Paul Ryan

JANESVILLE, Wis. —House Speaker Paul Ryan said Monday that if Donald Trump wants him to step down as a co-chairman of the GOP convention, he will respect his wishes.

“He’s the nominee. I’ll do whatever he wants with respect to the convention,” Ryan said when asked about that scenario in an interview with the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel.

Ryan said he hopes he and Trump can begin to get to know each other when they meet later this week.

“I just want to get to know the guy . we just don’t know each other,” said Ryan, who delivered a political bombshell last Thursday when he said he wasn’t ready yet to support his party’s presumptive nominee.

“I never said never. I just said (not) at this point. I wish I had more time to get to know him before this happened. We just didn’t,” he said.

Ryan said his comments last week were him simply speaking his mind. He dismissed the criticism from Trump supporter Sarah Palin that he has his eye on the White House in 2020.

“I would not have become speaker of the House if I had 2020 aspirations. If I really wanted to run for president, I could have run in 2012 and 2016. The speaker is not exactly a good steppingstone for president. I think people who know me know that is not my aspiration,” Ryan said.

Mitt Romney, the 2012 Republican presidential nominee who picked Ryan as his running mate, is being courted to reconsider jumping into this year’s presidential race as an independent candidate, according to some media reports.

But Ryan said Monday that he was vehemently opposed to a third-party or independent presidential bid this year by conservatives unhappy with Trump.