MicroWaveTrump says he won't sign loyalty pledge required for first GOP debate
AutoTL;DRThis is the best summary I could come up with:
Former President Donald Trump on Wednesday said that he would not sign a loyalty pledge required by the Republican National Committee for participation in the first GOP debate this month.
During the interview, Trump also said he would announce next week whether he will participate in the Aug. 23 debate in Milwaukee, though a refusal to sign the loyalty pledge would make him ineligible under the RNC’s criteria.
The loyalty pledge also asks candidates to agree not to participate in any non-RNC sanctioned debate for the remainder of the election cycle.
Trump, Christie and Hutchinson are among at least eight candidates who appear to have met the donor and polling thresholds required to participate in the debates.
Former Vice President Mike Pence was the latest candidate to announce he had qualified for the debate, which will be hosted by Fox News.
NBC News reported in June that Trump was exploring potential counterprogramming during the first debate, according to people familiar with his deliberations.
I’m a bot and I’m open source!
hillbicksWow, so the shit show begins even before we had even one gop debate. Article states you can’t participate if you don’t sign the pledge to support the eventual nominee.
This is going to be really interesting…
BigFigCue rally where he claims “they unfairly banned me from participating”
Lol yeah right. He’ll be there anyway and won’t have signed it
And call the others weak for signing it.
Where does this leave somebody like Chris Christie, who wants to debate, but has also been fervently outspoken against Trump. There’s no way he would support Trump should he become the nominee. Perhaps he has to just fade away at that point.
They were all against him in 2016 too. Until they weren’t.
NewEnglandRedshirtThat photo of Ted Cruz phonebanking for Trump after Trump straight up insulted Cruz’s wife? That one photo was all I needed to know about the direction things were headed in for the Republicans.
I was thinking of Lindsay saying if they nominated Trump it would destroy the party and then turning into a hardcore trump sycophant.
But Cruz may be a better example.
I think they are both good examples. Cruz is the example I specifically think of, but that doesn’t make good bad!
IMO Graham is a better example because he still had a reputation of principles at the time, being friend with McCain and in general being outspoken.
Cruz never had any of that. Everybody hates Ted Cruz, even his close colleagues and family.
Leaves him taking a long walk off a short bridge
Thats the goal, be interesting.
Flying Squid
Jordan LundOf course not, he has no intention of debating. He’ll say the rules are unfair and people are being mean to him.
HairyblueChris Christie would destroy him in debates. And Chris really wants to make Trump look bad in front of everyone. AND Trump is scared of Chris.
Plus Trump knows he will only look bad if he goes to the debates. He likes to lie without people correcting him in real time.
Nobody “destroys” anyone in these things. They’re not debates, they are simultaneous stump speeches. They’re only if marginally more value that a YT video of “Sam Seder BLASTS Steven Crowder and DESTROYS his argument.” Debates aren’t debates anymore and we’re all the worse off for it.
And they will continue not being debates as long as the RNC and DNC continue running them.
He wouldn’t really though. Here’s how it would play out:
Chris Christie: (list of long horrible things Trump did)
Trump: “Why did you work for me then? Why didn’t you say anything? Why did you help with the Biden debates? If you felt that way and didn’t say anything, that’s a lack of courage and character.”
/jk We all know Trump would be like “squeal again you fat pig!”
Yeah we’ll never see him debate again, you could tell this years ago lol, thanks for pointing this out
This is great news IMO
He’ll run on his own Freedom Party ticket and we’ll get a 3-party election. Oh no, now the rightwing votes are split. Bummer!
ToriborMuch more likely at this point that he just wins the nomination. There is still time for that to change, but nothing that indicates that it will.
The GOP is in a terrible state
We all know they’re in Mississippi, but there are chapters in some good states, too.
kescusayAh, the ol’… Wait a minute, what site am I on?
The old lemmy swap-a-doodle.
Hello future people?
We’ve all been lemmboozled!
The US is in a terrible state. Mostly because of the GOP.
Right, there’s really no reason for Trump to participate in the debates anyway - he’s way far out in front, so it would only hurt him. Hell, this might even be an excuse to skip them without looking like he’s afraid to.
RivalarrivalTrump doesn’t believe he will win the nomination. If he believed he would win, there would be no problem with him signing the pledge. He believes the eventual nominee will be one of 3 or 4 people he despises and cannot support.
He’ll run on his own Freedom Party ticket and we’ll get a 3-party election. Oh no, now the rightwing votes are split. Bummer!
Republicans are too spineless. Realistically trump will threaten to run third party, and they will forgo the primaries and hand him the nomination.
Isn’t that a little unconstitutional? I know that hasn’t stopped them in the past, but just straight up cancelling a vote of the people is more blatantly fascist than I’d expect from even them.
The political parties are private organizations. They can do whatever they want with their nomination process.
Yeah in short even the democratic party notes that. When the DNC was sued under the accusation of rigging the primaries against Bernie Sanders. The case was thrown out for lack of standing. In short the DNC said “You are accusing us of rigging the primaries… but rigging the primaries isn’t a crime so there’s no reason to spend the time proving it one way or the other”.
