Former President Donald Trump plunged back into campaign mode Saturday to kick off his 2024 White House bid, stumping in New Hampshire and South Carolina where he slung insults at Florida governor Ron DeSantis.
The 76-year-old ex-commander in chief called a potential presidential run by his GOP rival a great act of disloyalty.
Trump also took credit for the 44-year-old DeSantis initial election, insisting his political life was over.
If he runs, thats fine. Im way up in the polls, Trump told The Associated Press after his South Carolina speech.
Hes going to have to do what he wants to do, but he may run. I do think it would be a great act of disloyalty because, you know, I got him in. He had no chance. His political life was over.
Appearing first in New Hampshire, Trump told the audience of Republican party leaders that he is more angry at the direction of the country now and more committed to taking back the top job than he ever was.
The former president also took aim at his successor, President Joe Biden.
What a pigsty that place was, right? he said of the garage whereclassified documents from Bidens vice presidency were foundthis month.
He needled Biden for themassive corruptionseen on Hunter Bidens laptopbefore a small crowd of 413 party officials at Salem High School in Salem during the state GOPs annual meeting.
We have a president whose sons laptop from hell exposesmassive corruption, Trump said in the 55-minute speech.
Do you think the father was upset? Trump asked in an aside. Whats on it,son? Every crime that youve ever committed, pop.
The former president said helaunched his third White House run to confront the colossal disasters that Joe Biden is leaving in his wake.
What theyre doing is poisoning our country,he said, citingsuch ills aslax border security, a wokemilitarythatcantfight orwin,and radical left-wing prosecutorswho refuse to put criminals in jail.
Im the only one they go after,he complained,citingtheFBI raid of Mar-a-Lagoand thetax-fraud chargesagainst the Trump Organization. Nobody gets prosecuted,they go after me.
At his second campaign appearance in Columbia, South Carolina, Trump was endorsed by some of the states top Republicans, including Gov. Henry McMaster and Sen. Lindsey Graham.
There are no Trump policies without Donald Trump, Graham said, taking a veiled shot at the GOP primary challengers waiting in the wings.
You can talk about his policies, but you cannot do what he did.
Trumps 40-minute speech focused not only on the border and the troubled economy, but on hot-button social issues as well.
Were going to stop the left-wing radical racists and perverts who are trying to indoctrinate our youth and were going to get their Marxist hands off of our children, he said, promising to cut federal funding to schools that push far-left content in the classroom.
He also pledged to defeat the cult of gender ideology, adding, Were not going to allow men to play in womens sports its ridiculous.
Since declaring in November his plans to run for a second non-consecutive term, Trump has stuck to video-released policy statements rather than his raucous trademark rallies to win back the loyalty of Republicans disillusioned by his bombastic style and his fixation on his 2020 loss to President Biden.
The campaign stops came two days after the respected Granite State poll found Trump trailing Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis by 12 points among New Hampshire Republicans even though the former president remains the GOPs only announced presidential candidate.
The poll, conducted by the University of New Hampshire, found DeSantis was the choice of 42% of likely GOP primary voters, with Trump at 30% a difference well outside the samples 5.2% margin of error.
The states first-in-the-nation primary status makes it crucial to Trumps nomination chances. But his popularity there crumbled during his presidency: he lost New Hampshire to Joe Biden by 7 points in 2020, after coming within a single point of beating Hillary Clinton there in 2016.
A host of big-name Republicans, including former veep Mike Pence, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, UN Ambassador Nikki Haley, and others are widely expected to challenge Trump for the GOP nomination although recent national polls show all of them in the single digits, far behind both DeSantis and Trump in a hypothetical 2024 presidential primary.
An Emerson College poll this week gave Trump a narrow 44% to 41% lead over Biden in a hypothetical 2024 election, while a Biden-DeSantis race would be a toss-up: 40% for the incumbent president, 39% for the Republican rival.
