Former national security adviser John Bolton is warning that the indictment of former President Donald Trump by a Manhattan grand jury could serve as “rocket fuel” for his 2024 campaign.
Bolton said that if Trump is acquitted, or the charges are dropped, it would greatly help his campaign, but also said if the former president is convicted it would not play well with voters, while speaking on CBS News’s Face the Nation.
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“If Trump is acquitted or he gets the case dismissed because it’s not legally sufficient or for whatever reason, that will be rocket fuel because he can say, I told you it was a political prosecution, I told you I was being picked on, and now I’ve been vindicated. If he’s convicted, however, at some point before the campaign ends, I think that will have a very different impact on people. You can say it’s a sleazy case, and it involves sleazy people,” Bolton said.
The former national security adviser under Trump also stated that Republicans can express concern for the indictment of Trump but should not make him the 2024 nominee because of the indictment.
“I think what the Republicans need to do to save the party, and frankly to save the country, is they can be as concerned about poor Donald Trump being mistreated by this prosecutor as they want, but the reward, the cure for that mistreatment is not to make Donald Trump the Republican presidential nominee. Those are two completely different subjects,” Bolton said.
Bolton, who has teased a presidential bid in the past, said he is still “considering” a run but also said the response to the indictment of within the GOP has “not been encouraging for the future of the party.”
“No, I’m still considering, and I have to say watching the response to the indictment has not been encouraging for the future of the party. Trump is a cancer on the Republican Party. We need his supporters. That’s absolutely true. Most of them have correct values.” Bolton said.
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While Bolton is teasing a potential run, he also says he could support someone other than Trump. He also argued that a Ronald Reagan approach to foreign policy would be more popular than Trump’s style of “isolationism.”
Trump is set to be arraigned in Manhattan on Tuesday, with the charges set to be unsealed after he is arraigned, per New York state law. The former president has maintained his innocence and has announced he will deliver a speech on Tuesday after the arraignment. He is the first former president to be criminally indicted.
