Donald Trump's Recent Performance In The Polls May Come As A Surprise
The annual Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) was held in Orlando, Florida, over the weekend. While the rest of the world is focused on the current Russian invasion and military actions against Ukraine, CPAC's attendees were focused on the United States, and on the upcoming midterm in November — and eventual presidential election in 2024.
CPAC is a way the Republican Party and other conservatives "gauge the mood of grass-roots activists," explains the BBC. Many stars of the Republican Party appeared, speaking to attendees about topics the political party is focused on. Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, for example, boasted that his state has been a "citadel of freedom," safe from the "authoritarian h**lscape" the rest of the country has been facing, per MSNBC.
DeSantis claims the Covid-19 pandemic was used to create a "Faucian dystopia where people's freedoms are curtailed and their livelihoods are destroyed" and a "biomedical security state, ” MSNBC reports. DeSantis did not, however, acknowledge the war in Ukraine.
Other speakers, like Florida Congressman Matt Gaetz, brought up Ukraine is a way to question whether or not the United States should be getting involved in the war. According to the BBC, Gaetz argued the sanctions President Joe Biden has placed on Russia were the equivalent of "footing the bill" for Ukraine since he believes sanctions against Russia could negatively impact the American economy.
Donald Trump's recent poll performance is down from last year
Former President Donald Trump also spoke at CPAC amid the Ukraine crisis. As The New Republic reports, Trump has become a controversial figure within a party that has historically backed him because of the mounting legal pressure against him. In fact, is a possibility of "real indictments from Manhattan and Fulton Country, Georgia," which "may be a factor in 2024." As it is, the former president was unable to block his White House visitors logs from the January 6 committee investigating the events of the January 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol (via The New Republic).
Trump's legal trouble hasn't shaken his core supporters inside the Republican Party. According to PBS News Hour, the Republican Party is actually paying Trump's legal bills for the probe against the Trump Organization's finances being conducted by the New York attorney general and Manhattan district attorney.
There has been no official announcement about Donald Trump making another run for president in 2024. But that didn't stop CPAC from including him in one of the polls they conducted over their four-day conference. No one was surprised; Fox News reports CPAC has been a "Trump-fest" since he won the 2016 election.
No one was surprised, either, when Trump led the polls that included his name by a large margin. He won the poll with 59% of the vote — 10% less than he received at CPAC in 2021, per the New York Post. Florida Governor Ron DeSantis came in second with 31% of the vote and led a poll without Trump's name with 61% of the vote, per The Hill.