"I've been really clear about this," Paul Ryan said. | Getty Ryan to POLITICO: 'I am not going to be the nominee' The speaker gives his most Sherman-esque statement on the matter yet.

Speaker Paul Ryan said in an interview there is "no situation" in which he will accept the Republican Party's presidential nomination this year, his firmest rejection of the fanciful notion that he'd be drafted during a contested GOP convention.

"I've been really clear about this," Ryan told POLITICO Wednesday. "If you want to be president, you should run for president. We should select our nominee from among the people who are running for president. Clear and simple. So no, I am not going to be the president. I am not going to be the nominee."


Ryan added, "I am not going to become the president through Cleveland."

The unwavering statement comes as the Republican Party begins to come to grips with the real prospect that Donald Trump will lead the GOP ticket in November. Former Speaker John Boehner and other party elders have floated Ryan as a consensus candidate if Trump fails to clinch the nomination on the first ballot.

Ryan was just as resolute that he would not run for speaker of the House when Boehner announced his resignation last year. Reminded of that in the interview, Ryan said, "It was a different situation. I'm already in Congress. That's a totally different situation."

Ryan has not endorsed a candidate, but he has spoken with all of the remaining GOP hopefuls about his policy agenda. He characterized those conversations as fruitful.

But Ryan has said he will support the eventual Republican nominee, even as he's criticized the frontrunner a few times in recent weeks. Asked about violent incidents at Trump’s rallies, the speaker said candidates should take responsibility for the tenor of their political events. He was equally critical of Trump’s proposal to bar Muslims from the U.S. and Trump’s apparent hesitance to distance himself from former KKK Grand Wizard David Duke.

"I am speaker of the House, so I am going to keep doing what I said I am going to do," Ryan told reporters Tuesday. "Which is when I see our principles being distorted, we are going to stand up in defense of our principles. Not just Republican principles, conservative principles, but American principles. At the same time, what can we control? We can control our agenda. That's what we're doing. With respect to who the nominee is going to be, that's going to be selected by the voters."

But GOP elders have been fanning the flames of a Ryan-as-white-knight scenario. Boehner has quietly been floating Ryan as the best alternative if the party doesn't settle on a nominee before Cleveland. During a question-and-answer session Wednesday at a business conference in Boca Raton, Florida, Boehner went public with the idea, saying he would support Ryan on a second ballot at the convention if it comes to that.

"If we don't have a nominee who can win on the first ballot, I'm for none of the above," Boehner said at the Futures Industry Association conference here. "They all had a chance to win. None of them won. So I'm for none of the above. I'm for Paul Ryan to be our nominee."

At the same event, Boehner referred to Ted Cruz “Lucifer,” roughly translated to the devil. Cruz has infuriated Boehner and other GOP leaders over the years, most acutely with his quixotic push in 2013 to defund Obamacare that led to a two-week government shutdown.

The ex-speaker said the 2016 nominating contest is “still Donald Trump’s race to win.”

“But with Rubio dropping out last night, the anti-Trump vote now is only going to be split between two people,” Boehner said, referring to Florida Sen. Marco Rubio, who exited the race after a disappointing finish in the Sunshine State.

“Cruz or [Ohio Gov. John} Kasich could win some of these states and I don’t think it’s fifty-fifty yet, but it’s close to fifty-fifty that we get to the convention without a nominee with a sufficient number of delegates to win on the first ballot,” Boehner added.

Patrick Temple-West contributed to this report from Boca Raton, Florida

