Former Rudy Staffer John Avlon: Last Few Days Have Not Been His ‘Finest Hour’

CAMEROTA: "Rudy Giuliani had said last week that he does not believe President Obama loves America. And he has just put out this clarification in the Wall Street Journal. Let me read a portion of it. 'I did not intend to question President Obama's motives or the content of his heart. My intended focus really was the effect his words and his actions have on the morale of the country and how that effect may damage his performance.' It sounds like Rudy Giuliani was not expecting any of the backlash that he's got. John?"

AVLON: "Well, he should have been. This op-ed in the Wall Street Journal is definitely the intent by Rudy to effectively walk back the comments, to try to clarify what he said. And what he said in that sentence essentially is he didn't mean to say that the president didn't love America. Rudy is saying that he didn't mean to question what's in his heart or his motives, but that's of course what that statement does and the initial doubling down I think compounded the problem. Look, Rudy was a great transformational mayor. I was proud to work for him but there is no question the last few days haven' been his finest hour and that's led to this attempt to clarify. Sometimes these play to the base comments made in private really don't reflect the best in us, they don't reflect the best in our politics or in ourselves and I think this is one of those cases."