Corey Check is “very confident” former President Donald Trump will win the 2024 Republican presidential primary race. “But it will be the toughest uphill battle,” said the 21-year-old Butler, Pennsylvania resident who donned Trump’s iconic “Make America Great Again” red hat while talking with the Washington Examiner.
He’s frustrated with the ever-increasing number of candidates who are challenging the former president to become the GOP‘s next standard-bearer.
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“The thing that’s hurting us the most is that the primary is split up between the establishment picks and Donald Trump. And the people that are showing up for political free food, like cabinet positions where they want to be the vice president, or they’re gonna run again in 2028, which is what some other people are gonna do,” said Check.
He’s among the thousands of conservative activists who have gathered at the Washington Hilton hotel in the nation’s capital over the weekend for the Faith and Freedom Coalition’s Road to Majority Policy Conference. He’s also one of the die-hard Trump supporters that all other 2024 hopefuls are attempting to persuade to abandon Trump and back them instead.
But the crowd of conservative activists saved their loudest approvals during the conference for moments when Trump was being feted, a sign that, despite Trump’s legal and political baggage, it will take Herculean efforts to unseat his throne over the Republican base.
The most notable example of Trump’s hold over the GOP came when former New Jersey Republican Gov. Chris Christie, a vocal anti-Trump presidential candidate, felt the ire of Trump’s supporters on Friday when he attacked the former president for being “unwilling to take any responsibility for any of the mistakes that were made.” The crowd booed and heckled Christie during his speech, with at least one person shouting “No!” as he lambasted Trump.
“You can boo all you want, but here’s the thing — our faith teaches us that people have to take responsibility for what they do. People have to stand up and take accountability for what they do,” Christie responded.
Will Jones was one of the attendees who unrepentantly booed Christie as he spoke. Jones, a 46-year-old Douglas County, Georgia resident, said Christie should show “decency” toward Trump for all the opportunities he was afforded
“I would have thought that if a person gave him that many opportunities and moved them around that many times to give them opportunities, that he would at least take the decency or dignity not to bash the one that was giving him the opportunities,” Jones told the Washington Examiner.
While Jones is interested in some of the other candidates who spoke, including long-shot 2024 hopeful Vivek Ramaswamy, he’s backing Trump.
“There are so many things that President Trump has done, and that has been great for our country. And a lot of them follow after what he’s doing,” Jones later added.
But Jones wasn’t the only attendee who liked what Ramaswamy had to say. Charles Vo, a 22-year-old political science major at the University of Washington, said he “related” to Ramaswamy as a child of immigrants. “Vivek was up there, and he was just a breath of fresh air compared to the candidates we’ve had in the past,” said Vo.
Although Vo remains undecided, he was also receptive to Gov. Ron DeSantis (R-FL), Trump’s closest competitor.
Some attendees of the conference believe DeSantis should have waited until 2028 to run for president.
Mayra Joli, a 57-year-old Miami, Florida resident, told the Washington Examiner now is not DeSantis’s moment. “Ron DeSantis can be close but no cigar,” said Joli, who wore a bright red “MAGA” hat and a “women for Trump” jewelry piece around her skirt. “Ron DeSantis is good for what we elected him to do: Governor of Florida. And he’s been doing great.”
“Ron DeSantis is the candidate that we need to save in the drawer for 2028,” she added. “In those four years, Gov. DeSantis can season himself and learn from the master. And that master is Donald Trump.”
Other candidates, such as former Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson and Sen. Tim Scott (R-SC), received polite responses from the crowd, who clapped when he hit on issues they approved of, such as their anti-abortion stances. But it was clear from the way the crowd roared when Lt. Gov. Mark Robinson (R-NC) endorsed Trump, or when they cheered other speakers who called Trump the next GOP standard-bearer, that the crowd was full of backers of the former president.
Even the latest candidate to enter the race, former Texas Republican representative Will Hurd, refrained from haranguing Trump, lest he becomes the next candidate who is booed on the stage. But when Hurd announced his campaign on Thursday, he specifically called out Trump. “If we nominate a lawless, selfish, failed politician like Donald Trump who lost the House, the Senate, and the White House, we all know Joe Biden will win again,” Hurd said in his announcement video.
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And the polls concur with what the crowd shows. Trump consistently leads all other challengers by double digits in national polls, proving he’s still king of the proverbial GOP hill.
One piece of advice Check has for the rest of the 2024 base is simple: “Just drop out, endorse Donald Trump, save the money for the primary, and put it toward the general.”
