CPAC: Nikki Haley calls out Republicans’ failure to win voters’ confidence – live

Steve Bannon just got off stage after an enthusiastic, 15-minute defense of Donald Trump that was the best received speech of the day.

Bannon, a former White House adviser who is appealing a federal prison sentence for ignoring a subpoena from the January 6 committee, won more applause than any speaker before him by singing the former president’s praises and attacking Fox News for ignoring Trump.

“Donald J. Trump, let me repeat, in a very volatile time in American history, it was four years of peace and prosperity,” he said, to loud applause, “You know why? He puts you in the room to make decisions.”

“And that’s why they hate him,” Bannon continued. “They don’t hate him because he’s Trump. They hate him because he represents you.”

He then attacked Fox News for not giving the former president enough coverage. “Note to Fox senior management: when Donald J. Trump talks it’s newsworthy,” Bannon declared.

“Maga, Maga, Maga. Remember, Murdoch, you deem Trump’s not going to be president, well we deem that you’re not going to have a network,” Bannon declared as he wrapped up his speech.

Conservatives at CPAC today heard from one Republican presidential contender, Nikki Haley, and another potential contender, Mike Pompeo. But the convention remains very much Donald Trump’s show.

“I’m still sticking with Trump,” said Gary Wolcott, a 69-year-old retiree from the Virginia suburbs near Washington DC. He acknowledged that Haley’s speech “was definitely impressive, and Pompeo’s, too”. But neither dissuaded him from the support he’s maintained for Trump since his first days as a candidate in 2015.

“I just believe he’s the person who is most for America, and he gave up a lot to run for president. He’s not a career politician, and I know he’s always going to try to do what he thinks is best for America,” Wolcott said.

Karen and Donald Ruthig’s sentiments were much the same.

“He gets things done,” Karen, 77, said of Trump. As for the other candidates, “Maybe they’re wanting to run for vice? I don’t know, but I don’t think they can make it as president.”

Her husband, Donald, called Pompeo’s speech “fabulous”, but Haley’s “predictable”. He didn’t think either could win. “I don’t think Nikki Haley is electable. I don’t think Mike Pompeo is electable, and I’m not even sure that Ron DeSantis is at this point,” he said, referring to the Florida governor who is seen as probably the second strongest contender to Trump among Republicans.

Donald, a 73 year old who was attending the convention along with his wife from Virginia’s rural eastern shore, worried that if the GOP nominates anyone but Trump, many voters will stay home. “Without Trump’s complete base, we haven’t got a prayer,” he said. “So while there may be some very good candidates in the field, the electability issue (makes) him front and center.”

As enduring as his support was for Trump, Wolcott called on the former president to change tactics as he navigates his second GOP primary.

“His liability is, he’s got to stop bashing Republicans. He needs to explain why he’s good, not why they’re bad. So long as he can do that he will easily win the presidency. I’m not sure he can do it,” he said.

The White House this afternoon decried Tennessee’s aggressive move to limit drag shows in the state.

The state’s Republican governor, Bill Lee, yesterday signed a bill passed by the legislature that restricts public drag show performances – the first state to do that this year, CNN reported.

The law limits “adult cabaret performances” on public property, defining such as a show “that features topless dancers, go-go dancers, exotic dancers, strippers, male or female impersonators who provide entertainment that appeals to a prurient interest, or similar entertainers.”

At the White House press briefing on Friday afternoon, White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said: “American people are focussed on so many issues..the economy..healthcare..safety in schools” and lamented Republicans’ targeting activities like drag shows as their priority instead.

“Going after drag shows, how is that going to help people’s lives?” she asked. KJP is the first out gay White House press secretary.

She added that these “ridiculous policies” are “dangerous. They vilify our fellow Americans at a time when LGBTQ Americans are facing heightened violence.”

Joe Biden has the backs of LGBTQ Americans, she noted, “and will continue to be there for the community.”

Earlier this month, famous Tennessee drag queens, including Eureka and Jaidynn Diore Fierce spoke up to Entertainment Weekly, with Eureka calling the bill “blatantly unconstitutional.”

They talked to a competitor on this season’s Ru Paul’s Drag Race, and now fellow Tennessean, Aura Mayari, who said she was deeply upset and saddened by the push and said the law was nothing more than “a mask used to hide discrimination toward the LGBTQ+ community and the desire to erase drag.”

