthia. After she explained that Trump had opposed the war from the onset, The Huffington Post tried to point out the facts.
“What if I told you he supported it?”
“Well,” she responded, “I wouldn’t believe you.”
