President Obama calls Trump 'woefully unprepared' for the presidency Obama also slammed Republicans who condemn the real estate mogul’s statements while maintaining that they will vote for him.

President Barack Obama on Tuesday challenged Republicans to abandon Donald Trump, a candidate he argued is “woefully unprepared” for the presidency.

Obama blasted Trump for his rhetoric, including his recent spate of attacks on a Gold Star family who criticized the Republican presidential nominee in a personal address at the Democratic National Convention last week.


And the president also trained his fire on Republicans who continue to support the real estate mogul, no matter how divisive his campaign becomes.

“I think the Republican nominee is unfit to serve as president,” Obama said, speaking alongside Singapore Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong at a bilateral news conference at the White House. “I said so last week, and he keeps on proving it. The notion that he would attack a Gold Star family that had made such extraordinary sacrifices on behalf of our country, the fact that he doesn’t appear to have basic knowledge around critical issues in Europe, in the Middle East, in Asia means that he’s woefully unprepared to do this job.”

While Obama has been sharply critical of Trump in the past, his Tuesday excoriation was unprecedented in this campaign season. The president sought to put politics aside and offered a top-to-bottom takedown of the businessman, arguing that Trump's behavior is so far outside the norm that nobody, including Republicans, should consider him for the White House.

With that in mind, he also criticized Republicans who continue to condemn and denounce the real estate mogul’s statements while maintaining that they will vote for him in November.

“The question I think that they have to ask themselves is: If you are repeatedly having to say, in very strong terms, that what he has said is unacceptable, why are you still endorsing him?” Obama said. “What does this say about your party, that this is your standard-bearer?”

Hillary Clinton’s campaign echoed Obama’s sentiments. Press secretary Brian Fallon told MSNBC that the comments Trump makes are unparalleled for a presidential nominee and urged Republicans to counter appropriately.

“I think the response has been too timid from some top Republican leaders who have in recent days criticized Donald Trump’s remarks,” Fallon said, adding that while some Republicans are distancing themselves from Trump, they “have not gone far enough in terms of actually disavowing Donald Trump’s candidacy.”

“If Republicans have had enough of having Donald Trump speak for them, it’s time for them to disavow him as their candidate for president,” he said.

Trump responded with a statement attacking Obama and Clinton on foreign and economic policy, accusing them of destabilizing the Middle East, fostering a growing Islamic State and producing “the worst recovery since the Great Depression.”

He blasted Clinton specifically for setting up a private email server during her tenure as secretary of state, putting the country’s security at risk and lying “repeatedly.”

“Hillary Clinton has proven herself unfit to serve in any government office,” Trump said. “She is reckless with her emails, reckless with regime change, and reckless with American lives. Our nation has been humiliated abroad and compromised by radical Islam brought onto our shores. We need change now.”

At the news conference, Obama indicated that Trump’s incendiary remarks are more troubling than just a one-time thing.

“This isn’t a situation where you have an episodic gaffe,” Obama said of the former reality TV star’s political missteps. “This is daily and weekly, where they are distancing themselves from statements he’s making. There has to be a point at which you say, ‘This is not somebody I can support for president of the United States, even if he purports to be a member of my party.’ The fact that that has not yet happened makes some of these denunciations ring hollow.”

New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, who endorsed Trump after suspending his presidential campaign, called criticism of the Khan family “inappropriate.” Trump has said Khizr Khan had “no right” to criticize him on the DNC stage last week and intimated that his wife Ghazala stood beside him on the podium but didn’t speak because of her religion.

“I didn’t see Mr. Khan’s speech at the DNC but I’ll just say this: I’m a father and I just cannot imagine the pain of losing a child under any circumstances,” Christie said at a news conference Tuesday. “And for Mr. and Mrs. Khan, the pain of losing their son while defending our country is unfathomable, and I think it gives them the right to say whatever they want, whether they’re right or wrong.”



Obama insisted that he isn’t skeptical that Republicans’ outrage is real but maintained “there has to come a point at which you say somebody who makes those kinds of statements doesn’t have the judgment, the temperament, the understanding to occupy the most powerful position in the world.”

The president suggested that his rift with Trump is much deeper than policy disagreements. He acknowledged that while he disagreed with 2008 and 2012 Republican presidential nominees John McCain and Mitt Romney on policy, “I didn’t have a doubt that they could function as president.”

Obama said both McCain and Romney had the right attributes for the Oval Office and were knowledgeable enough to run the country, had either of them won their election. If that were the case, he said, Democrats would “compete four years from now to try to win an election.”

“But that’s not the situation here,” Obama said. “And that’s not just my opinion. That is the opinion of many prominent Republicans. There has to come a point at which you say enough. The alternative is that the entire party, the Republican Party, effectively endorses and validates the positions that are being articulated by Mr. Trump. And as I said in my speech last week, I don’t think that actually represents the views of a whole lot of Republicans.”