PALM BEACH, Fla. — Former President Donald Trump on Tuesday announced his intent to run for the Republican presidential nomination.
According to The Associated Press, Trump officially launched his third campaign for the White House during a speech at his Mar-a-Lago club a week after the 2022 midterm elections.
“I am tonight announcing my candidacy for president of the United States,” Trump said, according to the AP.
The AP said that Trump is entering the race for the 2024 election at a time of “political vulnerability.” He was hoping to have launched it following GOP midterm victories along with the candidates he had backed, but many of those candidates lost their campaigns.
The announcement comes as he faces several continued investigations, including a probe of confidential government records seized from Mar-a-Lago after his presidency and a congressional investigation into his role in the Jan. 6, 2021, riot at the U.S. Capitol.
It was not immediately clear how Tuesday’s announcement might affect any of the investigations.
Considered an underdog in the 2016 presidential election, Trump beat out former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to become the nation’s 45th president. He served as head of the U.S. government from January 2017 until January 2021.
During his presidency, Trump pursued an “America First” trade policy and pushed to build a wall on the border between the U.S. and Mexico. He broke with long-standing presidential tradition when he met North Korean leader Kim Jong Un in 2018 and nominated three judges – Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh and Amy Coney Barrett – to serve on the Supreme Court.
He was impeached twice by the House of Representatives and acquitted both times by the Senate. In 2019, the House voted along party lines to impeach Trump after a whistleblower alleged that he tried to pressure Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy into announcing an investigation into Biden and his son, Hunter. In 2021, the House impeached Trump for incitement of insurrection following the Jan. 6 riot at the U.S. Capitol.
Trump had never held public office before his time in the White House. He was then best known as a New York businessman who founded the popular reality TV shows “The Apprentice” and “The Celebrity Apprentice.”
As of Tuesday, it was not immediately clear who else might declare a run for the Republican presidential nomination. Potential candidates include Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin, former Vice President Mike Pence and former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, Bloomberg News reported.
If chosen as the Republican nominee, Trump will likely face President Joe Biden in the presidential election. Biden has not formally announced his candidacy, though White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre in June confirmed his intent to appear on the ballot.
Biden won the 2020 presidential election with 81.2 million votes to Trump’s 74.2 million. The former president has repeatedly claimed that voter fraud cost him the race; however, several officials – including then-Attorney General William Barr – said no evidence was uncovered to suggest widespread fraud.
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