How Rand Paul went from calling Donald Trump an 'orange windbag' to being a devout disciple

U.S. Sen. Rand Paul once called President Donald Trump a "fake conservative."

Trump had lobbed his own insults at Paul, saying he "reminds me of a spoiled brat without a properly functioning brain." Later, the Kentucky senator shot back, calling the bellicose New York City business tycoon a "delusional narcissist" on Comedy Central.

Yes, Paul and Trump came out swinging as they fought for the Republican Party's 2016 presidential nomination.

But then, things began to change dramatically — once Trump won the nomination and ultimately the presidency.

Within three years, Paul shifted from calling Trump a bully who was "all blather" to lashing out at the president's political enemies throughout the impeachment saga.

As the impeachment trial unfolded in the Senate, Paul put himself front and center as a chief defender of Trump, downplaying the seriousness of the proceedings by doing a crossword puzzle during early arguments and walking out on the trial after Chief Justice John Roberts rejected one of his questions because it was related to the identity of the whistleblower whose allegations prompted the impeachment inquiry.

"I don’t know how you go from saying 'This is the worst person on the face of the Earth' to 'I must protect this person at all costs,'" said Marisa McNee, the Kentucky Democratic Party's deputy executive director. "Only (Paul) can answer that question."

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Brian Darling, who worked as Paul's senior communications director from late 2012 to early 2015, contends that Paul and Trump align closely on foreign policy and issues like cutting taxes.

They've both advocated for winding down America's military involvement in Afghanistan and Iraq, for example.

He also said Paul's pivot makes sense politically.

"Well, it’s smart politics not to trash talk the president and to make comments that are disparaging toward the president, even when you disagree with him, because then you won’t have any influence over the process," Darling said.

The Republican Party of Kentucky's spokesman Mike Lonergan said Paul's relationship with Trump benefits the state.

“Our Republican leaders like Senator Paul and President Trump are working hand-in-hand to make life better for Kentuckians," Lonergan said.

Similarly, Paul's staff told The Courier Journal the senator is proud to work with the president to promote policies that benefit Kentucky, but declined to comment further.

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Here's how Paul and Trump evolved from Republican rivals to golfing buddies:

'What do you do to a bully?'

A review of The Courier Journal's archives found Paul criticizing the future commander in chief starting in 2011, after Trump said Paul's father, former U.S. Rep. Ron Paul, had no shot at becoming president.

"I think his chances are less than my father's," Paul said of Trump on CNN. (Ron Paul sought but lost the GOP's presidential nomination in 2012.)

Four years later, in 2015, Paul and Trump launched competing presidential campaigns.

The Kentucky senator, who lives in Bowling Green and is an ophthalmologist by trade, didn't harshly criticize his new opponent at first.

Trump infamously kicked off his campaign by saying immigrants crossing the U.S.-Mexico border were "rapists" bringing drugs and crime to America. But Paul didn't slam Trump for his comments, instead telling reporters he had to stick to his message and "not be distracted by others."

Paul, 57, switched tactics quickly.

In August 2015, he criticized Trump during the GOP primary's first debate and issued a statement calling Trump a "fake conservative" whose comments are "all blather, non sequitur and self-aggrandizing bombast."

"What do you do to a bully? You stand up to him," Paul said. "That's what I did on the debate stage, and I was the only one."

At the next debate, Paul went after Trump again.

"Do we want someone with that kind of character, that kind of careless language to be negotiating with (Russian President Vladimir) Putin, to be negotiating with Iran?" he asked.

Later that year, though, Trump's campaign barreled ahead while Paul's seemed stalled.

"Prediction: Rand Paul has been driven out of the race by my statements about him —he will announce soon," Trump tweeted.

But the Kentucky senator wasn't down for the count yet.

In January 2016, Paul popped up on Comedy Central, where he called Trump a "delusional narcissist and an orange-faced windbag."

The following month, Paul dropped out of the primary.

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Pivot to Hillary

After his presidential campaign ended, Paul focused on getting reelected to the Senate, a race he would win handily over then-Lexington Mayor Jim Gray.

He said he'd support whoever the GOP nominated and stuck to that promise when Trump clinched it that summer.

Instead of targeting Trump, he centered much of his public criticism on the Democrats' presidential nominee, Hillary Clinton. Paul also slammed Gray, and made comments linking him to Clinton and then-President Barack Obama.

He did, however, distance himself from some of Trump's incendiary comments.

After Trump suggested a judge's Mexican heritage would make him biased in a court case that concerned Trump University, Paul said, "I think it's important that we not vilify people based on their ethnicity." And he said he had no evidence America's elections were compromised despite Trump's claim that the election was being rigged.

When Trump faced the biggest crisis of his campaign — the revelation that he was recorded in 2005 bragging about sexually assaulting women — Paul called his comments "offensive and unacceptable."

