Dozens of former Trump staff had call to figure out how to thwart Trump in 2022, 2024 – Business Insider

About three dozen former US officials who served under President Donald Trump jumped on a conference call this week to figure out how to thwart Trump's efforts in the 2022 and 2024 elections, according to CNN.

Jake Tapper reported on the call, which was said to have taken place last Monday and involved high-profile Trump officials including John Kelly, Trump's former chief of staff. Also on the call, per CNN, were the former White House staffers Alyssa Farah Griffin and Anthony Scaramucci, the former Department of Homeland Security official Elizabeth Neumann, and Chris Krebs, the former director of the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency.

CNN noted that the people associated with the call were known critics of Trump. Kelly has made several statements about Trump, saying the former president "doesn't know any history at all, even some of the basics on the US." He also said in August 2020 that informing Trump that the things he planned to do were illegal was like "French kissing a chainsaw."

Scaramucci, who held the role of White House communications director for less than two weeks, has broken with Trump and repeatedly feuded with the former president. Griffin, a former spokeswoman for Vice President Mike Pence who also served as Trump's communications director, was ridiculed by the president, who called her a "clown." She also commented in January that the Republican Party was "morally in disrepair" because of the GOP's failure to acknowledge the January 6 Capitol riot was a "big deal."

According to Tapper, Miles Taylor, a Trump official turned prominent Trump critic, helped lead the call and told CNN the participants were "overflowing with ideas" on how to stop Trump. Ideas, according to Tapper, included "shining a light" on the former president's financial backers and figuring out how to defeat Trump-endorsed candidates running in 2022 and 2024.

"We all agreed passionately that letters and statements don't mean anything," Taylor told CNN. "The two operative words are 'electoral effects.' How can we have tangible electoral effects against the extremist candidates that have been endorsed by Trump?"

Taylor is best known for anonymously writing a scathing 2018 New York Times op-ed article titled "I Am Part of the Resistance Inside the Trump Administration."

The Trump-era White House press secretary Stephanie Grisham was said to have missed the call because of a COVID-19 infection but told CNN she was still engaged with the group. Grisham signaled the group's plans earlier this month, saying on January 6 that the group planned to meet to talk about how they could "formally do some things to try and stop" Trump.

The group which has not released its name or published a list of members is among several GOP-linked organizations that have expressed opposition to Trump. In October, a Republican group called Republicans for Voting Rights put up several billboards across the US, including in Times Square, to remind the former president that he lost the 2020 election. The Lincoln Project, founded by current and former Republicans, also worked during the 2020 election to prevent Trump's reelection.

Trump has not yet announced a 2024 presidential run and said in November that he would "probably" wait until after the 2022 midterm elections to confirm his decision on a 2024 presidential bid.

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Dozens of former Trump staff had call to figure out how to thwart Trump in 2022, 2024 - Business Insider