Continued here:
Donald Trump opens 2024 run in New Hampshire, South Carolina
- North Korea Wants to Convince the World It Can Nuke Hawaii. Donald Trump Is Happy to Oblige. - The Intercept [Last Updated On: May 3rd, 2017] [Originally Added On: May 3rd, 2017]
- Donald Trump's peculiar obsession with authoritarian leaders - Chicago Tribune [Last Updated On: May 3rd, 2017] [Originally Added On: May 3rd, 2017]
- Does Donald Trump Have Dementia? - The Root [Last Updated On: May 3rd, 2017] [Originally Added On: May 3rd, 2017]
- Donald Trump Has Been Lying About The Size Of His Penthouse - Forbes [Last Updated On: May 3rd, 2017] [Originally Added On: May 3rd, 2017]
- 'South Park' Creators Skirt Donald Trump Next Season Because Monkey Running Into Wall Can't Be Made Funnier - Deadline [Last Updated On: May 3rd, 2017] [Originally Added On: May 3rd, 2017]
- AFT President: Betsy DeVos and Donald Trump Are Dismantling Public Education - TIME [Last Updated On: May 3rd, 2017] [Originally Added On: May 3rd, 2017]
- This is the best news Donald Trump has had in a while - CNN [Last Updated On: May 3rd, 2017] [Originally Added On: May 3rd, 2017]
- Donald Trump Predicts Mideast Peace Is 'Not As Difficult As People Have Thought' - Huffington Post [Last Updated On: May 3rd, 2017] [Originally Added On: May 3rd, 2017]
- The Donald Trump Zone of Uncertainty shows up in the health-care debate - Washington Post [Last Updated On: May 3rd, 2017] [Originally Added On: May 3rd, 2017]
- Donald Trump - The New York Times [Last Updated On: May 3rd, 2017] [Originally Added On: May 3rd, 2017]
- Make America Great Again! | Donald J Trump for President [Last Updated On: May 3rd, 2017] [Originally Added On: May 3rd, 2017]
- Stephen Colbert Defends Donald Trump Jokes After Controversy Erupted - NBCNews.com [Last Updated On: May 4th, 2017] [Originally Added On: May 4th, 2017]
- Donald Trump May Have Exaggerated the Size of Something Else - Vanity Fair [Last Updated On: May 4th, 2017] [Originally Added On: May 4th, 2017]
- Amanda Knox: Donald Trump supported me when I was wrongly accused of murder. What do I owe him? - Los Angeles Times [Last Updated On: May 4th, 2017] [Originally Added On: May 4th, 2017]
- Donald Trump Says Peace in the Middle East Is 'Not as Difficult as People Have Thought' - Newsweek [Last Updated On: May 4th, 2017] [Originally Added On: May 4th, 2017]
- Donald Trump says he's a big fan of history. But he doesn't seem to trust historians. - Washington Post [Last Updated On: May 4th, 2017] [Originally Added On: May 4th, 2017]
- Donald Trump Deletes Tweet Calling Mahmoud Abbas Meeting 'an Honor' - Newsweek [Last Updated On: May 6th, 2017] [Originally Added On: May 6th, 2017]
- FCC to Investigate Stephen Colbert Over Controversial Donald Trump Joke - Variety [Last Updated On: May 6th, 2017] [Originally Added On: May 6th, 2017]
- How Trump won another unlikely victory - CNN [Last Updated On: May 6th, 2017] [Originally Added On: May 6th, 2017]
- Donald Trump's Tweets of the Week: Blasting North Korea, Shading the Democrats, Winning Bigly - Newsweek [Last Updated On: May 6th, 2017] [Originally Added On: May 6th, 2017]
- All Major TV Networks Block Trump's 'Fake News' Ad - Variety [Last Updated On: May 6th, 2017] [Originally Added On: May 6th, 2017]
- Martha Stewart Appears to Give Donald Trump the Middle Finger - Vanity Fair [Last Updated On: May 8th, 2017] [Originally Added On: May 8th, 2017]
- Outside Donald Trump's offices, pigs will fly - The indy100 (satire) [Last Updated On: May 8th, 2017] [Originally Added On: May 8th, 2017]
- President Trump seizes on election rules to push his agenda in new ways - USA TODAY [Last Updated On: May 8th, 2017] [Originally Added On: May 8th, 2017]
- Donald Trump finally gets a bill passed but his history of dealmaking is still full of failure - Salon [Last Updated On: May 8th, 2017] [Originally Added On: May 8th, 2017]
- Donald Trump's Star Gets the Toilet Treatment ... Wanna 'Take a Trump?' - TMZ.com [Last Updated On: May 8th, 2017] [Originally Added On: May 8th, 2017]
