After more than five weeks without speaking in public, former US President Donald Trump hinted on Sunday (28) that he would attempt to return to the presidency in 2024.
“They [democratas] lost the White House in November. And who knows, who knows, maybe I will decide to defeat them for the third time ”, he declared in a closing speech at the meeting of the Cpac, acronym in English of the Conservative Political Action Conference in Orlando, in Florida.
The Republican has not given a public speech since leaving the White House for his resort town of Mar-a-Lago, Fla. On Jan. 20 – such an interruption had not occurred in five years.
Overcrowded, the event at the Hyatt has the potential to become another gathering of spreading coronavirus, with the crowd crowded and challenging the Orlando City Hall order to wear masks.
Banned from social media and starved for attention, Trump gave a speech in which, in his style, he violated the usual etiquette of former presidents of not criticizing predecessors.
He accused Joe Biden of being a disaster for the country in managing the economy and overturning the policies he implemented, on immigration and foreign policy. “We went from America first to America last,” Trump said.
According to him, Biden created a crisis of illegal immigration, especially of unaccompanied minors, accusing him of suspending security measures at the border.
The attacks on Biden were so long that Trump still appeared to be campaigning. He said the entire plan to fight the coronavirus pandemic was his own.
He ridiculed his predecessor for saying he couldn’t find a vaccine stock when he arrived at the White House. But he said Biden shouldn’t lie because he has no idea what’s going on, in a suggestion that Biden is senile – the Democrat is 78 and Trump is 74.
As he has done at rallies, Trump has spoken in detail on tangent issues that have nothing to do with the Conservative conference, such as women in sport. He has repeated the false story that won last November’s election more than once. The audience responded by shouting, “You won! You won!”
Although he has not officially declared himself a candidate, Trump has made it clear that he is not giving up on claiming the leadership of the Republican Party.
The former president stressed the importance of reclaiming majorities in the House and Senate, during the legislative elections of November 2022. He sent messages to dissident party members, such as MP Liz Cheney, third in charge of the party in the House, which voted impeachment and was not invited to speak to the Cpac.
But it was Trump who pushed Republicans to major defeats, losing a majority in the House in 2018 and the Senate in January, with the second round for two seats for senators in Georgia – in addition to not being able to reelect. .
The former president has vowed he will campaign for the candidates in 2022, but is using the upcoming election to take revenge on disgruntled people like Cheney by backing nominations to challenge the re-election of those who voted for his dismissal. .
Research confirms that devotion to Trump among Republicans is similar to that reserved for a cult leader. The problem is that the party, whose demographic composition was already shrinking over the years, suffered losses following the invasion of the Capitol, inflated precisely by Trump, on January 6.
At least 140,000 voters disconnected from the legend in the weeks following the episode, a number which may be higher as 19 of the 50 US states do not identify party membership of registered voters.
Trump has amassed a fortune of over $ 250 million raising funds to contest the presidential election tally. At the Cpac conference, voters polled on various channels said they were convinced Joe Biden had not won and that Trump would be the legitimate president.
No one doubts that Trump’s excuse for continuing to ask for money from small donors after the election is just a tricky trick for him to use the funds for his own benefit, such as travel, legal fees and other expenses permitted by porous US election law. .
The question is whether he will once again go back on the campaign financing promises of the candidates he supports in the States. The re-election campaign grew to nearly $ 1 billion (5.6 billion reais) through August 2020 and continued to slow, forced to cancel TV commercials and other spending until defeat .
The first president to treat the White House like a reality TV script made the most of his TV appearance.
He insisted on delaying the start of the speech, scheduled for mid-afternoon in Orlando, and increasing the suspense over his arrival. He spoke for 1.5 hours. Thus, it invaded the TV news program of open TV and had precious free space on the right cable channels. CNN and MSNBC did not broadcast the speech live.
Trump’s plan is to continue sucking oxygen into Republican territory and preventing the emergence of candidates for the 2024 election – the lineage of wannabes is long.
For now, even Senator Mitch McConnell, Washington’s most powerful Republican who hates the president, avoids pushing the jaguar with the short stick. Although he accused Trump of being responsible for the violence on Capitol Hill, he said he would support Donald Trump if he were the party’s candidate in 2024.
What he did not say is whether he supports the candidacy of the man who faces two criminal investigations, in addition to several other civilians, and who will be 78 years old in 2024.