But he did not call for Trump to quit the race, as some other Republicans did.

On election night, both men won their races, setting the stage for a new phase in their relationship.

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A budding friendship

Paul is known as a senator who isn't afraid to break with his party and go his own way.

Trump got a taste of that soon after he was inaugurated when Paul refused to support a Republican plan to overhaul the Affordable Care Act — a promise the new president made to voters.

"I feel sure that my friend @RandPaul will come along with the new and great health care program because he knows Obamacare is a disaster," Trump tweeted.

But Paul didn't budge, saying the proposed legislation didn't go far enough in dismantling the ACA. He even skipped Trump's March 2017 visit to Louisville for a rally, saying he had to get to Washington, D.C., to work on the coalition trying to defeat the bill.

The president didn't seem concerned.

"I happen to like Rand Paul," he told the crowd in Louisville. "I look forward to working with him, so we can get this bill passed in the House."

A few months later, Paul still was criticizing the proposal. He and Trump talked on the phone about it, and Paul later said he had indicated he was open to negotiation.

Soon afterward, Trump tweeted that Republicans should consider repealing the ACA first and replacing it later — an idea for which Paul had publicly advocated.

In the end, Congress didn't pass either the bill Paul opposed or Paul's own proposal to repeal the ACA without replacing it right away.

Later in 2017, Paul opposed a different GOP effort to ax parts of the ACA because he felt it left too much of the law in place. Trump called him out, tweeting that he's a friend but "a negative force when it comes to fixing healthcare."

In the meantime, though, Paul worked with Trump on an executive order to make association health plans more accessible. The duo unveiled it that fall.

Paul and Trump also kept in touch as Republicans worked on a major tax reform plan — another top priority for the president.

Paul wanted to make sure the proposal didn't increase taxes for middle-class Americans and told Trump as much.

"I talked to him on Monday and he was on Air Force One flying somewhere, and he said that he absolutely agreed with me ..." Paul said in October 2017. "He says he will not let it happen, and I'm going to try to be an ally in making sure it doesn't happen."

That same month, Paul and Trump went golfing together.

"The president never loses, didn't you know?" Paul told White House reporters. "He's a little better golfer than I am, admittedly, but we had a good time."

It seemed the recent rivals were becoming pals.

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'@RandPaul, you really get it!'

Paul began to come to Trump's defense more publicly and fiercely starting in 2018.

When the FBI raided the office of Trump's then-personal lawyer, Michael Cohen, in April 2018, Paul went after special prosecutor Robert Mueller, who was in the midst of investigating Russian interference in the 2016 election. (Cohen pleaded guilty to charges of tax evasion and other crimes.)

"The president's right, it's a witch hunt," Paul said on Fox News shortly after the raid.

Then, in July 2018, Trump met with Russian President Vladimir Putin and publicly appeared to accept Putin's assertion that Russia didn't interfere with the 2016 election.

Republicans and Democrats criticized Trump for ignoring the American intelligence community's determination that Russia did, in fact, interfere. But Paul was less critical and indicated that he thought partisan hatred for Trump was fueling much of the outcry.

"The big picture is that we should be engaged with Russia," he said on CNN. "It would be a mistake not to have open lines of communication with them."

Trump appreciated Paul's support.

"Thank you @RandPaul, you really get it!" he tweeted.

Darling, Paul's former senior communications director, said Trump's willingness to engage with leaders from countries like Russia and North Korea dovetails with the Kentucky senator's views.

“He’s always been in favor of diplomacy with nations that our government has traditionally shunned and not spoken to," Darling said of Paul.

In August 2018, Paul even traveled to Russia to meet prominent officials there — a trip that served to support Trump "in engaging around the world," a Paul spokesman said.

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Meanwhile, Trump and Paul seemed to be influencing each other on personnel issues.

When Trump nominated Mike Pompeo — who previously was confirmed as CIA director despite Paul's opposition — to become his next secretary of state, the senator fought it at first. But he changed his mind after Trump arranged for him to meet with Pompeo.

And Trump ended up following Paul's advice that he should revoke ex-CIA Director John Brennan's security clearance after he harshly criticized the president for his meeting with Putin. (Paul was a longtime critic of Brennan.)

However, Paul refused to vote to confirm Gina Haspel, a University of Louisville grad whom Trump nominated to succeed Pompeo as CIA director.

That difference of opinion didn't dispel Paul's support for Trump, though. He even feuded briefly with U.S. Rep. Liz Cheney, R-Wyo., over their differences on foreign policy and over who was more aligned with Trump.

He also supported Trump's controversial decision to pull troops out of northern Syria, which effectively gave Turkey the go-ahead to invade. Later, he unsuccessfully urged the president to reverse his decision to send troops to guard oil fields in Syria instead.

