Trump aides scrambled to stop him from announcing his presidential candidacy on the eve of the midterms and upending the elections, report says
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Trump wanted to announce a 2024 bid Monday, right before midterm voting, The Washington Post said.
Aides successfully persuaded him not to, fearing it would upend the election, the report said.
Trump is now expected to announce a 2024 bid on November 15.
Aides to former President Donald Trump persuaded him not to announce his 2024 presidential campaign on Monday, fearing it could upend the midterm elections, The Washington Post reported.
According to three people who spoke with The Post on condition of anonymity, Trump had touted the idea of formally announcing his bid for the 2024 presidency Monday night at a rally in Ohio for the GOP Senate candidate JD Vance.
The suggestion prompted a scramble by top Republicans and some Trump aides to stop any announcement, two of the sources told the publication. Other aides, it reported, wanted Trump to go ahead with it.
Top Republicans have long been concerned that if Trump announced before the midterm elections, it could distract from their attempts to make the election a referendum on President Joe Biden's performance and issues including inflation and education.
In the end, Trump held off making the announcement and instead dropped another massive hint he'd be running, saying at the rally that he'd make "a very big announcement" on November 15 at his Mar-a-Lago estate.
(Axios last week reported that Monday would be the date on which Trump would likely announce his candidacy.)
"We want nothing to detract from the importance of tomorrow," Trump said at the rally.
Trump, for months, has been gearing up for another bid for the presidency, backing a slew of ardent loyalists in the midterms who have pushed his baseless claims that victory was stolen from him in 2020.
He has dropped a series of increasingly strong hints in recent public appearances that a formal announcement is imminent.
Republicans are expected to make significant gains in the midterms, with the data website FiveThirtyEight heavily favoring the party to retake the House and slightly favoring it to retake the Senate.
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