Trump opened up on the 2024 run, saying he’s ‘more committed’ than ever

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COLUMBIA, SC (AP) Former President Donald Trump kicked off his 2024 White House bid with stops Saturday in New Hampshire and South Carolina, events in early voting states that marked the first campaign appearances since when announcing his latest run more than two months ago.

Together we will complete the unfinished business of rebuilding America,” Trump said at an evening event in Columbia to introduce his South Carolina leadership team.

Trump and his allies hope that the events in states that have the most power to choose the nominee will offer a show of force behind the former president after a sluggish start to his campaign that left with many questioning his commitment to running again.

They said, He’s not doing rallies, he’s not campaigning. He might have lost that step,” Trump said at the New Hampshire GOPs annual meeting in Salem, his first event.

But, he told the audience of party leaders, I’m angrier now and I’m more focused now than ever. In South Carolina, he even dismissed the speculation by saying that we have big rallies planned, bigger than ever.”

While Trump has spent the months since his announcement mostly at his Florida club and his nearby golf course, his aides insist they are busy behind the scenes. His campaign has opened a headquarters in Palm Beach, Florida, and is hiring staff. And in recent weeks, supporters have been reaching out to political operatives and elected officials to drum up support for Trump at a critical juncture when other Republicans are preparing their expected challenges.

In New Hampshire, Trump touted his campaign agenda, including immigration and crime, and said his policies would be the opposite of President Joe Biden’s. He cited the Democrats’ move to change the election calendar, which cost New Hampshire its primary seat, and accused Biden, a fifth-place finisher in New Hampshire in 2020, of “disgracefully trashing the beloved tradition political.

I hope you remember that during the general election, Trump told party members. Trump himself won the primary twice, but lost the state each time to the Democrats.

Later in South Carolina, Trump said he plans to keep the state’s presidential primary as the first in the South and called it a very important state.”

In his speech, he veered from criticizing Biden and Democrats to disparaging comments about transgender people, mocking people who promote the use of electric stoves and electric cars, and mentioning the efforts while serving as president to increase oil production, strike trade deals and crack. down on migration at the US-Mexico border.

While Trump remains the only declared 2024 presidential candidate, potential challengers, including Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, former Vice President Mike Pence and former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley, who has been Trump’s ambassador to the United Nations, is expected to kick off their campaigns. in the coming months.

After his speech in South Carolina, Trump told The Associated Press in an interview that it would be a great act of dishonesty if DeSantis opposed him in the primary and took credit for the gubernatorial primary.

If he runs, that’s fine. I’m at the polls, Trump said. He has to do what he wants to do, but he can run. I think it was a great act of betrayal because, you know, I let him in. He had no chance. His political life is over.

He said he hadn’t spoken to DeSantis in a long time.

Gov. Henry McMaster, US Sen. Lindsey Graham and several members of the state’s congressional delegation attended Trump’s event at the Statehouse.

Trump’s team has struggled to line up support from South Carolina lawmakers, even some who had eagerly backed him before. Some said more than a year from primary voting is too soon to endorse or they are waiting to see who else enters the race. Others say it’s time for the party to transition Trump to a new generation of leadership.

South Carolina House Speaker Murrell Smith was among the legislative leaders awaiting Trump’s arrival, though he said he was there not to make a formal endorsement but to welcome the former president to the state in his role as speaker.

Otherwise, dozens of supporters crowded the ceremonial lobby between the State House and Senate, competing with reporters and camera crews for space between marble-topped tables and a life-sized bronze statue of former Vice President John C. Calhoun.

Dave Wilson, president of the conservative Christian nonprofit Palmetto Family, said some conservative voters may have concerns about Trump’s recent comments that Republicans who oppose abortion without exception have cost the party in the November elections.

It gives pause to some people within the conservative ranks of the Republican Party as to whether or not we need the process to work itself out,” said Wilson, whose group is hosting Pence for a speech in 2021. .

But Gerri McDaniel, who worked on Trumps 2016 campaign, rejected the idea that voters were ready to move on from the former president. Some in the media keep saying he is losing support. No, he’s not,” she said. Its only going to be greater than it was before because so many people are angry about what’s happening in Washington.

The event in South Carolina was in some ways off-brand for a one-time reality television star who usually favors large rallies and has tried to cultivate an outward image. Rallies are expensive, and Trump added new financial challenges when he decided to start his campaign in November earlier than many had encouraged. As a result, he is subject to strict fundraising regulations and is prevented from using his well-funded leadership political action committee to pay for such events, which can cost several million dollars.

Trump’s campaign, in its early stages, has already drawn controversy, especially when he had dinner with Holocaust-denying white nationalist Nick Fuentes and the rapper formerly known as Kanye West, who made a series of antisemitic comments. Trump has also been widely mocked for selling a series of digital trading cards depicting him as a superhero, a cowboy and an astronaut, among others.

He is the subject of a series of criminal investigations, including one into the discovery of hundreds of documents with classified markings at his Florida club and whether he obstructed justice by refusing to return them, as well also state and federal scrutiny of his efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 election, which he lost to Biden.

However, early polls show him as the favorite to win his party’s nomination.

The gun has been fired, and the campaign season has begun, said Stephen Stepanek, outgoing chairman of the New Hampshire Republican Party. Trump announced that Stepanek will serve as a senior adviser for his campaign in the state.

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Kinnard reported from Columbia, South Carolina, and Colvin from New York. Associated Press writer Michelle L. Price in New York contributed to this report.

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