This feels like the year when CPAC’s centre of gravity shifted from Fox News to Newsmax – more extreme, more fringey and less relevant.

Fox News personnel are thin on the ground as the network, embroiled in crisis over its part in pushing Donald Trump’s false claims of election fraud, tilts away from him towards rival Ron DeSantis.

Meanwhile Chris Ruddy, chief executive of Newsmax, was fawningly interviewed on stage by CPAC co-organiser Mercedes Schlapp. Adverts for Newsmax are running regularly on screens here.

CPAC is teeming with Trump loyalists. Donald Trump Jr, Steve Bannon, Mike Lindell and Sebastian Gorka are causing crowd congestion as the live stream and podcast loudly cluster outside the main ballroom.

Such scenes might symbolise how Trump has lost Fox News but dominates the likes of Newsmax, One America News Network and far right social media. Fox no longer carries his rallies live whereas those channels do – with smaller audiences.

It could be good news for DeSantis, a regular on Fox, as he seeks to command the Republican base and banish Trump to the margins.

Here are some more bits and pieces from Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene’s interaction with reporters at CPAC.

She called on everyone in the Republican party to support the eventual nominee for president in 2024 – something that former president Donald Trump seems unlikely to do.

But Greene confirmed that she is endorsing Trump, saying she talks to him “every week” and “I absolutely adore him”.

The Guardian asked: “Would you be his running mate?” Greene replied: “We haven’t really engaged. That’s up to President Trump who he chooses.”

Questioned about her message to former ambassador to the UN Nikki Haley and other potential candidates, she added: “Well, it’s nice that they’re running but they’re not going to win. President Trump is going to be the primary. I don’t know what they’re doing it for in the first place.”

And Greene said of Ron DeSantis: “I think he is a fantastic governor for the state of Florida and, at the snail’s pace things get done here in Washington, if I were Florida, I’d give him a third term and beg him to stay as governor.”

Rightwing congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene just held an impromptu question and answer session with a group of reporters at CPAC – who therefore paid little attention to Kimberly Guilfoyle’s speech from the nearby stage.

The Guardian asked the first couple of questions. Greene, an influential figure in the House of Representative, said: “I think the US should be pushing for peace in Ukraine instead of funding and continuing a war that seems to be escalating and putting the entire world at risk of world war three.”

The Republican from Georgia called for US funding to cease immediately. “Look, I voted for the resolution to support the Ukrainian people and against what Russia has done invading their country. But what the United States is doing is we are actually accelerating a war there and this war should be over.

“We should be promoting peace. Europe should have peace and the United States should do their part. Ukraine is not a Nato member nation and Joe Biden said in the beginning he would not defend Ukraine because they’re not a Nato member nation. It doesn’t make sense and the American people do not support it.”

Later Greene added that Biden is more interested in Ukraine’s border than America’s own or the victims of a toxic rail disaster in East Palestine, Ohio. She also floated an unfounded conspiracy theory that Biden’s son Hunter’s business dealings in Ukraine is likely underpinning the president’s motivations there.

“Does that play a role in Joe Biden’s commitment to Zelenskiy as if Zelinskiy and Ukraine is the 51st state of the United States of America?… Is that why we’re all going to be dragged into World War three? And I’m sorry, I’m not going on that train and most Americans – pretty much everyone I talk to – is not interested in that either.”

In the final days of the Trump administration, after he had lost the 2020 election, then-secretary of state Mike Pompeo declared that “there will be a smooth transition to a second Trump administration.”

Pompeo seems to have acknowledged reality in the years since, and stated the grim truth about the GOP’s recent election record in his speech at CPAC today. Here’s a clip:

He later appeared to throw some shade at his former boss:

Still no word yet from Pompeo on whether he plans to run for the GOP nomination next year.

At the Conservative Political Action Conference today, Republicans who are not Donald Trump are trying their best to convince the audience to give them a shot in 2024. Up first was his former UN ambassador Nikki Haley, who argued that the GOP’s struggle to win the popular vote in recent elections is a sign the party needs a change in leadership. And then she walked out of the speech venue to crowds of conservatives chanting “Trump! Trump! Trump!” That’s how it goes when you’re not on his side at a conference were Maga rules supreme. We’ll see if candidate Vivek Ramaswamy or Mike Pompeo, who hasn’t announced a run for president yet but is seen as a potential candidate, have better luck with the crowd.

