Former Republican Rep. Ron Paul on Wednesday blasted GOP presidential hopeful Donald Trump as a “dangerous” authoritarian on a power trip who won’t value civil liberties the way a U.S. president should.

“I think he’s is a dangerous person,” said Mr. Paul, whose son, Sen. Rand Paul is running against Mr. Trump for the Republican presidential nomination.

“And a lot of people find him sort of funny, and love him, even Libertarian types,” Mr. Paul, who is now a registered Libertarian, lamented on Fox News Radio. “They like him because he’s so disruptive to the party system, and I enjoy that too. But I think he’s a man that if conditions deteriorate, which they can — see I work on the assumption that the world is no more stable than Greece, and if those conditions come, people want to be told what to do: ‘And I know what the answer is, and I’ll do this, and I am the man to this.’

“And [Mr. Trump] comes across this very well, and people listen to him, and I believe he may be raising white horses someplace and he’s going to ride in,” Mr. Paul continued. “Because he is almost the opposite of a Libertarian, because it’s not like ‘I want to give you your freedom and your liberty to run your life as you choose. Your civil liberties are absolutely yours, you can’t hurt anybody, it’s your own money you can spend it any way you want.’ But he sounds like the person, ‘I know the answers and I’m going to do this and I’ve done this, I’ve done this, this and this.’”

“An authoritarian?” Fox’s Alan Colmes asked.

“He’s an authoritarian and that’s the way he claims he made all his money. So I see that as dangerous,” Mr. Paul responded.

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