The conservative political network associated with billionaire Charles Koch won’t be backing former President Trump’s 2024 presidential bid, Axios reports.
It makes the Koch network the latest GOP megadonor to distance themselves from Trump.
A political advocacy group backed by Koch is preparing to get involved in the primaries for the 2024 U.S. Presidential elections, saying it wanted to back a candidate who could “lead the country forward”, a memo released on Sunday said.
The Americans for Prosperity Action is the leading political arm of the Koch network.
It comes as Trump is setting up his game plan for 2024, making himself seem like a dove among hawks.
Trump is settling on a simple foreign policy pitch in his second bid for the White House: Want World War 3? Vote for the other guy.
Over the past week, Trump has assailed President Joe Biden’s handling of Afghanistan. He has said he could end the almost year-long conflict in Ukraine within “24 hours,” but without any indication how, and suggested sending tanks to the country could spark a nuclear war. He has railed against China and called Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis a “globalist.”
The claims are a continuation of a posture Trump sought to project both as a candidate for president in 2016 and while in the White House — one occasionally contradicted by his record, POLITICO reports.
Trump’s renewed focus on international affairs comes as the Republican primary field is expected to get crowded. Potential challengers are likely to pitch their own foreign policies. That includes two former Trump lieutenants: former U.N. ambassador Nikki Haley and former secretary of State Mike Pompeo.
Emily Seidel, the CEO of AFP and a senior adviser to AFP Action, wrote in the Koch network email that the U.S. must move past the current political situation.
Seidel wrote that a “hard truth” facing the Republican Party is that it has been “nominating bad candidates who are advocating for things that go against core American principles.”
While the memo does not mention Trump by name, an official with AFP Action said that the group does not intend to support Trump.
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