Will Trump attend RNC's spring meeting in Florida? Committee to invite him as GOP remains cautious over 2024 polls
For the Republican Party, Donald Trump is still to be a forgotten man. The former president, who retreated to his luxury resort in Mar-a-Lago, Florida, on the morning of the inauguration day, hours before Joe Biden took oath as his successor, said before exiting that he will be back in some form after repeatedly claiming that the 2020 presidential election was not a fair one. Now, it has been reported that the Republican National Committee (RNC) is planning to send him an invite to its spring donor meeting in April.
Politico cited a source to report about the development on Thursday, January 28, and said the committee is also expected to welcome other potential candidates for the 2024 presidential election and GOP leaders to the event, which will be held in Palm Beach Resort, Florida, between April 9 and 11.
The former Republican president has remained absent from public view since he left the White House on January 20 and his supporters also miss him in the virtual world since Twitter and other major social media platforms banned him following the violence at the Capitol that he allegedly incited on January 6.
According to the Politico report, a spokesperson of the former president did not confirm whether Trump, who recently set up a former president’s office in Palm Beach, would attend the RNC meeting. His Mar-a-Lago resort is also located in Palm Beach.
Trump has not ruled out a rerun for the White House in 2024 although he is also careful of the fact that he will be approaching the 80s by that time and if elected, he will be the oldest to become the president, eclipsing the record held by the current incumbent Biden. The RNC though is also cautious about demonstrating neutrality over the invitation since Trump is no longer an incumbent president. It also invited the businessman-politician and other likely presidential candidates to its annual winter meeting earlier in January but Trump, who was still in office then, did not make an in-person appearance.
Republican Party trying to stay neutral
That the Republican Party has its concerns over automatically backing Trump in the 2024 primary race is also evident from other reports. RNC Chairperson Ronna McDaniel recently told the Associated Press that the party has to stay neutral while trying to convey its openness to the primary battle.
“I’m not telling anybody to run or not to run in 2024,” she said, adding: “That’s going to be up to those candidates going forward.” McDaniel, however, said she wants to see Trump playing a continuing role even if he is not a candidate. “What I really do want to see him do, though, is help us win back majorities in 2022,” she said.
The GOP has found itself deeply split over Trump and if it doesn’t automatically back the former president for the 2024 presidential election, it could face another serious challenge to retain trust of millions of the individual’s supporters. Matters would get worse if Trump forms a new party and his GOP supporters flock to that platform, leaving the red party in a serious spot of bother. McDaniel is currently faced with a challenge of holding together a Republican Party that looks increasingly fractious.
The Politico report said while the venue of the April donor meeting is yet to be finalized, informed sources say it will not be at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort.
The event generally draws major party donors and it needs to be seen how things shape up this year since the former president is still widely popular with GOP donors, despite the Capitol violence that saw him getting impeached by the Democratic-controlled Senate for the second time in 13 months. However, the majority of the Republicans in the Senate have voiced against pursuing the impeachment trial against him saying it is unconstitutional since he is no longer in the office.