John Bolton says he hadn’t realised how ‘bad’ Trump would be

US president’s ex-advisor explains why he voted for him in 2016, and would not again

Ex-national security advisor John Bolton has admitted that he could not believe Donald Trump’s administration would be “that bad”.

Mr Bolton’s comments came during an appearance on The Late Show on Tuesday night as his damning memoir on Mr Trump, The Room Where It Happened, hit bookstores.

“Having experienced 17 months of working with him I can’t in good conscience do that again and that’s why I’m not going to vote for him,” Mr Bolton told host Stephen Colbert, adding that he would not vote for Democratic challenger Joe Biden either.

“I couldn’t believe it was that bad”, he said. “I know other people say they saw it from the beginning”.

Mr Colbert retorted: "But you're an international negotiator, how could you be naive, you've dealt with the worst people in world."

To which Mr Bolton replied: “I thought surely they [Donald Trump] would want to learn about the complexities of arms control negotiations and that sort of thing. As I detail in the book, that turned out not to be true”.

The Late Show host also asked the ex-Trump insider what Republicans thought about the president’s re-election chances.

“I think many of them, in fairness to Trump, look at the comparison as I did in 2016 with Hilary Clinton”, said Mr Bolton. “[They] look at the comparison with Joe Biden”.

The president’s ex-advisor then explained that Republicans believed Mr Trump would be “subject to the pressure – especially these days – of the Left.”

“I brought that argument in 2016”, added Mr Bolton, whose book claims Mr Trump tried to convince Chinese President Xi Jinping to assist in his 2020 re-election bid with large agricultural products purchases.

“I am hard-pressed to identify any significant Trump decision during my tenure that wasn’t driven by re-election calculations,” wrote Mr Bolton.

The Late Show host, Mr Colbert, argued on Tuesday: “No, he’s going to be subject to the pressure of Vladimir Putin! And Xi Jinping! He’s a person willing to sell out the interest of the American people for his own re-election.”

“What could be worse in Hilary Clinton or Joe Biden’s philosophy then betraying your country to a hostile foreign leader?”, added the TV host.

Mr Bolton, who denies claims he will vote Democrat in November, said he voted for the president in 2016 because he believed “we at least have to try it out”.