Ben Stein, who this week blasted Donald Trump's economic platform as "sheer idiocy," told
Newsmax TV on Wednesday that the billionaire real-estate tycoon will definitely clinch the Republican presidential nomination — and he plans to vote for him.
"I definitely think he will be the nominee and we can do a lot worse," Stein, a noted economist and actor who wrote speechs for Presidents Richard Nixon and Gerald Ford, said Wednesday on "The Steve Malzberg Show."
"He's got his head totally right about defense. He knows the main issue in the whole world is that America has to have an adequate defense posture. This is something that Mr. [Barack] Obama definitely does not know."
Watch
Newsmax TV on
DirecTV Ch. 349,
DISH Ch. 223 and
Verizon FiOS Ch. 115. Get
Newsmax TV on your cable system —
Click Here Now
On Tuesday, Stein appeared on
"CNN Newsroom" and said Trump's recent prediction of a "very massive recession" coming soon in the United States was "nonsense" and that Trump's views on the economy are "sheer idiocy."
He added, "It breaks my heart, it makes me want to cry because I'm Republican, I've never voted for a Democrat. And to think the guy who's our likely standard bearer has such nonsensical ideas of every single aspect of the economy is just breathtakingly horrible."
But Stein told Malzberg that Trump — the Republican presidential front-runner who leads Ted Cruz in delegates, 740-514 — needs to buckle down on his knowledge of the economy.
"That's the main thing. I wish he would take a few days off and talk to a few people who know something about the economy," Stein said.
"That fact that he's getting big crowds tells us nothing about the real rate of unemployment. The fact that he think he's going to recoup billions, hundreds of billions, trillions by renegotiating trade deals with China and Mexico is just nonsense.
"He's probably the most ignorant candidate about economics there's ever been but I like him anyway because defense is much more important even than economics."
Asked about the claim of Trump's supporters that their candidate has proven brilliance with money as a multibillionaire successful businessman, Stein shot back:
"Multibillionaires are a dime a dozen in America today and that doesn't show he knows anything at all about predicting the economy.
"And by the way I wouldn't want to be an investor in Donald Trump's enterprises. His investors haven't done well at all. He's done well, his investors haven't done well. If he's the nominee and he's running against Hillary, I'm going to vote for him.
"But I really wish we get somebody that has his head screwed on right. He's a fantastically successful self-promoter but as an economist, even as a businessman, he's in no great shape."
Stein, a bestselling author who writes Newsmax Magazine's Dreemz column, has appeared in such movies as "Ferris Bueller's Day Off," "Honeymoon in Vegas" and "Planes, Trains & Automobiles."
Related Stories:
© 2026 Newsmax. All rights reserved.