Here’s a recap of the day’s events:

• A call to defund the police was a surprise applause line at CPAC.

• Rightwing congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene wants to make providing gender-affirming care to minors a felony.

• Democrats remain behind Joe Biden, if the statements of House lawmakers are any indication.

CPAC is a tough place for Republicans who are not on Donald Trump’s side.

Following her speech, Nikki Haley stepped outside the venue to greet conservative attendees – who made their preference for next year’s GOP presidential nomination clear, as this video from Bloomberg News shows:

The parade of speeches by former Trump officials continues with Mike Pompeo, who served as secretary of state from 2018 to 2021.

He’s thought to be considering a run for the White House next year, but hasn’t yet said one way or the other. Let’s hear what he has to say.

Nikki Haley has a tall order in overcoming the former president’s popularity among Republicans.

The latest polls have shown her support well below that of Trump’s. Here’s one from Yahoo News/YouGov, which shows Trump in the lead with 45% support, against Haley’s 4%.

Haley, who served as Trump’s ambassador to the United Nations, is surely aware of where she would end up if the Republican primary were held today. As she closed out her speech, she appealed to the audience to consider an alternative to the former president.

“We’ve lost the popular vote in seven of the last eight presidential elections. Our cause is right, but we have failed to win the confidence of a majority of Americans. That ends now. If you’re tired of losing, then put your trust in a new generation. And if you want to win – not just as a party, but as a country – then stand with me,” Haley said.

Nikki Haley is now on stage at CPAC, and started her stump speech off by reiterating her call for politicians over the age of 75 to take a mental competency test.

“When I launched my campaign, I said every politician over 75 years old should be required to take a mental competency test. Have you seen DC lately? We should start with Joe Biden – and we shouldn’t stop there,” she said. The last part seemed to stir a murmur of disapproval from the audience, considering that Donald Trump is 76, and would also be subject to one of these tests.

Many seats noticeably empty.

At their retreat in Baltimore this week, House Democrats voiced enthusiasm about Joe Biden‘s likely reelection campaign, with the president expected to formally announce his 2024 bid in the next several weeks.

“I think he will win. I think he’s our strongest candidate,” congressman Pete Aguilar, the House Democratic caucus chair, said Thursday at an event with Punchbowl News. Aguilar added, “I think that he can and should run, and he’s going to have the support of the House Democratic caucus.”

Even House progressives, who have previously clashed with Biden over policy concerns, appear to be rallying behind the president. Congresswoman Pramila Jayapal, chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, said Thursday that she hopes Biden will announce his reelection campaign sooner rather than later.

“Nobody is surprised that Biden was not my choice in the first election for the primary,” Jayapal said. “But the CPC and the President and his administration have formed an incredibly strong partnership.”

The mayor of a Maryland city has resigned after authorities arrested him on charges of possessing and distributing images of child sexual abuse, according to multiple reports.

Patrick Wojahn, 47, had been the mayor of College Park since 2015 and, before that, a member of the city council there for eight years when he was arrested Thursday. He had submitted his resignation later the previous night, as the local news outlet WBAL reported, but that did little to head off the scandal that his arrest ignited, drawing headlines nationally.

Charging documents cited by the local news station WTOP accused Wojahn of using an anonymous account to upload child abuse imagery to the mobile messaging application Kik in January. Kik officials then alerted the federal missing and exploited children center, which prompted police to subpoena internet service providers’ records that linked the uploads to Wojahn.

Local county investigators searched Wojahn’s home in February, and they seized cell phones, a tablet, a computer and a storage device before Thursday’s arrest.

Wojahn faces 40 counts of possessing child abuse imagery and 16 of distributing it.

College Park has a population of about 35,000 and is just northeast of Washington DC. Perhaps unsurprisingly, Wojahn’s arrest shocked the city’s residents.

Local resident Drake Allen said he feared the scandal showed that College Park was “headed in the wrong direction”.

“I don’t know if this is going to wake anybody up. It should, but it probably won’t,” Allen said, before describing how he wishes Wojahn’s successor is “just a regular mayor who does his job.”

On stage at CPAC now is Donald Trump Jr, who came bearing gifts.

“There’s a little surprise for all of you,” he told the audience. “Check under your seats. If there happens to be a gold chocolate bar underneath there … that’s a VIP ticket to my father’s reception tomorrow at CPAC,” the former president’s son said.

Wonder what Roald Dahl would think of that.