Former President Donald Trump has repeatedly said he is unlikely to participate in the first 2024 Republican presidential primary debate on Wednesday, August 23.
But Trump said he’d be watching on Fox News… and the 45th president said he will use the debate as a pseudo-contest to help him decide on his running mate.
“Let them debate so I can see who I MIGHT consider for Vice President!” Trump wrote on his Truth Social app.
“I haven’t totally made a decision. I like the debates. I might be here because of the debates. I might have won against Hillary with the debates and I might have gotten the nomination because of the debates,” Trump said about his pending decision.
He said that participating would increase viewership — which could help his rivals.
“But when you’re leading by 50 and 60 points against these people, and you have people at zero, and 1 and 2 — and then they’re going to be asking me hostile questions and they probably won’t have much of an audience if I’m not in the debates according to what I read.”
“If I’m not in the debates, then they’re not going to have a very big audience. It seems almost like it would be foolish to do them,” he said.
Trump defended his potential choice to skip the first debate in an interview with Breitbart on Wednesday.
Former President Ronald Reagan “didn’t do them. Other people didn’t do them,” Trump said, referring to Reagan’s decision to skip the first 1980 Republican primary debate hosted by The Des Moines Register.
Reagan’s decision backfired when then-Republican rival George H.W. Bush won Iowa after a standout performance.
Trump told Breitbart that Fox News Channel, which hosts the upcoming debate, is openly hostile towards his campaign.
“I don’t know that I should be doing it, to be up against a hostile network with hostile people that are polling at zero,” he said. ” I mean, they don’t have any votes … they’re at 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 [percent] maybe—and I’m in the 60s.”
“I see a poll the other day, I’m at 78 and you have people at zero,” Trump claimed about his fellow Republican Party candidates.
The 45th president repeated that while the debate may potentially backfire, he hadn’t made a final decision yet.
“I feel it’s sort of foolish to be doing it,” Trump said. “I think it could be stupid… it could be a stupid thing to do. But I have not made up a decision.”
“I don’t mind doing them. I like to do them—I enjoy them actually and I think they’re a good thing. But when you’re leading somebody by 50 or 60 points, I think doing it might be foolish,” he said.
But expect all the other candidates to make an appearance… and perhaps win the contest to be Trump’s running mate?
The Horn editorial team