Talk about strange bedfellows.
Charles Koch — one-half of the petrochemical billionaire duo that orchestrates a vast network of conservative causes — told ABC News in an interview Sunday that the top Republican presidential frontrunners are so bad Hillary Clinton might make a better option.
Critical of the divisive rhetoric embraced by Republican candidates, Koch compared Donald Trump’s “monstrous” views on surveilling American Muslims to Nazi Germany, and called Ted Cruz’s promise to carpet-bomb ISIS “frightening.”
ABC News Chief White House correspondent Jonathan Karl asked the billionaire, “So is it possible another Clinton could be better than another Republican?”
“It’s possible,” Koch responded.
“You couldn’t see yourself supporting Hillary Clinton, could you?,” asked Karl.
“We would have to believe her actions would be quite different than her rhetoric, let me put it that way,” Koch said.
In the 2012 election, the Kochs’ army of groups spent over $400 million. While the Koch network had planned on spending $889 million this cycle, they may prefer to sit out the presidential race entirely if it’s a Trump-Clinton race. “I could see the network not participating in the presidential election at all,” one senior Koch official said.
For her part, Clinton has little interest in sharing headlines with the Kochs.
In January, while campaigning in Iowa, Clinton alleged that Republican politicians don’t believe in climate change because they “just have to do what the Koch brothers tell them.” Between 2002 and 2010, the duo spent nearly $120 million funding groups promoting climate change denial.
But in case her opinion of Charles Koch was unclear, Clinton responded to the interview on Twitter.
Not interested in endorsements from people who deny climate science and try to make it harder for people to vote. https://t.co/TWN4zYhMBh
— Hillary Clinton (@HillaryClinton) April 24, 2016
