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WASHINGTON − Republican presidential candidates and other GOP leaders shed their reluctance to criticize Donald Trump this weekend after the ex-president served up an unusual political issue: North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un.
Trump’s praise of Kim for a new position with the World Health Organization drew attacks from Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, former Vice President Mike Pence, former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley and other Republicans who said the former president’s foreign policy is reckless.
“I was surprised to see that,” DeSantis told reporters in Iowa, where a number of GOP candidates stumped over the weekend.
DeSantis condemned Kim as a “murderous dictator” and called the World Health Organization “bankrupt.” He and other Republicans have long attacked the organization for its handling of the COVID-19 pandemic .
“We need to be getting out of that” rather than “congratulating” dictators for joining it, the Florida governor said.
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Pence, who plans to officially join the 2024 race this week, also took the opportunity to criticize the front-runner.
“Whether it’s my former running mate or anyone else no one should be praising the dictator in North Korea,” Pence said in Iowa. Pence also poked Trump for his past praise of Russian President Vladimir Putin.
Trump, who made one-on-one meetings with Kim a centerpiece of his foreign policy, triggered the political furor with a Truth Social post about news that North Korea has been elected to the executive board of the World Health Organization.
“Congratulations to Kim Jung Un!” Trump proclaimed.
Republican candidates have been reluctant to criticize Trump, given his large base of support in the GOP.
But Haley, who was also Trump’s ambassador the United Nations, told Fox News that “you don’t congratulate a thug.”
“I mean, let’s keep in mind this,” Haley said. “This thug has threatened America. It’s threatened our allies over and over again. This is not something to play with.”
Republicans who have long criticized Trump also condemned his praise of North Korea’s dictator.
Former U.S. Rep. Will Hurd, R-Tex., who has discussed mounting a longshot presidential bid of his own, cast it in terms of “good and evil.”
“America is good, and Kim Jong Un is evil,” Hurd tweeted. “It goes against everything we stand for and believe in to congratulate the Devil.”
Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp, a frequent critic of Trump who had to defeat a Trump-backed challenger in a primary last year, also jabbed Trump’s Truth Social post. Kemp tweeted: “Taking our country back from Joe Biden does not start with congratulating North Korea’s murderous dictator.”
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