Primaries aren’t in the constitution
It says that if there is a primary election, citizens cannot be refused the right to vote due to not paying taxes or a “poll tax”
It says nothing about when or if such an election should be held.
Nice bit of schadenfreude, since there’s no primary without Trump, and Trump is almost certain to lose in another general. In the immortal words of Lindsay Graham from 2016, “If we nominate Trump, we will get destroyed. And we will deserve it.”
XhieronHe is absolutely not certain to lose. If he runs on the GOP ticket, we have every reason to believe that it will be close, and wither it is or not, the GOP will lie, cheat, and resort to violence in order to win, disrupt the process, or, barring either, overthrow the government. The Biden slam dunk narrative is a GOP talking point designed to get needed Blue voters to stay home. The Republic is absolutely at stake, and that means everyone needs to take it seriously.
I disagree. The 2022 midterm was supposed to be their “red wave”, and it failed miserably. The most likely candidate to lose were MAGA republicans in that election, indicating that MAGA politics is no longer a winning platform. There’s also signs of cohesion in the democratic party to exploit the fracturing of the GOP, best seen in this legislative session from MN and MI. I’m not saying that it will be a slam dunk win, I’m saying that the odds of Trump winning are inarguably stacked against him. One failed election, other politicians on the same platform failing, multiple federal criminal prosecutions, a fractured GOP, McConnell and McCarthy pushing the party towards center, and a lot more factors point to Trump losing the election. Either way, this pledge will bite the GOP in the ass.
pelotronWell also remember that Republican state legislatures continued to gerrymander the shit out of their districts in 2020. The electoral map is different now than the last election.
I spy that midwest.social account, so I’m sure you heard about the Wisconsin supreme court election and how Protasiewicz won. That combined with the lawsuit for partisan gerrymandering is likely to lead to redistricting that will make the state more representative. The deep south states that are redistricting are trying to cement their power to prevent another Wisconsin from happening rather than tip the scale in their favor
Here in Kansas they submitted a district map from the twilight zone that survived litigation. It’s ridiculous.
Idk about you, but I’m pretty tired of the republic being at stake every four years. The peaceful transition of power has been the cornerstone of our democracy for 247 years. It is amazing that all it took to destroy it was one fat trust-fund baby.
A substantial fraction of their base is his cult now, and the Republicans know that they cannot win without his support. Ultimately they will bow to his will because the parts of the party which have not been utterly brainwashed realize that it is currently their only path to victory, no matter how distasteful that is.
I think to some degree, everyone is brainwashed. But holy shit, imagine being brainwashed by THIS GUY.
Doubtful, many repubs are probably sealed witnesses which would explain the speed with which everything is moving. That way they can in secret undermine trump and save face do they can give the nomination to someone who isn’t desantis or trump.
Doubtful, many repubs are probably sealed witnesses which would explain the speed with which everything is moving.
Are you referring to the trials? The best case scenario for Trump opponents is to delay them.
They know that if he is actually convicted, that will seal his nomination with the party’s base, who have a persecution complex and will have no problem at all voting for a felon (while driving to the polls with a “thin blue line” decal on the car, ignoring the irony).
Nope best case for his opponents is a split repub ticket with a convicted trump. If they win good great, they can try to pardon Trump and move on. If they lose they have an excuse and possible route to legal remedy and reelection.
Hear me out on this one…
Trump signs the pledge. Since the RNC is a private body they can technically choose anyone they want and choose someone not Trump. Trump sues them bringing the question of the RNC/DNC into play. Trump further runs independent causing the RNC to sue him to keep him off the ballots (again also putting the RNC/DNC into question). While things work their way in the courts, Republicans have a split ticket problem.
Split the vote. Please.
Why? It’s not like his word means jack shit. Just to screw with the RNC?
For news headlines where he’s being persecuted by the deep state again.
Trump is loyal to no one but himself. Even if he did sign it he would never honor it.
Yup! 100%
Honestly they should all refuse to sign it because the bastards should not agree to support the traitor Trump if he wins the nomination.
Trump believes he is going to lose the nomination. If he thought he was going to be the nominee, there wouldn’t be a problem signing the loyalty pledge. He believes the 3 or 4 other candidates he despises have a better chance at winning the nomination than he does.
My point is none of the other candidates should have agreed to sign it. It confirms they’ll support someone who tried to overthrow the government before they’ll vote Democrat.
And I’m not sure you’re right re: Trump’s motives. He wouldn’t agree to support the other candidates in 2016 either, and this time around I wouldn’t be surprised if he ran independent if he doesn’t get the nomination.
Trump’s motive is always narcissism. I don’t give a rat’s ass about his motives. I’m just amused at his belief. He has stated his concern that he could lose the nomination to someone he can’t support, and used the likelihood of his loss as his argument that he shouldn’t sign the pledge.
He didn’t think he was going to win in 2016. He lost in 2020. And he doesn’t think he’s going to win in 2024.