Tom Tancredo: Rand Paul Needs to Walk a Delicate Balance

Rand Paul must walk a "very thin line" — pushing the conservative ideology Republicans want to hear, and contrary to his libertarian roots — as he seeks the GOP presidential nomination in 2016, former Rep. Tom Tancredo tells Newsmax TV.

"The fact is he is going to have to explain a lot of things," Tancredo, a five-term Colorado Republican, said Wednesday on "The Steve Malzberg Show."

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"He's going to have to walk a very thin line between wanting people to believe he is indeed tough on [the Islamic State, or ISIS] in terms of his foreign policy [and] that he's going to be an interventionist as opposed to noninterventionist, which has been his past … and on the other hand, what's he going to do about immigration."

Tancredo, a former GOP presidential candidate himself, said if Paul wants to win the Republican primaries, he'll juggle his libertarian tendencies in front of a Republican electorate, which doesn't want open borders.

"But he's a very smart guy and if any candidate can walk that line, it's probably him," Tancredo told Steve Malzberg.

But, Tancredo added, "I would bet the real Rand Paul is much more like his daddy [former Rep. Ron Paul of Texas] with whom I served than he is a changed man on the issues that are very important: foreign policy and immigration especially."

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