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- Former US President Donald Trump will give a speech at CPAC.
- He has hinted that another run for president.
- Trump remains popular in conservative politics.
Former US President Donald Trump is to deliver a speech later this month at a gathering of conservative politicians in Orlando, Florida, a source familiar with the plans said Saturday, his first extended public speech since leaving the White House. January 20.
The appearance is scheduled for Sunday, February 28, at the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC), one of the largest annual meetings of conservative politicians in the country.
READ | Trump sued for attack on Capitol under ‘Ku Klux Klan Act’
Trump will be “talking about the future of the Republican Party and the conservative movement,” the source told AFP.
He is also expected to challenge the “disastrous border and amnesty policies” of his successor, President Joe Biden, the source added.
Trump, who was indicted for an unprecedented second time for his role in fomenting the January 6 assault on the United States Capitol, nevertheless remains a powerful force in American politics.
Three-quarters of Republicans want Trump to play a prominent role in the party, according to a Quinnipiac University poll this week.
‘We have tremendous support’
Since reluctantly leaving the White House on January 20 and yielding to Biden, despite his constant but unfounded claims that the election had been stolen, Trump has largely kept to himself on his Mar- a-Lake in Florida.
Stripped of his Twitter megaphone, he called up friendly cable TV news shows this week after the death of conservative radio host Rush Limbaugh, musing on the far-right Newsmax channel about the possibility of a future political career.
“I won’t say it yet, but we have tremendous support. And I’m looking at the poll numbers that are going through the roof.”
“Let’s say someone is charged, usually their numbers would go down, they would go down like a dead balloon. But the numbers are very good, they are very high,” he said.
And perhaps in anticipation of what could happen at CPAC, Trump issued a statement Tuesday criticizing top Republican Senator Mitch McConnell, who had scathingly rebuked the former president despite voting to acquit him of inciting an insurrection.
“The Republican Party can never again be respected or strong with political ‘leaders’ like Senator Mitch McConnell at the helm,” Trump said in the statement.
“Mitch is a tough, sullen and serious political hacker, and if the Republican senators are going to stay with him, they will not win again.”
Biden, who is trying to steer the United States through the Covid-19 pandemic and an economic crisis, has tried to avoid talking about Trump, at one point calling him “the ex-guy.”
Lawmakers from his Democratic Party have introduced legislation to create a path to citizenship for 11 million undocumented immigrants, reversing Trump’s hardline policies.
A small number of asylum seekers, most of them Central Americans forced to wait in Mexico under Trump, have also begun crossing into the United States while their cases are processed.
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