From the June 8 edition of CNN's At This Hour with Berman and Bolduan:
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KATE BOLDUAN (HOST): Matt, you have some interesting perspective on this. You sat down just yesterday in an in an interview with the top Republican in the Senate, [Majority Leader] Mitch McConnell [(R-KY)]. Before we get to that specific interview with Mitch McConnell, what do you make of where things stand right now with House Speaker Paul Ryan [(R-WI)]? The endorsement, his biting criticism of Donald Trump yesterday, and then saying in this closed door meeting with Republicans this morning, we need to unite, though it's unclear exactly how he was, what he was directing his members to do.
MATT LEWIS: Yeah. Look, there's no way around this. I mean, there's dissonance, there's inconsistency. It doesn't make a lot of sense. I think we can all appreciate that Paul Ryan is in a bind right now. Donald Trump has put a lot of Republicans in a very difficult spot. But I do think that Paul Ryan is going to have to make a choice. Does he want to be the conscience of conservatism? The guy who, if Donald Trump goes down and loses in five months, somebody is going to need to be the leader of a conservative movement in exile that can sort of reemerge in the post-Trump era. I fear that Paul Ryan has abdicated that role. And you can either be a good, loyal, partisan Republican soldier, or you can be the conscience of conservatism. Paul Ryan can't do both things.
