While Donald Trump attacks Bill Clinton, Mike Huckabee defends him
Donald Trump may be ready to bring up the more sordid parts of Bill Clinton's history, but one of his opponents for the nomination was out this morning pointing out some of the former president's attributes.
"He's still immensely popular with Democrats....He's still popular with a lot of Americans," Mike Huckabee said, in a Fox News Channel "Fox & Friends" appearance.
Huckabee, who, like Bill Clinton, served as governor of Arkansas, then went on to praise Clinton's political skills. "After seven years of Obama, a lot of Republicans would take Bill Clinton back -- warts and all -- just because at least he understood how to govern. He was not the kind of person who would demonize the other side legislatively. Now, Bill Clinton is partisan -- most of us are -- but he also had a history, and I think it was the fact he'd been a long-term governor and understood how to govern," he said.
Trump said on NBC's "Meet the Press" Sunday, "I think really the media seems to have given President Clinton a pass on this," adding, "He took advantage of a girl that was 20 years old and an intern in his office. There is no excuse for that."
He had also tweeted:
Hillary Clinton has announced that she is letting her husband out to campaign but HE'S DEMONSTRATED A PENCHANT FOR SEXISM, so inappropriate!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) December 27, 2015
If Hillary thinks she can unleash her husband, with his terrible record of women abuse, while playing the women's card on me, she's wrong!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) December 28, 2015
This came after an interview Hillary Clinton had given to the Des Moines Register last week, in which she said of his "schl****d" comment that "it's not the first time he's demonstrated a penchant for sexism."
But while Huckabee praised Clinton, he harbors no expectation that Trump is offending any voters with his attacks on the former president. "Nothing's backfired on Donald Trump yet," he said. "He's played the whole media game like a kid on Christmas morning with a toy drum."
Huckabee, who's lagging Trump and other Republicans in the polls, still holds out hope that he might perform well in Iowa. His campaign surveyed 5,000 people in Iowa and found 75 percent of them had not made up their minds yet, while they're sorting through "enough mail every day to give them a hernia."
Huckabee won the Iowa caucuses in 2008, and he says if he's not a top finisher there, he will drop his bid for the presidency.
CBS News' Katiana Krawchenko contributed to this story.