Panetta says ‘reckless’ Trump, Cruz hurt U.S. overseas

image

Former U.S. Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta, who also served Pres. Barack Obama as CIA director, has been speaking out against Donald Trump and Ted Cruz on behalf of the Hillary Clinton campaign. (Photo: David Hume Kennerly/Getty Images)

Former Defense Secretary Leon Panetta said Friday that he regularly talks to officials around the world who are repulsed by the “deeply reckless” rhetoric on national security from Republican presidential frontrunner Donald Trump and his rival Ted Cruz.

The former CIA director, speaking to reporters on a conference call organized by Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign, did not name the foreign dignitaries in question.

“I take a number of trips abroad, to the Middle East and elsewhere, and almost everywhere I go, responsible leaders in those countries express deep concerns about the kind of rhetoric that they’re hearing in the campaign from Donald Trump [and] Cruz,” Panetta said.

He was referring to remarks from Trump and the Texas senator in the aftermath of the terrorist attacks in Brussels. The Manhattan real estate mogul refused to rule out using nuclear weapons against the so-called Islamic State, reiterated his call for using torture on terrorism suspects, and pushed for closing U.S. borders to Muslims. Cruz called for having U.S. authorities “patrol and secure Muslim neighborhoods.”

“I know that sometimes these candidates think that they’re just talking to their voters in this country,” Panetta said. “That’s the worst mistake they can make, because the rhetoric they’re using is damaging the United States abroad and creating real concerns about where this country is going in the future.”

Panetta said Trump and Cruz’s rhetoric was “divisive” and “hurts the ability to develop the kind of alliances we absolutely need in order to confront a dangerous enemy.”

Panetta was not asked to identify the foreign officials in question, and did not do so.

The Trump and Cruz campaigns did not immediately return requests for comment.

While overseas unease with Trump is real, especially in Mexico, invoking unnamed foreign dignitaries in this sort of political context can have its pitfalls, as Secretary of State John Kerry learned during his 2004 run for the White House.

The former Massachusetts senator endured a storm of criticism after declaring “I’ve met more leaders who can’t go out and say this publicly, but boy, they look at you and say, ‘You got to win this. You got to beat this guy,’” and then refusing to identify who had said so.

And Democrats had a field day in 2012, when Republican Sen. Scott Brown of Massachusetts said he had “secret meetings with kings and queens and prime ministers and business leaders and military leaders.”

But Panetta was taking his cue from Hillary Clinton herself.

“I’m having foreign leaders ask if they can endorse me to stop Donald Trump,” she said in a March 13 town hall event in Ohio.

“I mean, this is up to Americans, thank you very much, but I get what you’re saying,” said the former top diplomat, who pointed to public remarks from Italian Prime Minister Mateo Renzi, but refused to name any other world leaders. Campaign aides likewise declined to identify them.

At least one controversial foreign leader recently refused to be drawn into the debate. Cuban President Raúl Castro, asked whether he preferred to see Clinton or Trump win, curtly demurred: “I cannot vote in the United States.