Syndicated columnist
George Will said Sunday he abandoned the Republican Party "for the same reason" he joined it— "I'm a conservative" — and he feels let down by the message of GOP leaders.
Speaking on
"Fox News Sunday," the conservative pundit explained why he "changed my registration to unaffiliated 23 days ago."
"So the long and the short of it is, as Ronald Reagan said when he changed his registration, I did not leave the Democratic Party, the Democratic Party left me," he said.
"I left it for the same reason I joined it in 1964 when I voted for Barry Goldwater," Will explained. "I joined it because I was a conservative. But I leave for the same reason, that I'm a conservative."
He then went on to decry the meeting between Trump and House Speaker Paul Ryan after the real estate mogul became the GOP presumptive nominee.
"They stressed their common principles and their vast shared ground, which is much more important than their differences," he said. "I thought that was puzzling doubly so because Paul Ryan still didn't endorse him."
He added the endorsement followed Trump's attack on an Mexican American judge who's presiding over fraud cases in California against Trump's defunct real estate seminar program.
"And I decided that, in fact, this is not my party anymore," he said.
Trump blasted Will's decision in a tweet Sunday, calling him "one of the most overrated political pundits" who "lost his way long ago."
Will sarcastically responded, saying, "He has an advantage on me because he can say everything he knows about any subject in 140 characters and I can’t."
Trump has torn apart his frequent critic in the past,
denouncing him last October in a tweet bomb, saying "Take off his little spectacles and he's just another dummy."
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