Trump discusses Putin and airs election grievances as Republicans focus on midterm wins
- At the Conservative Political Action Conference’s annual meeting, the former US president was the strong favourite in a straw poll
- Trump on Saturday described Russian President Vladimir Putin as ‘smart’, adding: ‘But the real problem is our leaders are dumb. Dumb. So dumb’
Leading Republicans spent much of three days avoiding Donald Trump’s chief grievances or ignoring him altogether as they unified behind a midterm message designed to win back the voters the polarising former president alienated while in office.
That changed on Saturday night.
Facing thousands of cheering activists at the Conservative Political Action Conference’s annual meeting, Trump falsely blamed his 2020 election loss on widespread voter fraud, for which there is no evidence. And on Sunday, he was the strong favourite in a straw poll of those at the conference.
“Of course he’s smart,” Trump said in his remarks on Saturday, doubling down on praise of the Russian leader that many other Republicans have avoided after the invasion. “But the real problem is our leaders are dumb. Dumb. So dumb.”
While Trump expressed support for the Ukrainian people and called the country’s president, Volodymyr Zelensky, a “brave man,” he also noted his ties with other leading autocrats. He specifically pointed to his friendly relationships with Xi Jinping of China and North Korean leader Kim Jong-un.
Trump then left no doubt he is the most powerful voice in Republican politics by indicating he will run for president a third time in 2024. “We did it twice, and we’ll do it again,” Trump said. “We’re going to be doing it again, a third time.”
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Up until Trump’s appearance, lies about election fraud, the focus of last year’s conference, had been an afterthought among the top speakers. No one parroted Trump’s approving rhetoric toward Putin. And some leading Republicans did not even mention Trump’s name.
Instead, those most likely to seek the Republican Party’s 2024 presidential nomination not named Trump united behind an agenda that includes more parental control of schools, opposition to pandemic-related mandates and a fierce rejection of “woke” culture. The message from more than a half-dozen elected officials, delivered to thousands of mostly white activists at an event that usually celebrates far-right rhetoric, does not mean the party has turned its back on Trumpism.
Far from it. The former president was a frequent topic among some of the conference’s lower-profile speakers. T-shirts proclaiming “Trump won” were being sold in the hallways.
And in the straw poll of 2,574 conference attendees, Trump earned 59 per cent, followed by Florida Governor Ron DeSantis with 28 per cent. No one else had more than 2 per cent.
When asked for their preference should Trump not run in 2024, DeSantis earned 61 per cent with no one else earning more than 6 per cent of the vote. The straw poll only measured the opinion of those at the conference, not broader Republican sentiment.
Aside from Trump, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis was a crowd favourite throughout the four-day conference. Audience members applauded almost every time his name was referenced or his picture appeared on big screens.
Conference organiser Matt Schlapp said Trump remains a dominant force, but he does not have an absolute lock on the party’s base.
“No. 1 is, Does he run again? And it’s overwhelming that people want him to,” Schlapp said. “But there’s a diversity of opinion.”
And while Trump’s most controversial supporters were generally given lower-profile speaking slots over the four-day programme, they were not excluded. Congresswoman Majorie Taylor Greene appeared on a Saturday morning panel hours after being featured at a conference of pro-Trump white nationalists.
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Trump offered Taylor Greene a particularly warm shout-out during his speech as he ticked down the Republican officials in attendance.
“I refuse to shut up,” Taylor Greene said earlier in the day during a brief appearance as she railed against “Democrat communists.”
Despite Trump’s dominant place at the head of the Republican Party, other party leaders are increasingly optimistic they have found a forward-looking strategy to overcome pro-Trump extremism and expand the party’s appeal with control of Congress at stake in November.
It’s essentially the same playbook that Virginia’s Republican Governor Glenn Youngkin used last autumn when he won in the swing state by avoiding Trump and his biggest grievances, including the false notion that the 2020 presidential election was plagued by mass voter fraud.
“There are people that perhaps have never voted the same way any of you have in a presidential race and they’re really angry,” Florida Senator Marco Rubio said on Friday. “And that’s why I believe that for all the negative we’ve heard, the pendulum is swinging.”
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Some leading Republicans seemed intent at CPAC on not helping Democrats by embracing Trump.
Missouri Senator Josh Hawley, who tried to block the certification of Biden’s electoral victory after the January 6 Capitol attack, sidestepped a question about whether he would challenge Trump in a 2024 prospective match-up.
“I’ve said I’m not planning to run for president,” Hawley said. He also declined to say whether he wants Trump to run again in 2024: “I never give him advice, including on this.”
Hawley also said it was a mistake for Republicans like Trump to offer soft praise for Putin: “Putin is our enemy. Let’s be clear about that.”
DeSantis, who has also refused to rule out a 2024 presidential bid should Trump run, did not mention the former president in his 20-minute address, focusing instead on his resistance to mask and vaccine mandates.
Trump’s former secretary of state, Mike Pompeo, spoke about his work in the Trump administration, but he did not repeat his own recent flattering comments about Putin, in which he called the Russian leader “very capable” and said he has “enormous respect for him.”
South Dakota Governor Kristi Noem, considered a potential running mate for Trump in 2024, talked about the 2016 presidential election and the unsubstantiated allegations that Democrats in power “spied” on the Trump campaign. But she pivoted quickly to the future.
“We have some fantastic fighters, like President Donald Trump. But he’s not alone. The American people are on our side,” Noem said.
