Tomorrow is the Washington, D.C. Republican Presidential Primary and for all his talk of wanting to “drain the swamp”, Trump is scared that he might lose the DC Primary.
Politico last night reported on Trump’s latest temper tantrum:
Donald Trump’s campaign wants Republican lobbyists in D.C. to know: If they don’t vote in this Sunday’s primary, they won’t get access should the former president end up back in the White House.
“If you don’t bother voting, don’t bother calling,” said one Trump campaign official, who was granted anonymity to speak about campaign strategy.
Bryan Lanza, a Washington, D.C.-based Republican lobbyist who served on Trump’s 2016 campaign and his White House transition team, said that “The Trump campaign is very cognizant of who makes up the GOP primary voters in DC.” He added, “The worst thing for them would be not showing up.”
The ultimatum constitutes a blunt threat toward the influence-peddling community, one that is highly unusual for a presidential campaign but fits the more publicly hardball model that Trump has often applied to governance.
Under D.C. law, campaigns are unable to know which candidates individual voters cast ballots for. But campaigns can access voter rolls from the District of Columbia’s Board of Elections to see who voted in the primary and who didn’t. A Trump campaign aide said they would be looking at the rolls when they were made available.
After reading this report our thoughts are that Trump and his campaign are clearly afraid of losing the DC primary, and that they don’t have nearly the confidence in themselves that they claim to have. So far Donald Trump has won every primary and caucus so far. However apparently Nikki Haley’s primary challenge has him more scared than he likes to let on. A Haley win in DC tomorrow could give her a boost leading into the Super Tuesday contests two days later.
Although it’s most likely at the moment at least that Trump will be the nominee, should she win a few primaries on Tuesday or keep it much closer than expected that will only continue to undermine Trump and grow the cadre of Republican voters who will not vote for Trump. Ambassador Haley had this to say about Trump’s latest outburst:
Do we seriously have a presidential candidate threatening retribution if people don’t vote for him? #SinkingShip https://t.co/CLDGMBaOHH
— Nikki Haley (@NikkiHaley) March 2, 2024
It also occurred to us another thing that could be upsetting the Donald is that Republican Senators Lisa Murkowski of Alaska and Susan Collins of Maine have both come out and endorsed Haley ahead of Super Tuesday. Since Trump cannot stand women standing up to him, it stands to reason that the man baby is so bent out of shape. Here’s to hoping that DC Republicans give the finger to Trump on Sunday!
On Tuesday we recommend keeping an eye on Vermont, Virginia, Massachusetts, Maine, Utah and Colorado. Some interesting things might be on the horizon.
