Horse hockey. Name his sins that I supposedly make excuses for him. The majority of his "connections" were because he has money they wanted, and these "connections" were on both sides of the political aisle. In fact, he criticized members from both parties.
That's literally all you do here. Which is fine, as he needs many defending him going into the election. I'd stick with that, instead of trying to go on the attack against actual conservatives, on your own side, as that really just makes it questionable as to what you're defending in the first place.