Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich says presidential debates can make or break candidates — but this cycle's GOP primary front-runner, Donald Trump, has taken that concept to a ferocious new level.
In a Sunday interview on
The Huffington Post's "Candidate Confessional podcast," the 72-year-old Gingrich, who in 2012 ran against eventual GOP nominee Mitt Romney, said Trump is channeling a character in Oscar-winner Leonardo di Caprio's movie "The Revenant."
"You need to understand that Trump is the grizzly bear in 'The Revenant,'" Gingrich said. "When you hit him, he devours you. He can't help himself. And so, he creates an environment unlike anything I've ever seen."
And Gingrich advises there's just one tactic he'd use to spar with the real estate billionaire in a face-off.
"I'd say, beat him up!" he said.
Gingrich recalls his own rocky primary race, and how debates helped put him back on track.
"It is like being a jazz musician," he said of a debate performance. "So, you and the audience are in the same zone. It's almost a Zen. You relax totally. You absorb the question. You feel the audience environment. And then you intuit what you should say."
"You want to hit one or two home runs a night," he added. "You don't want to try and hit 16."
But that formula isn't holding in 2016, he concedes.
"These debates are totally different," he said.
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