- Why Emmanuel Macron is the anti-Donald Trump - CNN [Last Updated On: May 8th, 2017] [Originally Added On: May 8th, 2017]
- Donald Trump's highly abnormal presidency: a running guide for May - VICE News [Last Updated On: May 8th, 2017] [Originally Added On: May 8th, 2017]
- Donald Trump Urges Senate Republicans to 'Not Let the American People Down' on Health Care - TIME [Last Updated On: May 8th, 2017] [Originally Added On: May 8th, 2017]
- Donald Trump wants to ramp up America's presence in Afghanistan - Salon [Last Updated On: May 9th, 2017] [Originally Added On: May 9th, 2017]
- Trevor Noah: Donald Trump Is 'Comedy Cocaine' - Variety [Last Updated On: May 9th, 2017] [Originally Added On: May 9th, 2017]
- Donald Trump says Congress has too much power. He's wrong. - USA TODAY [Last Updated On: May 9th, 2017] [Originally Added On: May 9th, 2017]
- Republicans abandon their virtues to stand behind Donald Trump and clap - Chicago Tribune [Last Updated On: May 9th, 2017] [Originally Added On: May 9th, 2017]
- Donald Trump's New Website Features Military Personnel, Tweets, Merchandise - Newsweek [Last Updated On: May 9th, 2017] [Originally Added On: May 9th, 2017]
- Donald Trump Can't Stop His Team from Undermining Him - GQ Magazine [Last Updated On: May 9th, 2017] [Originally Added On: May 9th, 2017]
- Pipelines and Donald Trump: British Columbia Goes to the Polls - New York Times [Last Updated On: May 9th, 2017] [Originally Added On: May 9th, 2017]
- Trump made one of his own tweets into a Twitter header. Cue the Twitter shade. - CNN [Last Updated On: May 9th, 2017] [Originally Added On: May 9th, 2017]
- Read Donald Trump's Interview With TIME on Being President - TIME [Last Updated On: May 11th, 2017] [Originally Added On: May 11th, 2017]
- Donald Trump Thinks He Invented a Phrase That's Been Around Since 1932 - Vanity Fair [Last Updated On: May 11th, 2017] [Originally Added On: May 11th, 2017]
- Donald Trump After Hours - TIME [Last Updated On: May 11th, 2017] [Originally Added On: May 11th, 2017]
- Donald Trump Is Launching a Panel to Investigate Voter Fraud - Fortune [Last Updated On: May 11th, 2017] [Originally Added On: May 11th, 2017]
- Donald Trump thinks he invented the phrase 'priming the pump.' That's telling. - CNN [Last Updated On: May 11th, 2017] [Originally Added On: May 11th, 2017]
- What Donald Trump doesn't understand about the federal government - Washington Post [Last Updated On: May 11th, 2017] [Originally Added On: May 11th, 2017]
- Donald Trump, 'Brexit,' Snapchat: Your Thursday Briefing - New York Times [Last Updated On: May 11th, 2017] [Originally Added On: May 11th, 2017]
- Donald Trump Backslides on Campaign Promise To Curb Legal Immigration - Breitbart News [Last Updated On: May 13th, 2017] [Originally Added On: May 13th, 2017]
- James Comey, Donald Trump, San Antonio Spurs: Your Friday ... - New York Times [Last Updated On: May 13th, 2017] [Originally Added On: May 13th, 2017]
- Donald Trump's Financial Ties to Russian Oligarchs and Mobsters Detailed In Explosive New Documentary from the ... - AlterNet [Last Updated On: May 13th, 2017] [Originally Added On: May 13th, 2017]
- WikiLeaks Offering $100000 For Donald Trump's 'Comey Tapes' - HuffPost [Last Updated On: May 13th, 2017] [Originally Added On: May 13th, 2017]
- Donald Trump's tax law firm has 'deep' ties to Russia - ABC News [Last Updated On: May 13th, 2017] [Originally Added On: May 13th, 2017]
- Is Donald Trump boosting the economy? Goldman finds mixed signals - MarketWatch [Last Updated On: May 13th, 2017] [Originally Added On: May 13th, 2017]
- Does Donald Trump want to be president? - Fox News [Last Updated On: May 13th, 2017] [Originally Added On: May 13th, 2017]
- Donald Trump la Mode - New York Times [Last Updated On: May 14th, 2017] [Originally Added On: May 14th, 2017]
- Yet another reason Donald Trump is bad news: He's utterly lacking in integrative complexity and that's dangerous - Salon [Last Updated On: May 14th, 2017] [Originally Added On: May 14th, 2017]
