(NewsNation) — Former President Donald Trump and his campaign for the 2024 GOP nomination started the week with some momentum after the Conservative Political Action Conference.
Trump headlined the CPAC event in Maryland over the weekend while his biggest competitor, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, skipped the gathering.
Trump also won the conference’s straw poll by a wide margin, getting 62 percent of the votes. DeSantis finished second with 20 percent, and former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley finished last with just 3 percent of the votes. She came in behind the relatively unknown Perry Johnson, a Michigan businessman who declared his candidacy at CPAC.
Republican strategist John Feehery told NewsNation the event showed a divide in the Republican Party between establishment Republicans and populist conservatives.
“There’s a lot of increasing skepticism about our really big investment in Ukraine when we should be investing in the United States,” Feehery said.
At CPAC, Trump promised to build his legacy, while avoiding direct attack against Republican challengers.
“From Trump’s perspective, if he can get, you know, divide the Republicans amongst themselves, then he can kind of easily win the nomination,” Feehery said.
The former president said he wanted to finish what he started, and he would continue his campaign even if he ends up getting indicted in one of the 2020 election probes he’s facing or in the classified documents investigation.
“No walls, no borders, bad elections. No voter ID,” Trump said in his speech of the current state of the country. “We will beat the Democrats, we will rout the fake news media. We will expose and appropriately deal with the RINOs. We will evict Joe Biden from the White House.”
DeSantis skipped CPAC this year, instead going on a book and fundraising tour. He spoke Sunday night at the Ronald Reagan library in California, where he took some jabs at California Gov. Gavin Newsom.
Like Trump, he avoided too many attacks on his fellow conservatives.
“A leader is not captive to polls. A leader will help shape and lead the public’s opinion. If they see you put out a vision, if they see you execute on that vision and produce good results, the people will follow,” DeSantis said.
One person who won’t be joining the race is former Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan, who announced he would not be running. Hogan said a crowded field could make it easier for Trump to win the nomination.
Feehery sees a challenge for Republicans as they try to woo conservative Trump supporters without alienating those in the middle.
“The thing I worry about, though, is independent voters really do not like Donald Trump, and they don’t like his threats to democracy, how they perceive the threats to democracy,” he said.
Haley also spoke at CPAC on Friday, as did former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, who is a potential challenger. They both made veiled critiques against Trump but did not call him out directly. They, and other GOP hopefuls, will have their work cut out for them as 95% of CPAC attendees who voted in the straw poll said they approved of Trump’s time as president.
