Clinton: Trump is being 'played' by Vladimir Putin and Kim Jong Un

Russian President Vladimir Putin, President Donald Trump, Hillary Clinton. (Photos: Evan Vucci/AP, Dennis Van Tine/starmaxinc.com via AP)
Russian President Vladimir Putin, President Donald Trump, Hillary Clinton. (Photos: Evan Vucci/AP, Dennis Van Tine/starmaxinc.com via AP)

President Trump “has such a limited understanding of the world,” that he has opened himself up to be “played” by authoritarians like North Korean leader Kim Jong Un and Russian President Vladimir Putin, according to his former presidential rival Hillary Clinton.

“He admires authoritarians,” Clinton said in an interview with the New Yorker. “In fact, before this crisis with North Korea, he was praising Kim Jong Un. He clearly has a bromance toward Putin, whom he lauds as a great leader. He’s being played by the Putins and the Kim Jong Uns of the world.”

“I’m not even sure he’s aware of that,” she continued. “Because he has such a limited understanding of the world. Everything is in relation to how it makes him feel. And therefore he has little objective distance, which a leader must have. Making decisions in the Oval Office requires a level of dispassionate, reasoned analysis. We’ve seen no evidence he’s capable of that.”

Indeed, Trump has praised Kim as a “smart cookie” and said he would be “honored” to meet with the North Korean leader, though both of those comments came before the latest escalations in the country’s missile program. Of course, Trump’s affinity for Putin is well documented, despite, or perhaps because of, the Kremlin’s meddling in the 2016 presidential election.

Clinton was in asked in the interview to describe her former opponent “as a human being,” which she indulged with a scathing analysis.

Trump, she said, “is immature, with poor impulse control, unqualified for the position that he holds, reactive, not proactive, not strategic, either at home or on the world stage.

“And I think he is unpredictable, which, at the end of the description one can give of him, makes him dangerous,” Clinton added.

After losing the election, Clinton largely stepped away from the spotlight, but she’s recently made media appearances in conjunction with the release of her book “What Happened,” a memoir reflecting on the campaign.