And after the president told four Democratic congresswomen of color, including Rep. Ilhan Omar, to "go back" to their ancestors' nations rather than criticize American policies, Paul offered to buy Omar a plane ticket to Somalia, her home country.

"I think she can look and maybe learn a little bit about the disaster that is Somalia," Paul said in an interview with Breitbart News, a conservative outlet.

Then came the impeachment saga.

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'This partisan abuse of power'

Paul became one of Trump's fiercest supporters in Congress after the U.S. House of Representatives launched an impeachment inquiry in September.

He denounced the House's effort repeatedly in interviews and defended the president against the allegations. His most controversial move centered on demanding the whistleblower's identity be revealed.

During a November political rally in Lexington that featured Trump, Paul said, "the whistleblower needs to come before Congress as a material witness. ... I say tonight to the media, do your job and print (their) name."

Once the House impeached Trump, Paul insisted the Senate must end the case quickly.

"The Senate will not continue this partisan abuse of power and should at once put an end to the charade," he announced.

Throughout the impeachment trial, Paul steadfastly supported Trump and lashed out at the president's former national security adviser, John Bolton, whom Democrats were clamoring to call to testify. Those calls intensified after The New York Times revealed details of Bolton's upcoming book that were related to the impeachment charges.

Paul, a longtime critic of Bolton's, called him a "disgruntled, angry man" and accused him of trying to use the attention he's getting to make money off his future book.

Paul also nabbed headlines after U.S. Supreme Court Justice John Roberts (who's presiding over the trial) refused to read a question aloud that Paul submitted, because it included the name of a person who may be the whistleblower.

Paul walked out on the proceedings and posted his uncensored question on Twitter instead.

Larry Sabato, director of the University of Virginia Center for Politics, said he thinks Paul's push to publicly identify the whistleblower is motivated by a personal interest in that issue, as opposed to simply being another way to show his support for Trump.

"There’s been kind of a mind-meld between Rand Paul and Donald Trump on that. They’re suspicious by nature," he said. "They found common cause in being very suspicious about the powers behind the scene."

Sabato said it's interesting that Paul has sidled up to Trump to the degree that he has but indicated the question of why that evolution happened may not matter that much.

"It’s like trying to peel back an onion on the motives that people have. It’s always layered," he said. "What’s important is what they do rather than analyzing the reasons why they do what they do."

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'There are more egregious examples'

Despite his fervent support for Trump on issues like impeachment, Paul has shown a continued willingness to split with the president on policy issues.

For example, he has called for the U.S. to end an arms deal it forged with Saudi Arabia's government, especially in light of the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi. The CIA concluded Saudi Arabia's crown prince ordered the murder, though he denied it.

Paul also voted to block the national emergency declaration Trump issued in 2019 to commandeer funding for the wall he's promised to build along the U.S.-Mexico border.

"I stand with President Trump on the need for a border wall," Paul said at the time. "But the Constitution clearly states that money cannot be spent unless Congress has passed a law to do so."

More recently, Paul aired his concerns about the potential fallout from an airstrike Trump ordered that killed Iranian military leader Qassem Soleimani, and he slammed a White House briefing senators received on the matter.

But he also praised Trump for signaling he would not pursue further military action against Iran. "The president shares my thoughts that the last thing we need is another ground war," he tweeted.

Paul may have become Trump's ally, but he hasn't fallen in line with him on everything, said Ilya Somin, a law professor at George Mason University who was on a panel of law professors that gave advice to Paul's 2016 presidential campaign.

However, Paul hasn't crossed Trump on matters such as impeachment that personally affect the president.

"I think part of what’s going on is he feels like on certain issues it’s more dangerous to oppose Trump than others," he said.

Earlier: Paul suggests John Bolton is trying to make money off impeachment trial

Somin also said Paul may be thinking of the political climate in Kentucky, where he'll be up for reelection in 2022.

"Kentucky is a very conservative, Republican state, so the GOP primary electorate in a place like Kentucky is likely to be much more pro-Trump in some ways than even Rand Paul has been," he said.

Somin, who's a libertarian, said it's "disappointing but not entirely surprising" that Paul has become a strong Trump supporter.

“And in his heart, I suspect he knows that what he said about Trump during the 2016 campaign is true, which is that the man is unethical and not fit to be president," he said.

But Somin pointed out that Paul is far from the only Republican in Congress who slammed Trump in 2016 but supports him now.

"There are more egregious examples like (U.S. Sen.) Lindsey Graham," he said. "A lot of these guys who are backing Trump now — if political circumstances change, they might be just as happy or at least just as willing to back some other kind of Republican if that seems like the road to political success."

Contact reporter Morgan Watkins at mwatkins@courierjournal.com and 502-582-4502 or follow her on Twitter @morganwatkins26. Support strong local journalism by subscribing today: subscribe.courier-journal.com.