‘America’s Comeback Starts Right Now’: Trump Officially Announces Bid for 2024 Presidential Election
02:04 GMT 16.11.2022 (Updated: 04:10 GMT 16.11.2022)
© AP Photo / Ross D. Franklin
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For months, the former US president raised the idea of running in the 2024 presidential election, but steered to mostly toying with supporters on whether or not he would actually make his bid official.
Former US President Donald Trump officially submitted paperwork with the Federal Election Commission (FEC) late Tuesday, formally filing paperwork for his 2024 presidential campaign.
Trump's filing with the FEC came minutes before he addressed supporters at his Mar-a-Lago residence in Palm Beach, Florida, and publicly declared himself as a candidate for the 2024 race.
"My fellow citizens, America's comeback starts right now," Trump began in his opening remarks to supporters, later going on to refer to what he called a "movement" but failing to expand on his meaning. "There's never been anything to compete with what we have all done."
"Together we built the greatest economy in the history of the world, when the [COVID-19] virus hit our shores I took decisive action and saved lives and the US economy, and by October of the same year, America was roaring back with the number one fastest economic recovery ever recorded, how about that?" said Trump in a calm and steady voice, an unfamiliar articulation for the president who ran on a platform of "telling it like it is."
"China was paying billions and billions of dollars in taxes and tariffs," he continued. "No president had ever sought or received one dollar from China until I came along and we were getting hundreds of billions of dollars, many people think that because of this China played a pretty active role in the 2020 election, just saying, just saying."
"The world was at peace, America was prospering and our country was on track for an amazing future, because I made big promises to the American people, and unlike other presidents I kept my promises," claimed the former president.
"For million of Americans, the past two years under Joe Biden have been a time of pain, hardship, anxiety, and despair, as we speak inflation is the highest in over 50 years, gas prices have reached the highest levels in history, and expect them to go much higher, now that the strategic national reserves - which I filled up - have been virtually drained in order to keep gasoline prices lower just prior to the election."
Trump then took the opportunity to blame Biden's "open borders" at the US-Mexico border for the increase in fentanyl in the US, as well as throwing out accusations against lawmakers of not caring about nuclear weapons because they perceive climate change to be a greater threat.
"We are here tonight to declare that it does not have to be this way," Trump said to a room of applause. "Two years ago we were a great nation, and soon we will be a great nation again. The decline of America is being forced upon us by Biden and the radical left lunatics running our government right into the ground. This decline is not a fate we must accept."
Trump then gave his endorsement to Herschel Walker, the controversial Republican candidate who is running for a US Senate seat in Georgia.
"A fabulous human being who loves our country and will be a great United States senator, Herschel Walker, get out and vote for Herschel Walker," Trump said, calling Walker an "America first leader", in reference to candidates he has backed who have supported his lie that the 2020 election was stolen.
"In order to make America great and glorious again, I am tonight announcing my candidacy for president of the United States," Trump announced. "This will not be my campaign, this will be our campaign, all together. Because the only force strong enough to defeat the mass corruption we're up against is you, the American people."
Jaime Harrison, an attorney and politician and chairman of the Democratic National Committee responded to Trump's announcement, saying that it was just the "kickoff" to what will be a "messy Republican primary."
DNC statement from @harrisonjaime: "Today is just the kickoff to what will be a messy Republican primary with candidates competing to be the most extreme MAGA Republican in the race. The DNC will be ready for them all."
— Mike Memoli (@mikememoli) November 16, 2022
Trump's bid for presidency comes a day after the chairman of the House committee (tasked with investigating the January 6 attack on the Capitol) said that Trump may be held in contempt of Congress for failing to appear for a scheduled deposition. Trump also filed a lawsuit against the panel on Friday, in an effort to block their subpoena requesting him to testify and hand over documents related to the insurrection.
“That could be an option. And we’ll have to wait and see,” said Rep. Bennie Thompson (D-MS). “The first thing we’ll do is see how we address the lawsuit. At some point after that, we’ll decide the path forward.”
Trump's bid for presidency may not hold much weight at the moment. His former running mate, former Vice President Mike Pence, earlier said voters will have "better choices" than Trump when voting for their GOP candidate in 2024.
A recent poll also determined that 65% of voters said Trump should not run for president, while the former president has also received criticism from members of his own party for backing candidates with extreme policies because of their loyalty to him, despite their weak favorability among voters.
