Former Trump Adviser Rips President’s ‘Clumsy, Sloppy Kind of Statement’

David Urban, a former campaign adviser to President Donald Trump, panned his former boss’s remarks about California’s two largest cities.

At a rally in Nebraska on Monday, Trump defended his decision to launch the war on Iran, saying that high gas prices are a small price to pay. The president has baselessly claimed that Iran’s acquisition of a nuclear weapon was imminent.

“And again, remember, with the war, it’s just artificial,” Trump told rally-goers. “It’s a little bit high. It’s a small price to pay for keeping the world safe, keeping our country safe. They could take out a city. Let them take out Los Angeles. Let them take out San Diego. This is a very small price to pay, and it’s gonna be over with very soon. It’s essentially almost over with. And they might keep going a little long. You know, they always say, ‘They have a big threshold for pain.’ They need it, let me tell you. But it’s gonna end very soon. And it’ll end one way or the other. And your gas and your gasoline and all the other things.”

Trump’s remarks about the obliteration of Los Angeles and San Diego drew confusion and condemnation. The White House responded to the criticism by insisting that the president had acted to prevent Iran from destroying those cities, as though Iran were capable of doing so.

Urban appeared on Tuesday’s AC360 on CNN, where Anderson Cooper asked for his reaction.

“How did you interpret the “take out” L.A. remark?” the host asked.

“I do think it was a clumsy, sloppy kind of statement,” Urban replied. “Obviously, he’s riffing there. I think that this administration’s intention the entire time has been to preclude Iran from getting a nuclear weapon so that it could do anything against any U.S. city in the future. And so, while it was crude and kind of rough and tumble and he kind of laughed about it, I don’t think the president meant it. Even The Guardian, the ‘conservative’ bastion, The Guardian corrected their headline to say that Trump didn’t suggest that the cities be nuked. So, I think he kind of, you know, as he goes on these riffs, Anderson, sometimes they’re not so artful. This is one of those instances.”

Watch above via CNN.

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