Former President Donald Trump is set to deliver his first address since leaving the White House on Sunday before the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC).
The address is slated to begin around 3:40 p.m. ET on Sunday, as he will cap the three-day conference, which has largely served as a long Trump rally.
Without Twitter and Facebook, Trump has been relegated to releasing statements and making occasional appearances on Fox News. Trump has been on Fox News in recent weeks to address the death of Rush Limbaugh and the car crash that injured Tiger Woods.
He has also released statements, mostly criticizing Republicans who supported his impeachment. In recent days, Trump has supported campaigns against Republican lawmakers who voted for impeachment.
He also released a scathing statement about Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell. While McConnell did not vote to impeach the president, McConnell suggested that the president can be held liable for the insurrection at the US Capitol on Jan. 6 that resulted in the deaths of five people, including a Capitol Police officer.
McConnell said, “Former President Trump’s actions preceding the riot were a disgraceful dereliction of duty.”
Trump responded on Feb. 16, "Mitch is a dour, sullen, and unsmiling political hack, and if Republican Senators are going to stay with him, they will not win again. He will never do what needs to be done, or what is right for our Country. Where necessary and appropriate, I will back primary rivals who espouse Making America Great Again and our policy of America First."
Despite McConnell’s strong statement condemning Trump, McConnell said this week in an interview with Fox News that he would support Trump as the GOP nominee in 2024.
During the first day of CPAC on Friday, speakers used their platform to blast Democrats and ostracize Republicans who supported Trump’s impeachment.
“Speaking of bombing the Middle East, have you seen Liz Cheney’s poll numbers?" said Donald Trump Jr. about the third-ranking Republican in the House, and one of 10 GOP representatives who voted to impeach Trump. "No listen, the one thing I’ll say for Liz Cheney is I’m sure she has a lot of bipartisan support, because if there’s one thing that she and Joe Biden definitely want to do, it’s bomb the Middle East."
Sen. Ted Cruz, who was caught up in controversy last week for going on vacation to Mexico while Texas was suffering from a major winter storm, seemed to have thrown his weight behind a Trump 2024 bid. Cruz came in second for the GOP nomination in 2016, and was largely seen as a frontrunner in 2024 if Trump had won reelection in 2020. Cruz also infamously held out endorsing Trump until closer to the election, which prompted boos from the Republican National Convention crowd when he told attendees to “vote your conscious.”
“They look at Donald J. Trump and they look at the millions and millions of people inspired, who went to battle fighting alongside President Trump and they are terrified,” Cruz said. “And they want him to go away. And let me tell you this right now, Donald J. Trump ain’t going anywhere.”