- Today Marks Trump's Twenty-First Visit to a Golf Club Since Becoming President - Vanity Fair [Last Updated On: May 14th, 2017] [Originally Added On: May 14th, 2017]
- Who Is Mary Anne Trump? Donald Trump's Immigrant Mother Came To America For A Better Life - Newsweek [Last Updated On: May 14th, 2017] [Originally Added On: May 14th, 2017]
- Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey supports Donald Trump's use of the social media platform - Los Angeles Times [Last Updated On: May 14th, 2017] [Originally Added On: May 14th, 2017]
- Donald Trump's Mother's Day proclamation is straight out of The Handmaid's Tale - Quartz [Last Updated On: May 14th, 2017] [Originally Added On: May 14th, 2017]
- See Alec Baldwin's Donald Trump Dismiss Nixon... - RollingStone.com [Last Updated On: May 14th, 2017] [Originally Added On: May 14th, 2017]
- Donald Trump Is Reportedly Considering Blowing Up the West Wing - Vanity Fair [Last Updated On: May 14th, 2017] [Originally Added On: May 14th, 2017]
- 'Our Institutions Are Under Assault' - HuffPost [Last Updated On: May 14th, 2017] [Originally Added On: May 14th, 2017]
- Donald Trump's disastrously bad week in Washington - CNN [Last Updated On: May 14th, 2017] [Originally Added On: May 14th, 2017]
- What Donald Trump said about the spread of classified material during the campaign - PolitiFact [Last Updated On: May 17th, 2017] [Originally Added On: May 17th, 2017]
- Donald Trump's plan to disenfranchise minority voters - The Hill (blog) [Last Updated On: May 17th, 2017] [Originally Added On: May 17th, 2017]
- Donald Trump, douard Philippe, Ransomware: Your Tuesday Briefing - New York Times [Last Updated On: May 17th, 2017] [Originally Added On: May 17th, 2017]
- Republican Congress won't rein in Donald Trump - USA TODAY [Last Updated On: May 17th, 2017] [Originally Added On: May 17th, 2017]
- Donald Trump Is a Stress Test for Democracy and We Are Failing - Slate Magazine [Last Updated On: May 17th, 2017] [Originally Added On: May 17th, 2017]
- Donald Trump, Ransomware, North Carolina: Your Tuesday Briefing - New York Times [Last Updated On: May 17th, 2017] [Originally Added On: May 17th, 2017]
- Donald Trump, Israel, Erdogan: Your Tuesday Evening Briefing - New York Times [Last Updated On: May 17th, 2017] [Originally Added On: May 17th, 2017]
- Can Donald Trump Be Trusted With State Secrets? - New York Times [Last Updated On: May 17th, 2017] [Originally Added On: May 17th, 2017]
- KING: Donald Trump has reached peak white privilege - New York Daily News [Last Updated On: May 18th, 2017] [Originally Added On: May 18th, 2017]
- How Trump learned about the special prosecutor - Politico [Last Updated On: May 18th, 2017] [Originally Added On: May 18th, 2017]
- Stephen Colbert Uses 'Let It Go' From 'Frozen' To Mock Donald Trump - HuffPost [Last Updated On: May 18th, 2017] [Originally Added On: May 18th, 2017]
- Donald Trump Said Saudi Arabia Was Behind 9/11. Now He's Going There on His First Foreign Trip. - The Intercept [Last Updated On: May 18th, 2017] [Originally Added On: May 18th, 2017]
- Chinese propagandists are using adorable kids to take on Donald Trump - Washington Post [Last Updated On: May 18th, 2017] [Originally Added On: May 18th, 2017]
- Donald Trump, Emmanuel Macron, Google: Your Thursday Briefing - New York Times [Last Updated On: May 18th, 2017] [Originally Added On: May 18th, 2017]
- Trump's Loyalty Test - TIME [Last Updated On: May 18th, 2017] [Originally Added On: May 18th, 2017]
- Donald Trump: Come out, come out, wherever you are - The Hill (blog) [Last Updated On: May 20th, 2017] [Originally Added On: May 20th, 2017]
- Donald Trump May Be Causing Problems For Disney World - HuffPost [Last Updated On: May 20th, 2017] [Originally Added On: May 20th, 2017]
- Don't underestimate Donald Trump - Chicago Tribune [Last Updated On: May 20th, 2017] [Originally Added On: May 20th, 2017]
- A Prayer for Donald Trump - New York Times [Last Updated On: May 20th, 2017] [Originally Added On: May 20th, 2017]