Gingrich: President Trump would be ‘big asset’ for GOP Congress

Former Speaker Newt Gingrich (R-Ga.) says Donald Trump would be an immense help to a GOP-led Congress if he’s elected president.

“If Trump keeps learning, he could become a big asset,” he said in an email to The Washington Post published Thursday. “He will shatter the traditional patterns [in Congress].”

{mosads}Gingrich said Trump’s rise couldn’t have happened in past elections.

“It took the combination of deep conservative and working class anger at President Obama, the collapse of government ([Hurricane] Katrina, the Veterans Administration, the border, inner city schools, etc.), the worst economy for male high school-educated workers since the Great Depression, the continuous and growing threat of terrorism and a sense that that the Republican leadership couldn’t solve things reinforced by the rise of 24/7 news and social media for Trump to dominate,” he wrote.

“He couldn’t have [done that] four or eight years ago.”

Gingrich said Trump reminds him of former President Andrew Jackson.

“Andrew Jackson represented a farmer-frontier-worker rebellion against the eastern establishment who had maintained control for over a generation,” he said. “The elite disliked him so much he got bad press for over a century until [Arthur M.] Schlesinger’s ‘The Age of Jackson’ rehabilitated him.

“You could make a similar argument for [Ted] Cruz, [Ben] Carson and [Carly] Fiorina as genuine outsiders,” he added of other GOP contenders.

Gingrich charged that the GOP’s crowded presidential field next year is a major boon for the Republican Party’s future.

“It has been good for America,” he said. “This is as smart a field of candidates as we have fielded in my lifetime. The Republicans are becoming the party of youth, diversity and creativity.”

The former Speaker said he is committed to backing the GOP nominee next year.

“By definition the person who learns enough to become the nominee is almost certainly the best person for the general election,” Gingrich added.