Donald Trump still has power Letting Republicans fight each other for his approval, and he enjoys it immensely.
The former president endorsed “Eric” in the Missouri primary, then watched two MAGA candidates named “Eric” vie to claim his endorsement, saying, “That’s a beautiful thing.” And I thought it was too strange.” Along with the thoughts of the former president.
On Monday, Trump wrote in a statement that “ERIC” had a “full and complete endorsement” in Missouri’s Senate Republican primary. He didn’t specify whether the nod was for Eric Greitens, the former governor of the scandal-plagued state, or for the state’s attorney general, Eric Schmidt. It was an absurd ending to a campaign that has been marked largely by both candidates doing their best to seek the affections of their former president. The days-long prelude to Trump’s “ERIC” declaration is that both Eric’s prominent supporters (including Donald Trump Jr.’s girlfriend and former Fox News host Kimberly Guilfoyle) It was marked by a ferocious duel to get on Gritens’ side. He listened to the former president and finally persuaded him to formally endorse one of his two men.
Neither candidate had Trump’s outright endorsement, but both did their best to claim semi-endorsement. actually got the heads-up that it had some kind of endorsement, even if it was late in the game. The lead time was very short, but the Greitens team made the most of it, according to people familiar with the matter and other sources familiar with the matter.
About two minutes before Trump’s office touted its “endorsement”, Team Graytens received a call informing them that the former president’s statement would not include his last name. “It didn’t matter. The campaign made a quick decision to just keep doing it,” says a second source. The campaign had prepared materials in advance, including social media posts, statements, fundraising emails and artwork, in case the Trump endorsement materialized on Monday night. They decided to use it all anyway and just waited, glued to their inbox and his Twitter timeline, waiting for the “approval” to go live. Internally, the idea, which was considered tactically savvy, launched an online blitzkrieg of Team Graytens, pivoting as quickly as possible from Trump’s statements coming in at the time to bring Team Schmidt into their possession. I wanted to beat it with a punch that claimed to be a thing. Especially “Eric”. The minutes of scrambling at Greitens 2022 so closely resembled a scene pulled from political satire that a source briefed on the matter said: rolling stone“Exactly so beep to exclude [a storyline] It may have been rejected like this beep A writer to be unrealistic.
Ultimately, as far as this stuff “works,” the plan for the Greitens campaign worked. By 6:39 p.m. ET on Monday, Greitens tweeted: Apparently catching up, he posted on Twitter, “Support — President Trump… take that fight to the Senate to save America!”
Both publicly and privately, Greitens happily and willfully ignored the fact that Trump didn’t actually elect him. In fact, both “ERIC” campaign chief advisors also saw the absurd and perverse humor of each candidate as they eagerly adopted their approach. And yet, of course, everyone accepted it, because … what else could Trump’s party do?”
“Just had a great phone call with President Trump and thank you for his support! We’ll be doing MAGA together,” Greitens tweeted less than an hour after his first tweet. Graytens told Trump, according to a source familiar with the news. Make sure everyone knows you endorsed the MAGA candidate. In return, former President Trump thanked Greitens and wished his “fighter” luck in Tuesday’s primary.
