Trump slams claims he is ‘not campaigning’ in first high-profile speech of 2024
At Donald Trump’s first high-profile campaign event in 2024, he sounded more like a politician than he did at any of his rallies in 2016 or 2020 — showing the ex-president may be ready to ‘play ball’ in his third presidential campaign .
He also said Joe Biden, who runs the country, makes it feel like April 1 every day.
While Trump resurrected some of his greatest hits during remarks at the New Hampshire Republican Party’s annual meeting on Saturday afternoon, he largely stuck to the script.
However, he made sure to reassure voters that he is still “angry” and still invested in winning and promised the rallies are coming “soon.”
“The rallies, which start very quickly, even if it is very early,” Trump said. “They almost force me into the rallies. “Why doesn’t he do the rallies two years earlier?”
Donald Trump defended himself against claims he was slow to start his campaign for president in 2024 at his first high-profile event with a speech in the first electoral state of New Hampshire
“But we’re going to do them soon. I think we need to do a big one here. Let’s do a big one. They love our rallies,” Trump said ahead of a future rally in New Hampshire.
Some strategists and politicians have pointed to the slow start to Trump’s campaign to support claims that he has lost the spark or drive for a second term in the White House — but the former president rebuked those claims.
“The fake news… said when I announced I just wanted to put my cards on the table. As you know, if you’re playing that very big game right now, the biggest game of all because the country and the survival of the United States of America is involved,” Trump told a group of New Hampshire Republicans. in Salem.
“But when I put the cards on it — and then I said, ‘Okay, let’s go.’ They said, ‘he’s not campaigning.’ This is about a month ago when I announced it. I said, well, you know, ‘I’ve got two years left.’
“They said, ‘he doesn’t hold rallies, he doesn’t campaign, maybe he lost that step.’ Well, I’m angrier and more committed now than ever before,” he insisted.
Speaking in the country’s first state election, Trump announced that outgoing New Hampshire GOP Chairman Stephen Stepanek will serve as senior adviser to his Granite State campaign.
With Stepanek on board, Trump says he actually has a chance to put New Hampshire in the red.
Trump also said that if he is not successful by 2024, “that will be the end” and the “Communists and Marxists” would have won and will now rule the United States.
Trump announced at the event that he is brining outgoing New Hampshire GOP Chairman Stephen Stepanek (right) as senior adviser to his Granite State campaign
“He’s going to help us make sure we win in the Granite State in 2024,” Trump said of Stepanek. “We stopped the communists, we stopped the Marxists, if we don’t stop them this time, I think that will be the end.”
“Everyone in this room shares one important mission: We are going to defeat Joe Biden and the radical Democrats,” the former president said. These are radical leftists. I think in many cases they are maxists and communists. I used to say that seldom, now I say that all the time.’
Trump spent a significant amount of time pointing out Biden’s failures, saying it makes him feel like every day is April 1st Joker’s Day.
Among the failures cited was the disastrous mishandling of the withdrawal of troops from Afghanistan, which was widely criticized. He also mentioned the Defund Police movement that led to massive crime spikes, as well as migrant policies that allowed drug smuggling and human trafficking to flood the border.
“We have people in the middle of the biggest crime wave in history who want to discourage the police. That’s April 1, right?’ Let’s defund the police.” You can’t even get your car — you go to New York, no one ever gets prosecuted,” Trump charged.
“I’m the only one they go after. It’s true,’ he said with a huge laugh. “No one is being prosecuted, they are going after me.”
Trump urged Americans to “be careful” with the “fragile” United States.
“It’s crazy — this is a crazy world we live in,” Trump said. “And we have to be very careful, because we have a very fragile country – this is a very fragile place.”