President Donald Trump’s campaign manager Brad Parscale outlined his re-election strategy in an interview with American Conservative Union president Matt Schlapp in front of a crowded Conservative Political Action Conference 2020 (CPAC) in Washington, D.C.
Parscale revealed that President Donald Trump’s re-election campaign had already dwarfed their 2016 efforts.
“The president was really smart,” Parscale said. “After the inauguration, Trump said that the fight didn’t stop that day – the fight was beginning. That’s the day when we put the pedal down for re-election.”
“In 2016, I said we were a plane flying that was being built in real-time. Some days we didn’t have windows, some days we didn’t have pilots,” he said. “But this time, I said to the president: Let’s build an entire fleet of planes before we even take off from the ground. And it’s operating better and more efficiently than any presidential campaign in history.”
Lara Trump, the president’s daughter-in-law who is working for the campaign, explained that part of that the re-election strategy was making in-roads with suburban women voters.
“In 2016, 25 percent of donations to the Trump campaign came from women. In 2019 and 2020, 50 percent are coming from the ladies,” she said. “We’ve got the women’s vote.”
Parscale said the campaign was launching a new volunteer initiative called “Army for Trump” next week.
“This week we’re launching ArmyForTrump.com. It’s time to get out there, get on the ground and become digital activists so we can fight,” he told a room filled with conservative activists.
“They’re going to cheat, trust me,” Parscale said about the Democratic Party. “They’ve been cheating in 2016, 2017, 2018, and 2019. They’re not going to wake up and decide to play fair in 2020.”
But Parscale said they were ready with a huge number of campaign volunteers.
“Let me give you some numbers that’ll make you feel really good. In 2016, we had 500,000 volunteers trained,” Parscale said. “In 2020, we’ll have 2 million.”
“There’s also a thing called a neighborhood team leader that increased turnout for the president by 15 percent,” he said. “In 2016, we had 3,000 of those in 2016.”
“We’re on pace for 90,000 in 2020.”
As the Democrats keep moving to the left, Parscale predicted more and more voters will flock to Trump.
That has put several states that Trump didn’t even compete in 2016 that will be in play in 2020, Parscale said – including Minnesota and New Mexico.
“America is going to wake up and say, ‘This isn’t what I believe in.’ Watch and see,” Parscale predicted.
“The President said that America will never be a socialist country,” Lara Trump reminded the crowd.
“The president said in 2016, ‘What do you have to lose by voting for me?’” she said. “Now, we’ve got everything to lose.”
Parscale also shared the size of Trump’s growing list – and how the campaign is bypassing the mainstream media and talking directly to the American people.
“Does anyone like data? I like data a little bit, if you’ve heard,” he said. “One thing that’s very interesting: If you listen to the president’s State of the Union speech, and listen by yourself, then listen to it through the media filter there’s a 50 percent decrease in approval.”
“It’s all about the handshake or the tear or stuff like that, but not about the actual speech,” Parscale said. “The media doesn’t show that. If they did, the president’s approval numbers will be even greater.”
The president’s 2020 re-election campaign is bigger by an order of magnitude than both his 2016 efforts — and dwarfs even former President Barack Obama’s campaigns in both 2008 and 2012.
“Even Obama, the size of his direct contact list was 18 million people,” Parscale said. “The president’s direct contact list by election day will be 50 million people, one of the largest direct contacts in the country.”
“What he does, and will continue to do, is talk directly to the people and be one of the most transparent presidents in history.”
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The Horn editorial team