What is Aleppo?

Libertarian candidate Gary Johnson: 'What is Aleppo?'

'I'm incredibly frustrated with myself,' Johnson says as his campaign tries to minimize the fallout.

By Louis Nelson and Daniel Strauss

Asked what he would do about the Syrian city of Aleppo, the region at the center of that nation’s civil war and refugee crisis, Libertarian presidential candidate Gary Johnson responded by asking, “what is Aleppo?”

“What would you do if you were elected about Aleppo?” MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” panelist Mike Barnicle asked the former New Mexico governor during an in-studio interview Thursday morning.

“And what is Aleppo?” Johnson responded.

“You’re kidding,” a stunned Barnicle replied, to which Johnson answered that he was not.

Barnicle explained to the Libertarian candidate that Aleppo is “the epicenter of the refugee crisis” in Syria, giving Johnson enough information to finally answer the question.

“Okay, Got it. Well, with regard to Syria, I do think that it’s a mess,” he said. “I think the only way that we deal with Syria is to join hands with Russia to diplomatically bring that at an end but when we’ve aligned ourselves with — when we have supported the opposition, the Free Syrian Army, the Free Syrian Army is also coupled with the Islamists, and then the fact that we're also supporting the Kurds and this is, it's just a mess. And this is the result of regime change that we end up supporting and, inevitably, these regime changes have led to a less safe world.”

Co-host Joe Scarborough followed up with Johnson, asking him if he really thinks “that foreign policy is so insignificant that somebody running for president of the United States shouldn’t even know what Aleppo is, where Aleppo is, why Aleppo is so important?”

“I do understand Aleppo and I understand the crisis that is going on. But when we involve ourselves militarily, when we involve ourselves in these humanitarian issues, issues, we end up with a situation that in most cases is not better, and in many cases ends up being worse,” Johnson replied. “And we find ourselves always, politicians are up against the wall, and ask what to do about these things, and this is why we end up committing military force in areas that, like I say, at the end of the day have an unintended consequence of making things worse.”

In an interview with Mark Halperin after his Morning Joe appearance, a flustered Johnson said, "I'm incredibly frustrated with myself,” as he went on to explain how he realizes he needs to get “smarter” on certain issues.

As many expressed dismay at Twitter at the gaffe, Johnson’s campaign tried to minimize the fallout. Asked about the comment, Joe Hunter, a spokesman for Johnson's campaign, said in an email that "it was a hiccup."

Johnson's campaign released a formal statement later Thursday morning where the Libertarian nominee said he "blanked."

"Yes, I understand the dynamics of the Syrian conflict — I talk about them every day. But hit with “What about Aleppo?”, I immediately was thinking about an acronym, not the Syrian conflict. I blanked. It happens, and it will happen again during the course of this campaign," Johnson said in the statement. "Can I name every city in Syria? No. Should I have identified Aleppo? Yes. Do I understand its significance? Yes."

House Speaker Paul Ryan, meanwhile, chalked the comment up to Johnson’s isolationist views on foreign policy. “Well he is an isolationist, Hugh," Ryan said an interview with Hugh Hewitt on Thursday morning. "Let’s give him the credit of the doubt on that.”

Johnson has ramped up his campaigning efforts in recent weeks, working to build enough national support to earn a spot on the general election debate stage alongside Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump. To do so, he must average 15 percent support among five national polls selected as criteria by the Commission on Presidential Debates. Despite newly deployed advertising and multiple TV appearances, Johnson appears to be short of the 15 percent threshold, polling at 8.6 percent according to the Real Clear Politics polling average.

He got a boost on Wednesday from Mitt Romney, a strident opponent of Donald Trump, who tweeted that Johnson should be included on the debate stage.

Ryan, in his interview with Hewitt, didn't go quite as far. “Oh, that’s a polling question. If he polls well enough, he should, but I don’t think he’s anywhere close to that polling threshold. What is the threshold? 15 percent or something like that?”